Job Description

Overview

The Clinton Health Access Initiative, Inc. (CHAI) is a global health organization committed to our mission of saving lives and reducing the burden of disease in low-and middle-income countries. We work at the invitation of governments to support them and the private sector to create and sustain high-quality health systems.

CHAI was founded in 2002 in response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic with the goal of dramatically reducing the price of life-saving drugs and increasing access to these medicines in the countries with the highest burden of the disease. Over the following two decades, CHAI has expanded its focus. Today, along with HIV, we work with our partners to prevent and treat infectious diseases such as COVID-19, malaria, tuberculosis, and hepatitis. Our work has also expanded into cancer, diabetes, hypertension, and other non-communicable diseases, and we work to accelerate the rollout of lifesaving vaccines, reduce maternal and child mortality, combat chronic malnutrition, and increase access to assistive technology. We are investing in horizontal approaches to strengthen health systems through programs in human resources for health, digital health, and health financing. With each new and innovative program, our strategy is grounded in maximizing sustainable impact at scale, ensuring that governments lead the solutions, that programs are designed to scale nationally, and learnings are shared globally.

At CHAI, our people are our greatest asset, and none of this work would be possible without their talent, time, dedication, and passion for our mission and values. We are a highly diverse team of enthusiastic individuals across 40 countries with a broad range of skill sets and life experiences. CHAI is deeply grounded in the countries we work in, with the majority of our staff based in program countries. Learn more about our exciting work: http://www.clintonhealthaccess.org.

CHAI is an Equal Opportunity Employer, and is committed to providing an environment of fairness, and mutual respect where all applicants have access to equal employment opportunities. CHAI values diversity and inclusion, and recognizes that our mission is best advanced by the leadership and contributions of people with diverse experience, backgrounds, and culture.

Program Overview

The World Health Organization projects a global shortfall of 11 million health workers by 2030, increasingly concentrated in the African region. This includes a shortage of nearly 900,000 midwives (Nove et al., 2021) and a similar gap in children's nurses, who make up only around 2% of the nursing workforce in several African countries, despite children comprising up to half the population (North et al., 2019). These shortages are closely linked to preventable maternal, newborn, and child deaths and high under-five mortality. WHO Afro modelling estimates that health workers required a $36.3 billion wage bill in 2022, against an available financing envelope of just $20.85 billion—a 43% workforce financing gap across the region's 47 countries. This constrained fiscal space is prompting governments and partners to rethink traditional workforce approaches, including how new technologies, such as AI-enabled tools for training, clinical decision support, and workflow efficiency, can extend the reach and impact of a limited workforce, while keeping health workers and human connection at the centre of care. In May 2026, African governments adopted the Accra Declaration at the Africa Health Workforce Investment Forum, committing to concrete action on planning, training, and retaining the continent's health workforce.

Against this backdrop, a multi-country health workforce initiative is being set up to strengthen the availability, quality, distribution, and retention of primary health care and maternal, newborn, and child health (MNCH) workers across the Africa region. The initiative will support government-led efforts to close these gaps — including shortages in nursing, midwifery, MNCH specialists, allied health cadres, and community health workers — that limit access to quality primary MNCH care.

The initiative will be informed by a country-led planning process, partnering with governments, training institutions, and implementing organizations to strengthen health workforce policy, planning, and financing systems; expand and improve training capacity; support the equitable distribution and retention of health workers; and address gaps in medical equipment and facility infrastructure that limit health worker effectiveness and retention.

A secretariat is being set up at CHAI Ghana to provide technical, programmatic, and financial management assistance to participating governments and partners, including workforce planning and training design, monitoring and evaluation, and alignment with the initiative's technical framework and country priorities.

Position Overview

The Evidence, Learning, and Information Systems Director is responsible for tracking the initiative’s progress against its goals and targets, and for coordinating the overall M&E approach across governments, the Secretariat, and academic/evaluation partners.

During inception, they will design an M&E system that tracks progress of the initiative, while also strengthening countries’ national data systems. During planning, they will advise on information system-related interventions at the country level needed to track progress. They will also ensure that all country-level plans include robust M&E plans mapped to initiative-level targets and indicators. During implementation, they will maintain a dashboard tracking progress against indicators and lead the Secretariat in data-driven course correction when necessary. They will also lead the initiative’s research agenda and learning processes, ensuring that insights from data and lessons from programming are disseminated and applied across the initiative as they emerge. During close-out, they will compile all data and prepare final reports. They will supervise one or more M&E officers – exact roles and team structure will be finalized following the co-creation of the M&E approach.

Responsibilities

Inception

• Design the initiative’s M&E system with a focus on building government data systems at the country level.
• Develop the core indicator and data reporting template and contribute to the narrative reporting template.

Country planning

• Advise on information-systems-related interventions needed at country level.
• Provide technical guidance on system design and indicator development, including via review of country-level plans.

Implementation

• Oversee a dashboard tracking progress against indicators and lead the initiative in data-driven course correction when necessary.
• Manage reporting on progress towards the initiative’s goals.
• Lead the initiative’s learning processes, ensuring insights from data and program lessons are disseminated and applied across the initiative as they emerge.
• Coordinate a technical advisory group of leaders in health systems research (drawn from academic institutions, multilaterals, and government) providing strategic and methodological guidance to M&E and research.
• Engage, as required, and manage contracted academic and evaluation partners executing more in-depth analysis, quasi-experimental studies, and peer-reviewed research.
• Steward the initiative’s research agenda.

Management

• Supervise one or more M&E Officer(s).

Qualifications

• 10+ years of public health experience in planning, project/change management, stakeholder coordination, capacity building, and program performance management.
• Experience designing and implementing a centralized M&E system from the ground up, including frameworks, tools, and guidelines.
• Familiarity with government health information systems in sub-Saharan Africa.
• Experience with M&E capacity building and knowledge management, including training and community-of-practice leadership.
• Program management experience across health system strengthening initiatives, coordinating with academic research institutions, government ministries, implementing partners, and donors.
• Experience working as an academic researcher or with academic researchers in the public health field.
• Advanced degree in a relevant field.
• In-depth knowledge of health workforce and health systems programming in East, West, and/or Southern Africa.
• Technical and programmatic experience in health workforce, financing, systems, PHC, and MNCH, including measurement and data use in these areas.
• Experience working with private philanthropies, engaged boards, and donor reporting.
• Lived experience, extensive knowledge, and understanding of the cultural, political, and economic context in African countries.
• Ability to inspire, motivate, and manage a diverse and geographically dispersed team.
• Willingness to travel regularly internationally.
• English fluency required.
• Working French or Portuguese is an advantage.

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