Business Title: Regional Emergency Response Advisor (English-Speaking Africa)

Job title: Regional Emergency Response Advisor (English-Speaking Africa)

Job Summary

The STRIDES Regional Emergency Response Advisor supports outbreak response planning, coordination, and implementation across English-speaking Africa, ideally bringing prior experience with high-consequence pathogens (e.g., viral hemorrhagic fevers). The advisor aligns country programs with STRIDES leadership’s direction, tracking and reporting on response efforts while leading coordination with technical, finance, and operations teams to mobilize resources. They develop tools and guidance, and work within established incident management frameworks to strengthen emergency readiness and execution. In addition, this person will manage the creation of knowledge products—reports, technical materials, and conflict-sensitive solutions. Working with project teams and HQ, the advisor leads program evaluations on effectiveness, reviews technical/operational activities, and directs assessment reports across their portfolio. The role also contributes to business development, including pursuing opportunities, capture/proposal leadership, and building partnerships. This position will be based in Nairobi.

Accountabilities:

Technical Requirements:

• Leads outbreak response and preparedness activities in alignment with established STRIDES emergency response protocols and in-country incident management systems.
• Manages the coordination of day-to-day response activities across technical, operational, and administrative teams to ensure alignment with response objectives and timelines.
• Oversees the consolidation of response information and manages internal coordination during active outbreaks.
• Leads standardization of response processes across their portfolio of countries, including reporting templates, deployment trackers, and coordination tools.
• Spreadheads continuous improvement of emergency response systems by integrating lessons learned and best practices into tools and guidance.
• Provides project staff with overall technical direction and guidance in line with the project expected outcomes.
• Leads analysis of project implementation to identify areas for improvement and propose appropriate technical strategy and guidelines.
• Manages the collaboration with the research and evaluation team to report on data and assessments.
• Leads the development and dissemination of tools, materials, reports, papers, and intervention for research projects.
• Serves as the authoritative on emergency response and preparedness best practices to assist with implementation
• Reviews technical work plans and budgets for accuracy and aligned with the STRIDES program and donor goals.

Project Design Implementation:

• Mentors and provides technical guidance to junior emergency response staff and partners across the region; may supervise junior technical staff, sub-contractors, and others implementing technical project work.
• With technical oversight, provide technical leadership in design, development, planning, implementation; and capacity- building of specific technical components of projects
• Creates technical portion of the project plan, within the given resource and financial constraints
• Directs the day-to-day technical and operational activities of assigned projects, tracking delivery of project outputs and monitoring staff members' LOE (Level of Effort) needs to ensure adequate coverage of resources.
• Coordinates requests from CO (Country Office) for technical assistance
• Engages in the design, development, planning, and implementation of global-level innovative technical strategies.
• Develops or writes technical briefs, reports, or other necessary materials to facilitate research, best practices, policies, and procedures.
• Leads collaboration with the DTT (Digital Transformation & Technology) team to develop and maintain response tracking systems (e.g., dashboards, trackers, logs) to support situational awareness and decision-making.
• Oversees the adaption and maintenance of tools, templates, SOPs (standard operating procedures), guidance notes, and job aids to support outbreak preparedness and response activities, ensuring implementation is consistent with best practices in the industry/subject and meets client/funder contractual obligations.

Business Development and Client/Funder Support:

• Maintains collaborative relationships with donor/client organizations, relevant government agencies, bilateral and other NGOs (non governmental organizations) and consistently maintained and viewed as a knowledgeable resource in their technical area.
• Leads proposal research and development proposal strategies, which consists of directing proposal research, data collection, and strategies.
• Reviews proposal, budgets, and workplans.
• Participate in client / funder meetings and provide technical input, and drafts sponsor reports and presentations
• Represents the organization and / or Institute to external entities at professional meetings and conferences.

Capacity Building, Training and Supervision:

• Develops and implements technical training and capacity building interventions related to emergency response and preparedness.
• Supervises and/or provide technical guidance to staff members locally and in the region.

