bCPAP Project Manager

Job Description

JOB TITLE: The bCPAP Project Manager

TEAM/PROGRAMME: Programme and Operations

LOCATION: Lusaka

GRADE: NAT 3

POST TYPE: National

Safeguarding:

Save the Children does not tolerate any form of exploitation, abuse, or harassment against any person. It is the responsibility of all employees and representatives to protect all people who come in contact with our organization. Save the Children commits to applying the same standards to all its employees and subject them to the same processes regardless of their position, influence, or reputation within or outside of the organization.

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

Save the Children International’s Diversity Policy, aims to promote equal opportunity in employment and to ban any kind of discrimination based on sex, age, social class, disability, HIV status, religion, race and ethnicity.

INTRODUCTION [PROJECT OVERVIEW]

Save the Children (SCI) is the world’s leading independent non-profit organization for children. Our vision is a world in which every child attains the right to survival, protection, development, and participation. SCI’s Mission is to inspire breakthroughs in the way the world treats children, and to achieve immediate and lasting changes in their lives. In Zambia, Save the Children has been implementing programmes since 1983 across Child Rights Governance, Health and Nutrition, Child Protection, Education, Child Poverty, and Humanitarian Response.

Save the Children, in partnership with Vayu Global Health and the Ministry of Health (MOH), and with funding from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Charities (LDSC), will implement the Better Care for Small and Sick Newborns in Zambia project. The project aims to reduce facility-level neonatal mortality by improving access to high-quality respiratory care through the implementation of bubble Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (bCPAP), strengthening referral and transfer systems for sick newborns, and enhancing the capacity of health workers across Lusaka, Central, and Southern Provinces. The project will be implemented in ten district-level public health facilities providing maternity services with functional 24-hour inpatient newborn care units. The intervention will strengthen the quality of care for small and sick newborns through evidence-based clinical practice, health systems strengthening, capacity building, mentorship, quality improvement, and sustainable integration of bCPAP services into routine newborn care.

ROLE PURPOSE

The Project Manager will provide overall leadership, strategic direction, coordination, and oversight for the implementation of the Better Care for Small and Sick Newborns in Zambia project, ensuring timely delivery of planned outputs, outcomes, and impact in line with project objectives, donor requirements, and national newborn health priorities. The Project Manager will be the primary point of contact for external stakeholders including Ministry of Health (MOH) officials at national, provincial, and district levels, implementing partners (Vayu Global Health, Pediatric Association of Zambia, academic institutions), The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Charities (LDSC), and donor representatives. Regular collaboration with the Health and Nutrition Technical Lead, Senior Management Team, PDQ, Awards, Finance, Supply Chain, Human Resources, and MEAL teams will be essential to ensure quality implementation, timely decision-making, effective resource utilization, and achievement of project objectives.

The Project Manager is expected to demonstrate strong leadership, programme management, partnership development, technical coordination, and mentorship skills while promoting innovation, adaptive management, learning, and continuous improvement throughout the project lifecycle.

SCOPE OF ROLE:

Reports to: Head of Programme Operations

Staff reporting to this post: (2)

Indirect:

Budget Responsibilities: Main budget holder for the “Better Care for Small and Sick Newborns in Zambia”

KEY AREAS OF ACCOUNTABILITY:

1. Technical Leadership

• Provide overall strategic leadership for project implementation across all supported provinces, districts and facilities by translating project objectives into annual work plans, implementation schedules, budgets and performance targets as appropriate to ensure timely delivery of project outputs, outcomes and milestones.
• Lead adaptive management through continuous review of implementation performance and emerging evidence to keep the project well aligned with the national newborn health priorities and donor expectations.
• Coordinate multidisciplinary technical teams to ensure integrated delivery of evidence based newborn clinical services, quality improvement, MEAL and other operational activities to continuously improve project performance through effective data management.
• Lead overall implementation and translation of project objectives into practical implementation strategies that deliver measurable health outcomes while ascertaining quality delivery against approved workplans, budgets, milestones and contractual obligations.
• Provide strategic oversight to ensure project activities remain aligned with Ministry of Health priorities, donor expectations and Save the Children programme quality standards.
• Ensure integration of gender equality, safeguarding, disability inclusion and child rights throughout implementation
• Represent Save the Children during technical working groups, steering committees and coordination meetings with full recognition of The Christ of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints contribution to the project
• Ensuring that a quality and timely program phased budget aligned with the DIP is in place.
• Ensure that program implementation meets the monthly financial performance target (100% burn rate) and annual spending against life of award budget not greater than 100%.
• Ensure that all financial policies and regulations relating to cash flow management, expenditure controls, cash management, accounting information, advances management as put in place for the management and control of funds are followed by the staff and partners in implementing the different program activities.
• Hold monthly staff meetings to plan and reflect on program roll out.
• Financial management – Ensure excellent financial management and accountability in line with SCI policy guidelines anchored on effective and efficient forecasting, monitoring and tracking planned and actuals versus obligated

