Senior Technical Advisor, Pharmaceutical Management

Overview

The Tubiteho program aims at increasing access to quality essential health services, with particular emphasis on family planning (FP), maternal and child health (MCH), malaria and nutrition services to the Burundian population. To attain this result, the program seeks to strengthen sub-national pharmaceutical systems including supply chain systems (at provincial, facility and community levels) so to ensure continuous availability of FP, MCH, malaria, and nutrition products at service delivery points in target provinces.

Under the direction of the Chief of Party, the Senior Technical Advisor (STA) oversees and manages pharmaceutical management activities of the program at the sub-national level and beyond, and coordinates with the ministry of health and with other national partners to address pertinent issues of national scale.

S/He provides technical assistance to provincial and district health management teams, facility staff, and community health workers (CHWs) to strengthen commodity management systems for essential medicines and supplies. The STA coordinates with FP, MCH, malaria and nutrition programs at national, provincial and district levels to ensure that pharmaceutical system strengthening activities are consistent with national strategic plans.

S/he closely coordinates with other members of the Tubiteho team in the planning of pharmaceutical management improvement interventions ensuring their contribution to overall program objectives. The STA ensures adequate monitoring of activities, evaluation of performance and the dissemination of results by working respectively with program M&E and communication teams. The STA receives technical support from the Pharmaceuticals and Health Technology (PHT) Group of MSH in Arlington to ensure that deployed tools and approaches reflect best practices in the field of pharmaceutical management.

This position is contingent upon project award and funding.

Specific Responsibilities

Technical Support

• Participate in program assessments to identify priority pharmaceutical and supply chain management gaps and to define priorities for meeting program overall objectives.
• Collaborate in the development of Tubiteho program plans ensuring that priority pharmaceutical management improvement activities are adequately programmed and budgeted.
• Support the establishment of an essential package of commodities that best address priority health areas of Tubiteho including FP, MCH, malaria and nutrition commodities.
• Coordinate with local partners for the establishment of mechanisms at the provincial and/or district level to quantify commodity needs, develop and monitor the implementation of commodity supply plans.
• Coordinate with national and sub-national partners for the timely procurement and delivery of required commodities to target provinces and districts.
• Establish a standard pharmaceutical management information system (with patient and commodity data) to provide reliable data on commodity consumption and that can be used to monitor commodity availability and use; and to readily serve as early warning system and for decision-making.
• Collaborate with local partners to ensure that essential commodities are adequately stored and inventoried.

Capacity Building

• Participate in identifying institutional and individual capacity gaps in the area of pharmaceutical/supply chain management and develop capacity building plans to address them.
• Ensure the development of appropriate pharmaceutical/supply chain training materials, by type of cadre, to address identified individual capacity gaps.
• Oversee the implementation and evaluation of training programs for leadership and for operational staff.
• Work with local partners to develop terms of reference for necessary roles to support pharmaceutical/supply chain management operations at the different levels of the health system.
• Oversee and participate in the development/update and implementation of institutional standard operating procedures as needed (including forms and tools) to support quality standards to govern pharmaceutical management operations.
• Support members of DHMTs to be able to analyze commodity reports and to adequately use them for decision making.

Monitoring and Evaluation

• Participate in the development of Tubiteho program PMP ensuring that adequate outputs, deliverables and indicators for pharmaceutical/supply chain management are incorporated.
• Ensure that pharmaceutical/supply chain management data required for program monitoring and evaluation is routinely collected, validated, and analyzed for measuring program performance with emphasis on measures for stock outs and for commodity wastage.
• Collaborate with local partners and supervisors to integrate commodity management as an integral part of their supervision system.

Other

• Develop pharmaceutical management regular reports according to program and USAID/Tubiteho reporting guidelines; also develop ad-hoc reports upon request.
• Develop communication materials, success stories, and presentations to share best practices and lessons learned.
• Conduct any other tasks, as required.

Qualifications and Experience

• Degree in medicine, pharmacy, public health or an advanced degree in administration, logistics or supply chain combined with pertinent experience in public health.
• At least seven (7) years progressively responsible experience in pharmaceutical management, and/or supply chain at national, sub-national and community levels in a developing country context, preferably Burundi
• Demonstrated experience in two or more areas of pharmaceutical/supply chain management such as quantification/supply planning, logistics management information systems, warehousing, inventory control, distribution/transportation and/or rational use
• Experience working with health system strengthening programs funded by bilateral (e.g. USAID) or multilateral (e.g. WHO or UNICEF) donors.
• Strong knowledge and understanding of health and pharmaceutical systems in sub-Saharan Africa.
• Skills in developing training materials and in the management and delivery of capacity building workshops/events.
• Strong management, organizational, supervisory and communication skills.
• Demonstrated computer skills in Microsoft Office Suite applications, including Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.
• Knowledge of monitoring and evaluation approaches and appropriate methods for data analysis and reporting.
• French fluency and strong English capabilities are required including speaking, writing, and reading. Additional proficiency in local Burundi languages is a plus.
• Ability to handle multiple tasks simultaneously, set priorities, and work independently.
• Willingness and ability to travel for extended periods of time in-country to support technical activities, and internationally, whenever needed.

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