MEL Advisor (OSRA Project)

Pathfinder International is seeking a MEL Advisor for the newly USAID-funded
OSRA program. The OSRA program is five-year Pathfinder-led USAID-funded
project. The goal of the OSRA program is to improve family health outcomes by
reinforcing the national family planning and reproductive health (FP/RH)
program in partnership with the Ministry of Health and Population (MOHP). The
OSRA program will achieve this purpose through the three pivotal results: ‎1)
Women's and men's uptake and continuation of voluntary family planning
services increased; ‎2) Youth equipped with knowledge and skills necessary to
make healthy life choices; and ‎3) Gender dynamics improved for enhanced
voluntary family planning and reproductive health outcomes. The OSRA program
will closely collaborate with different local stakeholders and other
Government of Egypt (GOE) entities to attain its results.
Job Summary : The MEL Advisor will work closely with the MEL Team Lead to
provide technical expertise and leadership to generate and analyze quality
evidence and data through monitoring, assessments, and evaluations. This
includes participating in the design and implement of a robust MEL system in
line with OSRA MEL Plan and Learning Plans; conducting and supporting
evaluation studies (baseline, midterm and end line), designing/adapting
program monitoring tools, ensuring effective monitoring of program outputs and
outcomes.
Key Responsibilities
* Develop with the MEL Team Lead and implement an evidence and learning agenda for the program, securing buy-in from USAID and government stakeholders;
* Collaborate with the MEL Team Lead and technical staff to ensure data from the M&E and learning systems are used for adaptive management to ensure approaches are grounded in evidence and are used to improve program effectiveness, including the facilitation of routine reviews of programming to assess alignment to targets and indicators.
* Under the guidance and supervision of the MEL Team Lead, contribute on the development and implementation of a coherent and coordinated Research, Evaluation, and Learning Plan aimed at improving quality outcomes.
* Participate in the training and mentoring of leadership, training, and mentoring to develop M&E tools, methodologies, and data analysis to assess program progress and impact and feed into adaptive management.
* Develop systems to capture and use data and relevant information on program activities, participants, outputs, outcomes, and impact.
* Effectively rollout M&E data collection and reporting systems to all staff and partners through training, site visits, manuals, supportive supervision and other technical support as needed.
* Provide on-going leadership to maintain M&E systems; identify skill gaps and build capacity among the program team.
* Lead on the process to develop, use and monitor actions using quality benchmarks developed by technical advisors.
* Support all program reviews and evaluation activities, including coordinating baseline, mid-term and final evaluations, and supporting donor and external reviews.
* Contribute to high quality, accurate and timely reports for OSRA Program Management, program partners and donors as required with MEL data and analysis.
* Provide leadership in MEL community of practice to collaborate and share best practices with other USAID-funded programs.
* In collaboration with the CLA Advisor, use USAID's Collaboration, Learning and Adapting (CLA) framework and set of practices to help improve development effectiveness throughout the program life cycle, valuing and using all forms of knowledge - tacit, experiential, and contextual - for design and adaptive management.
* Contribute to the development of strategic learning products such as policy briefs, policy position papers, publications, and others that share innovation and key learnings with USAID and stakeholders.
* Prepare and submit electronic reports to USAID Development Experience Clearing House (DEC), and datasets including data dictionary and other related documents to USAID Development Data Library (DDL).
Required Qualifications
* Bachelor degree in public health, applied statistics, or related field is required, with a sound understanding of different research, evaluation, and monitoring methods relevant to FP/RH, Gender, Social Accountability, and SBC
* At least ‎5 years of experience in M&E related to integrated community-based programs in FP/RH, AY, Gender, and SBC
* Experience with USAID MEL standard requirements and processes.
* Advanced training in quantitative and qualitative methodologies, including database management.
* Strong analytical skills and an understanding of monitoring, evaluation and assessment tools to promote evidence-based learning.
* Knowledge and demonstrated experience of designing and managing research and evaluations.
* Experience in knowledge management, translational and organizational learning in order to help drive improvements in evidence appreciation and uptake, including experience presenting information in different formats for different audiences.
* Sound critical and strategic thinking and planning skills, including ability to think creatively and innovate and to set priorities, manage work plans and evaluate progress.
* Strong oral and written communication skills in English with a clear ability to produce and disseminate research and evaluation outputs to a variety of audiences.
* Willing and able to travel to support field teams and lead particular pieces of work.
* Skills in statistical applications (SPSS/STATA) and computer assisted qualitative data analysis applications (NVivo/Atlas ti.).
* Extensive experience in designing and managing MEL plans, MEL systems and frameworks especially for USAID-funded projects.
Important Notice:
* This position is based in Egypt
* Deadline for Submitting Applications: March 2nd, ‎2023
* Please ensure you provide an updated resume (CV) with your application
Additional Information:
* Pathfinder International is an equal opportunity employer committed to company diversity.
* This job description summarizes the main duties of the job. It neither prescribes nor restricts the exact tasks that may be assigned to carry out these duties. This document should not be construed in any way to represent a contract of employment.
* Pathfinder International reserves the right to review and revise this document at any time. Furthermore, the employee will review the Job Description annually with their supervisor/s to include additional or revised responsibilities and tasks as deemed necessary.
Pathfinder is committed to the safeguarding and protection of the people we
serve and our staff. We have zero tolerance for any type of behavior that
inflicts harm on children, young people, adults, our staff and partners
including sexual abuse, harassment, bullying, and exploitation. We do
everything possible to ensure that we recruit only those who are suitable to
work with for us and expect that everyone we hire will abide by our
safeguarding and related policies and will report any suspected or known
violations. This job is subject to a range of vetting checks as legally
permitted in the country where they are being hired. By submitting an
application, the job applicant acknowledges they understand our intent to
verify suitability to work with us.