2. Program Planning and implementation Management.

• Lead implementation of all project components including:
  • Timely submission of quality program annual plans with the respective phased budget aligned with the Country office Country Strategic Plan (CSP).
  • Ensuring all program operations are based on and are in line with the approved annual plan, phased budget, detailed implementation plans (DIP), procurement plan.
• Provides leadership and design expertise in the rigorous application of Social and Behaviour Change Communication theory, practice, principles and current best practices with capacity to achieve measurable results for the sick newborns.
• Keep updated a repository of approved resources that can be shared with other partners for shared learning.
• Lead implementation of competency-based capacity strengthening strategies such as overseeing Training of Trainers (TOT) implementation model with cascaded onsite Low Dose High Frequency (LDHF) and mentorships for assured systems strengthen long-term institutional capacity.
• Promote leadership development among facility champions to foster appropriate and sustainable evidence-based QI initiatives through functional facility QI teams
• Proactively lead the project baseline, facility readiness assessments, capacity strengthening and procurement planning needs
• Working with MEAL, support routine monitoring, review and translation of newborn process and output data to align with the project desired strategic outcomes

3. Partner Management

• Develop and maintain strong working relationships with partnerships by:
  • Working with MOH across all levels of leadership and responsibility to ensure national alignment, government ownership, and sustainability beyond project active implementation phase.
  • Work with Vayu Global Health to provide technical guidance on bCPAP equipment and collaboration with Church volunteer clinicians to support selected training and mentorship activities
  • Work with Pediatric Association of Zambia (PAZ) and relevant academic institutions as a technical collaborator to support high-quality implementation of newborn and pediatric care interventions
• Work with relevant program staff to ensure all implementing partners undergo legal vetting and capacity assessment prior to commencing work with Save the Children.
• Ensure that all partners are engaged with appropriate agreements and effective monitoring systems are in place so that partner delivery meets donor expectations and requirements
• Represent Save the Children during technical working groups, steering committees and coordination meetings with full recognition of The Christ of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints contribution to the project.

4. Budgeting and Financial Management

• Responsible for the overall programs financial and budgetary management. This responsibility includes.
• Ensuring that a quality and timely program phased budget aligned with the DIP is in place.
• Ensure that program implementation meets the monthly financial performance target (100% burn rate) and annual spending against life of award budget not greater than 100%.
• Ensure that all financial policies and regulations relating to cash flow management, expenditure controls, cash management, accounting information, advances management as put in place for the management and control of funds are followed by the staff and partners in implementing the different program activities.
• Hold monthly staff meetings to plan and reflect on program roll out.
• Financial management – Ensure excellent financial management and accountability in line with SCI policy guidelines anchored on effective and efficient forecasting, monitoring and tracking planned and actuals versus obligated
• Support audits to ensure seamless compliance with donor regulations.

5. MEAL and Program Reporting.

• Ensure timely and quality program design and study processes which include baseline assessments, research and endline evaluations
• Ensure that the program adheres to and meets all quality benchmarks.
• Work with MEAL and project mentor to define a learning and project documentation agenda
• Lead pause- and reflect activities to understand what is working well and what adaptations may be needed to achieve project results
• Ensure accountability mechanisms are integrated into all aspects of programme management structures including information sharing, beneficiary engagement (including children’s participation) and that excellent collection and management of complaints and feedback is conducted in close collaboration with MEAL staff.
• Ensure regular monitoring of program results, documentation of programme, case studies, lessons learnt, significant changes and best practices and coordinating, learning and reflection meetings/sessions
• Ensure functional program monitoring and evaluation systems are in place
• Ensure timely submission of high-quality monthly program progress and end of fiscal year reports which are in accordance with the program reporting schedule and formats/guidelines.
• Ensure that issues raised in the reports are comprehensively addressed in a timely manner
• Contribute to the analysis, synthesis, and reporting of program outputs and results in close collaboration with the M&E team and ensure incorporation of lessons-learned into ongoing implementation.
• Submit routine reports for project in line with project’s reporting requirements.

6. Advocacy, Networking and influencing

• Guides and spearheads district level advocacy for children and other vulnerable groups in the Impact Area
• Liaise with PDQ to identify, develop and lead local level advocacy in line with organiz