Senior Immunization Officer at the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC)

Vacancy No:IFRC02983
Location: Abuja/Katsina
Duration:2 months
Category of Staff: National Staff
Grade: To be determined

Organizational Context

• The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies is the World’s largest volunteer-based humanitarian network. The Federation is a membership organization established by and comprised of its member National Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. Along with National Societies and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the Federation is part of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement.
• The overall aim of the IFRC is `to inspire, encourage, facilitate, and promote at all times all forms of humanitarian activities by National Societies with a view to preventing and alleviating human suffering and thereby contributing to the maintenance and promotion of human dignity and peace in the world`. It works to meet the needs and improve the lives of vulnerable people before, during and after disasters, health emergencies and other crises. 
• The Federation is served by a Secretariat based in Geneva, with regional and country offices throughout the world. The IFRC under its new vision for 2020 established its West Coast Cluster Office in Abuja to cover seven countries, namely Ghana, Togo, Nigeria, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Côte d'Ivoire and Benin. To strengthen its presence and ensure better integration and effective support to the National Societies, the work of the office is organised around the 3 pillars of health, disaster management and organisational development.
• The West Coast Cluster office in Abuja has different health programmes including strengthening routine immunisation systems, community surveillance of acute flaccid Paralysis, health emergency/disease preparedness, and health emergency response project.
• The Senior Immunisation Officer will be based in Abuja and support the health programmes activities in the Cluster, especially taking a lead on the immunisation portfolio.

Job Purpose

• Reporting to the Health and Care Delegate, the Senior Immunization Officer will lead the development and implementation of social mobilization and community surveillance of immunization activities implemented by the National Societies (NS) in the Cluster, especially in Nigeria.

The Senior Immunization Officer will:

• implement the work-plan as outlined in the project document on immunization in Nigeria, primarily funded through the CDC Corporative Agreement (CoAg)
• participate in key planning and technical meetings with the Ministry of Health and partners to represent IFRC and the host country NS on issues related to immunization
• develop and support immunization projects and activities in collaboration with partners including integration of immunization activities into community-based health programme.

Job Duties and Responsibilities
The Senior Immunization Officer is responsible for:

• Support the NS to improve the performance of immunization coverage in the country in collaboration with MoH, regional/global colleagues, especially in vaccine preventable diseases like measles, polio, meningitis, yellow fever.
• Contribute in providing specific technical support to ensure NS are able to effectively 1) support demand creation and social mobilization for routine immunization 2) improve the quality of supplemental immunization campaigns for measles, polio and other diseases 3) provide direct immunization service delivery in settings where government programs do not exist and security assessment indicate the NS can safely provide support.
• Compile and share evidence of what works, where and for whom, in strengthening immunization systems and campaigns, with an emphasis on innovation and scalable eHealth solutions.

Support of immunization during emergencies:

• Support NS capacity to assist government program for early detection and response to outbreaks of vaccine preventable diseases including measles, cholera, Ebola virus disease and meningitis.
• Ensure NS has capacity to conduct social mobilization and demand creation for routine immunization and supplemental immunization campaigns in complex settings.
• Support NS capacity to provide immunization services in settings where the national program is weak to deliver the service.
• Support CSO platforms to address the equity gap in immunization in priority countries.

Contribute to delivering quality in operations:

• Under the direction of the Health Delegate, ensure that tools, guidelines and projects are based on evidence, applicable international standards and follow a resilience based health approach.
• Ensure that immunization questions and challenges are addressed by operational research in partnership
• with different research institutions and other partners
• Ensure that behavioural change components and training are following good standards and are aligned to department wide approaches
• As part of quality enhancement programme, contribute to supporting National Societies to develop systems that allow a ‘seamless’ transition from health development to emergency response to recovery, build back better and accelerated development
• Perform knowledge extraction, analysis, documentation, validation codification and dissemination of results/lessons learned in the specific thematic area and ensure knowledge sharing and content management with both internal and external stakeholders
• Work with knowledge management and communications colleagues to share information, lessons learned and best practices.

Reporting:

• Be accountable to the Health Delegate by providing progress reports on results against objectives and risk analysis.
• Monitor the activities and budget utilization regularly and suggest reprogramming whenever required in the different immunization projects in the Cluster.
• Ensure budget needs are met and program activities are reported in a timely and efficient manner.
• Any other work assigned by the Health Delegate or Head of Country Cluster.

Job Requirements
Education:

• Master’s degree in Public Health, Medicine, or Health management or related discipline

Experience:

• Minimum of 5 years’ experience in health projects in large projects/programmes
• Experience working with international non- governmental organization, UN or bi-lateral agencies
• Proven evidence of writing report, case studies and M&E
• Experience of working with National Societies

Knowledge, Skills and Languages:

• Self-supporting in computers, especially Excel.
• Very good interpersonal, communication and presentation skills
• Motivated, self-started personality, sense of responsibility and organization skills
• Ability to multi-task, work under pressure, and prioritize workload in order to meet tight deadlines.
• Good negotiation skills, good judgment and maturity
• Good knowledge of the operational context and area
• Flexibility and ability to travel in the operation’s areas
• Fluent in written and spoken English
• Knowledge of French is preferred

Competencies and values:

• National Society relations
• Communication - Teamwork
• Professionalism - Integrity - Diversity
• Judgement-Decision-making
• Results focus and accountability