Country Team Lead

Terms of Reference-Country Team Lead STOP Spillover Project

Position: Country Team Lead
Duty station: Vietnam One Health University Network (VOHUN) National Coordination Office, Hanoi University of Public Health
Accountable to: Regional Lead & Project Director
Program title: USAID Strategy to Prevent (STOP) Spillover
Contract type: Fixed term
Duration: This is a full time position, renewed yearly based on performance evaluation, and availability of funds.

Project description:

The USAID STOP Spillover program provides a critical opportunity to enhance global understanding of the complex drivers of viral spillover and to augment sustainable national capacities in surveillance, risk analysis, and behavior change. The project supports ten prioritized countries across Africa and Asia to gain critical knowledge about their Spillover Ecosystems, to refine and use that knowledge effectively, efficiently, and sustainably to reduce the risk of zoonotic viral spillover and spread.

This is a five year project from October 2020 to September 2025.

STOP Spillover is a USAID-funded project to anticipate and address threats posed by the emerging zoonotic diseases that pose the greatest risk of jumping from animals to humans. Tufts University, together with an international consortium of nine core partners that include South East Asia One Health University network (SEAOHUN), icddr,b-Bangladesh and Africa One Health University network (AFROHUN) and six core sub-award partners are working collaboratively utilizing diverse capabilities among consortium members and stakeholders to implement the STOP project in five countries in Africa and five countries in Asia over the next five years.

The consortium will support countries to build their capacity to assess, communicate and decrease risk of viral spillover and spread of zoonotic disease The consortium will work with USAID to develop and institutionalize innovative, country-specific, and
sustainable approaches so they are well-prepared to stop viral spillover from animals to humans and reduce amplification and spread of the virus among humans. STOP Spillover will focus on strengthening national capacity in a number of targeted countries to 1) understand the factors that contribute to the risk of spillover of pathogens from wildlife to humans; 2) develop, assess, and implement early risk-reduction interventions that will reduce the spillover and spread of these threats; and, 3) recognize and respond rapidly to zoonotic spillover events.

STOP Spillover’s approach centers around leveraging global-level Resource Hubs, made up of consortium partner staff and key short term technical advisors and consultants, to provide expertise, technical assistance, and support to a Country Team. The Country Team, composed of a full-time Country Team Lead and four part-time supporting members, will drive implementation of the project, ensuring that project activities are responsive and contextualized to the needs of Vietnam.

The position

This is a leadership position and is responsible for the programmatic, administrative and strategic management of STOP Spillover program in country i.e. formulating and implementing strategy, policy and managing the day-to-day operations of STOP Spillover program to achieve the objectives of the programs.

Tasks and responsibilities:

The country team lead will:

• Provide leadership to project implementation in country and contribute towards project leadership at the global level.
• Manage and coordinate all activities and provide oversight function for country level activities and the country team to effectively implement project activities according to the work plan and budget.
• Directly supervise country team members to effectively ensure quality and timeliness of programmatic reporting.
• Working with country teams develop workplans and oversee its implementation.
• Supervises activity implementation and ensure that stated goals and reporting requirements are met.
• Lead the recruitment and supervision of One Health-Design Research and Mentorship (OH-DReaM) teams, which will lead the design, implementation and validation of interventions designed to mitigate viral spillover and spread of zoonotic diseases
• Serve as a point of contact for in country internal and external stakeholders, as well as facilitate communication, networking and coordination with other partners.
• Liaise and build strong relationships with government and other collaborators/stakeholders to implement interventions designed for achieving goals and objectives of the program.
• Leads efforts to document lessons, showcase successes and ensure appropriate branding/visibility of the program.
• Perform management functions under the project, provide budget oversight and execute any other assigned tasks. Oversee overall budget, monitoring expenditure, and evaluating impact.
• Report to regional lead, and in-country institution/leadership of VOHUN and South East Asia One Health University Network (SEAOHUN)
• Collaboratively work with country leads from other STOP Spillover supported countries

Qualifications and requirements

• At a minimum, a Master’s Degree in a relevant field, including but not limited to Public Health, Epidemiology or Veterinary Medicine, Environmental Sciences, Nursing, and Biomedical sciences, biotechnology, agriculture, economics, social science environment project management, International development or any other relevant discipline, A PhD will be an added advantage.
• At least 5-10 years of in-country experience with supervising and managing projects with actors such as government partners, academia, international partners, funders, and/or private sector with direct leadership of professional and support staff, program/technical oversight, and project/grant management.
• Ability to speak the dominant national language.
• Good understanding of One Health concepts and expertise, as reflected as expertise in a discipline or several relevant areas: social and behavior change, surveillance, risk reduction and management, intervention implementation and mitigation of zoonotic disease amplification and spread, public health and ecosystem health.
• Excellent collaboration capabilities, e.g. capacity to work productively in teams, working in multi-cultural and multi-disciplinary settings.
• Experience working with government agencies, communities, intergovernmental agencies, academic institutions, international agencies in country (WHO, FAO, OIE, others) or NGOs.
• Excellent organizational, written, and verbal communication skills.
• Proven experience in managing donor funded projects especially USAID.
• Gender and cultural awareness and sensitivity.
• Experience within and across academic, public and private sectors
• Experience with planning and managing large, multi-actor public health programme interventions
• Proficient in relevant Microsoft Word, Excel, and Powerpoint programs, Comfort with social media.
• Willingness to travel locally and internationally

Disclaimers:

STOP Spillover does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, sex, language, religion, ethnicity, disability, age, sexual orientation and gender identity.

This organization is committed to the recruitment of a diverse, inclusive workforce, and thus, women and members of other underrepresented groups are strongly encouraged to apply

The salary for this position will depend on qualifications and experience and in line with projects funds.

How to apply:

Interested candidates are invited to send an application letter, a resume or curriculum vitae with names of 2 referees referencing “Country Team Lead” as the subject to [email protected] [1] and copy to Ms. Pham Thanh Ha, Administrative and Finance Officer, email: [email protected] [2] before 31 May 2021.