Breakthrough ACTION (BA) is a five-year cooperative agreement, funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to lead USAID’s social and behavior change programming around the world. Primed by the Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs (CCP), BA partners include Save the Children, Ideas42, ThinkAction, and Camber Collective.
The vision of the project is to ignite collective action using next generation behavior change approaches to empower households and communities to become healthier and more prosperous. While the work will harness the power of communication – from mass media campaigns to community outreach – to inspire long-lasting change, the project will also take advantage of other innovative approaches such as market science, behavioral economics and human-centered design to drive progress. Using these state-of-the-art, evidence-based tools, Breakthrough ACTION will have a global reach and will work in partnership with host governments to encourage people in developing countries to adopt healthy behaviors, from using modern contraceptive methods and sleeping under bed nets to being tested for HIV, and preventing the spread of zoonotic diseases.
Based in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, the DCOP will provide strategic leadership, general oversight and guidance on the implementation of the BA projects in Burkina Faso. In addition, the DCOP will play a regional advisory role for BA activities in Niger, Guinea, and any other West African country in coordination with the staff from each BA project.
In Burkina Faso and Niger, BA is implementing the Sahel RISE II project over four years to achieve improved health, family planning, and nutrition outcomes among populations in select regions of these countries. The resulting program will comprise an important element of RISE II, a new suite of USAID development and humanitarian assistance projects and activities to be managed collectively by USAID/Sahel, USAID/Food for Peace, USAID/West Africa, and the USAID field offices in Burkina Faso and Niger. RISE II will also include forthcoming health service delivery and development food security (DFSA) activities managed by USAID/Sahel and USAID/Food for Peace, respectively.
USAID/West Africa Regional seeks to invest in BA (referred to herein as West Africa Breakthrough ACTION, or WABA) over the next three years to support increased adoption of positive behaviors pertaining to family planning and reproductive health (FP/RH) among individuals in Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Niger and Togo. Breakthrough ACTION Guinea has a one year Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA) and a two-year Integrated Health (malaria, family planning, maternal and child health) projects, which aim to foster a culture of positive attitudes toward the health system and increase health-seeking behavior. The DCOP will also provide SBC technical support to this project in coordination with WABA staff in Burkina Faso and Niger and other BA staff in Guinea.
Strategic Project Management (25%)
- Provide strategic leadership and guidance on the implementation of the project in coordination with project staff in Burkina Faso, ;
- Provide support to the coordination between relevant Social and Behavioral Change (SBC) public and private sectors actors in Burkina Faso, including NGOs, multilateral agencies, media partners, research firms, local organizations, and the government;
- Provide SBC technical assistance to Niger and Guinea as per countries plans;
- Work closely with existing public and private networks and groups related to SBC in both countries to ensure strong integrated programing across BA’s projects in the three countries;
- Support reporting as required by USAID, CCP, and Save the Children on BA’s projects in Burkina Faso;
- Liaise with project staff, USAID Missions and partners to ensure coherence of the programme strategy and overall implementation;
- Represent BA with USAID mission in Burkina Faso and other partners.
Operations (25%)
- Oversee the project team to ensure smooth day-to-day running of field operations and ensure that project plans are clearly prioritized;
- Strategically identify capacity gaps and arrange for appropriate training of project team and partners to adequately equip them with the skills and knowledge required to accomplish their responsibilities;
- Responsible for overseeing the BA field office in Kaya to ensure adequate support in logistics, procurement, and administration to deliver the project effectively at a high standard.
Representation (20%)
- In coordination with relevant team members, establish, maintain, and improve active and regular working relationships with JHU-CCP as the consortium prime and representatives of other organizations and partners (UN, NGOs, INGOs, counterparts, donors, government authorities etc.) who are involved in the project.
Oversight of Project Management (15%)
- Support staff in ensuring that project activities are planned and supervised, risks identified and managed to ensure smooth implementation;
- Liaise with the Finance and Award Managers to ensure that accurate project expenditure reports are produced monthly;
- On at least a quarterly basis, review project budgets to ensure that project spend is on-track, budgets are re-phased and spent within donor budgets and expenditure guidelines, and no-cost extensions/cost extensions are requested in a timely way (if need be);
- Review and finalize project reports ensuring that donor guidelines are followed and high standards met, prior to submission;
- Ensure that key contributing staff have a clear understanding of donor requirements and expectations at the proposal, agreement, kick off, implementation, amendment, reporting, close out and audit stage;
- Ensure potential issues and amendment requests are flagged promptly to donors and project leadership;
- Ensure compliance with SC and project procedures and policies.
Human Resources (10%)
- Supervise project technical advisors and field program managers;
- Ensure appropriate staffing of the project, planning and implementing specific actions to recruit, manage and motivate project staff;
- Ensure appropriate gender and ethnic diversity within the project team;
- Ensure that project staff have clearly defined objectives and understand their responsibilities. Ensure compliance with staff development strategies and performance management systems and evaluations.
Reporting and learning (5%)
- Contribute to the project teams inputs on the monthly, quarterly & annual reports based on donor requirements and other reports as required;
- Document key project activities as they relate to learning and knowledge management.
- Minimum 5-7 years' experience in public health and Social and Behavioral Change, including community mobilization, capacity strengthening, mass and community programming, family planning, and malaria in Sub-Saharan Africa;
- Professional level of technical or managerial knowledge, skills, and experience to manage the operational activities of a unit or team, or provide the technical and management support related to various size projects;
- Demonstrated experience in design, plan, and implementation of SBC programs, including budget management;
- Strong working familiarity with USAID regulations and policies;
- Demonstrated experience with team building, negotiation, collaboration and coordination across multiple projects, local organizations, government, and private sector;
- A seasoned SBC project manager with at least 10 years of relevant experience, including at least two managing development programs in the field;
- Fluent oral and strong analytical, written English and French communications skills.
Preferred Qualifications
- General knowledge in health subject areas relevant to the project (MCH, family planning, nutrition, malaria);
- Experience in West Africa.