Operations Management (Finance, HR, etc.):

• Manages the processes, services, planning, organizing, coordinating, and controlling of all technical resources for a project.
• Directs efforts to work with the Finance Team to develop and track response budgets, spending forecasts, and cost monitoring in coordination with finance teams.
• Oversees the processing of emergency procurement requests, consultant deployments, and surge staffing needs.
• Ensures the overall project portfolio remains aligned with organizational timelines, technical standards, and donor/client expectations, holding junior technical officers accountable for work plan execution.
• Manages the timelines of multiple projects and budgets, leading the development of donor reports and presentations.
• Proposes and executes solutions to operational resource gaps and constraints
• Reviews SOPs (standard operating procedures), SOW (statement of work), and reports on technical and financial tracking data.
• Cultivates supplier relationships to ensure rapid procurements for outbreak response

Project/Program Reporting:

• Organizes processes with the MEL Team to track outbreak response activities, milestones, deliverables, and resource utilization across response pillars or workstreams.
• Reviews regular situation reports, activity summaries, and operational updates for leadership, partners, and donors as required.
• Manages the timely and accurate documentation of response actions, lessons learned, and after-action inputs.
• Oversees SOWs and budget tracking systems
• Drafts sponsor financial and technical reports.
• Collates and uploads output and deliverables data to sponsor data systems.
• Prepares and delivers presentations to sponsors on progress.
• Helps in the development and review of country work plans.

Quality Assurance:

• Ensures technical deliverables are consistent with best practices in the industry / subject and meet client / funder contractual obligations
• Identifies areas for improved efficiency or effectiveness within prescribed parameters, and institutes enhancements to procedures.

Applied Knowledge & Skills:

• Ensures appropriate and timely technical support for field projects.
• Ensures the quality of implemented technical activities and systems at all levels. Conducts routine coordination with employees and consultants, on-site and in the field.
• Strong knowledge and skills in a specific technical area/function and general understanding of concepts and principles of related technical areas/functions.
• Solid knowledge of standards for the technical area/field, operational processes and procedures, work, and task flow.
• Has the ability to manage projects, set realistic priorities, and plan for the successful implementation of activities.
• Proficient writing and verbal communication skills.
• Relevant computer software skills (including, at a minimum, the standard applications in MS Office).
• Ability to manage their own work to job and performance standards.
• Must be able to read, write and speak fluent English fluent and host country language. Proficiency in Swahili, Hausa, and/or Arabic, among other regionally spoken languages, will be an asset.

Competencies: There are 31 FHI 360 development competencies, of greatest focus for this particular job will be:

• Project Management (Planning and Time Management) - Accurately scopes out length and difficulty of tasks (sets objectives/goals/measures). Breaks down work into steps, schedules, task/people assignments. Marshals people, time, and resources efficiently. Arranges information in a useful manner and orchestrates multiple activities at once.
• People Management (Making Others Great) – Facilitate professional development of staff by providing challenging, learning assignments and opportunities. Shares and solicits feedback monthly at the very least. Helps establish compelling development plans. Assigns responsibility and accountability for tasks/decisions. Monitors process, progress, and results. Creates a climate in which people want to do their best.
• Creating and Managing Systems and Processes – Recognizes the need for standardization and balances client and organization need in systems design. Anticipates the effects of process change on people while optimizing task efficiency and simplicity.
• Employees are expected to possess or have high potential for the development of these three fundamental competencies.

Problem Solving & Impact:

• Demonstrates the ability to assess needs within agreed upon duties and considers course of action best to meet those needs.
• Effectively applies knowledge of technical area to solve a range of problems. Demonstrates the ability to develop solutions to problems that cannot be solved using existing methods or approaches.
• Faulty decisions/ recommendations /failures to complete assignments will normally result in serious delays to assigned projects resulting in considerable expenditure of additional time, resources, and funds.
• Decisions and actions impact primarily workflow, project processes and timeframes. Problems encountered are varied, requiring review of practices and precedents to resolve. Problem solving involves evaluating and resolving discrepancies with data, analyses, processes, etc. within prescribed guidelines.
• Policies or guidelines exist for most problems; others must be referred to by a supervisor or more senior professional.

Supervision Given/Received:

• May supervise junior staff members.
• Coordinates own workflow and sets individual priorities.
• Works under general guidelines for completion and accuracy as determined by the supervisor.
• Accomplishes results through lower-level staff managers or through experienced staff who exercise independence in their assignments.
• May manage a centralized functional area of activity.
• Serves as mentor to more inexperienced technical staff.

Education

• Master’s Degree or its International Equivalent in Knowledge/Information Services, Communications, Education, Environment, Health, Behavioral, Life/Social Sciences International Development, Human Development or Related Field.
• Project Management (PM) Certification preferred.

Experience

• Typically requires 8+ years of relevant experience in technical implementation of large projects and/or programs – may manage activities of lower-level staff, however, main function is individual contributor.
• Documented experience providing technical assistance, capacity building and business development in the specific technical domain.
• Prior work experience in a non-governmental organization (NGO), government agency, or private organization.
• International or Domestic (US) Program Development or Program management preferred.
• In-depth knowledge o