Emergency coordinator

Details

- Post number: 328908 (EMRO/11/FT396)
- Vacancy Notice No: EMRO/11/FT396
- Title: Emergency Coordinator Post No 328908
- Grade: P5
- Organization unit: EMCO Countries (EM_ACO), EM_AFG WHO Representative's Office, Afghanistan (EM_AFG)
- Assistant Regional Director (ARD), EM/EHA Emergency & Humanitarian Action
- The mission of WHO is the attainment by all peoples of the highest possible level of health.

Objectives of the programme

- The overall objective is to reduce the avoidable mortality, morbidity and disability among disaster affected populations.
- Preparation of national EPR and contingency plans to specific hazards, and the response to the manmade and natural disasters that occur in Afghanistan: earthquakes, floods, drought and food insecurity, active armed conflict, insecurity.
- Resource mobilization for EPR; preparation of Consolidated Appeal Planning (CAP) /Humanitarian Appeal Process, Flash Appeal (if necessary), Country Humanitarian Action Plan (CHAP), and Central Emergency Relief Fund (CERF) proposals.
- Support the MoPH for the development of EPR/DRR strategies, policies, standards, guidelines, tools and SOPs at all levels aiming in longer term the self reliance of national EPR system
- Resource mobilization for EPR

Description of duties

Purpose of the Post

- To provide technical expertise for the health sector emergency preparedness and response/Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) planning, implementation, monitoring, supervision and evaluation in line with Ministry of Public Health (MoPH)
- Emergency Preparedness and Response (EPR) national strategy.
- To ensure the Organization's presence and operational capacity to support the response to manmade and natural disasters in the entire country:
- To lead the coordination, response capacity and accountability of health cluster interventions in general and WHO in particular.

Summary of Assigned Duties

Under the direct supervision of WR Afghanistan and the technical guidance of Regional EHA Advisor/EMRO, the incumbent will perform the following duties:

- Lead the establishment and maintenance of effective coordination mechanism for health sector emergency preparedness and response:
• Chair the cluster meetings at national level and coordinate with sectoral and inter-sectoral partners
• Represent the cluster members in sectoral and inter-sectoral meetings
• Lead the decision making process ensuring it is result-oriented, on line with principles of partnership and international standards for emergency response
• Designate focal points for working groups in consultation with health partners
• Facilitate agreement on response strategy, work plans, distributions of tasks and responsibilities
• Ensure inter -cluster coordination at different level of operation 

- Lead the preparedness and capacity building in pre and post emergency for health sector, including at organizational level
• Lead early warning (intra and inter-sectoral) contingency planning and emergency preparedness efforts in health sector.
• Together with cluster members undertake capacity mapping and gaps identification and advise for the development of a capacity-development strategy for health sector
• Together with health partners develop a training plan for all stakeholders Identify the gaps and activities that cover the critical needs

- Provide technical advice and operational support for needs assessment and analysis, prioritization and strategic planning
• Ensure that all identified health needs are covered through joint actions of health stakeholders with different mandates and expertise
• Organize needs assessment and analysis to ensure evidence based planning
• Advise on the development of overall strategy and response plan for health sector with linkages to DRR, early recovery and development that complements as much as possible the government policies and plans
• Ensure that the strategy and plans are regularly updated to evolving needs
• Ensure that the health strategy is adequately reflected into the overall country strategy such as CHAP, Flash Appeals, etc

- Lead the planning for transition through strengthening the national DRM mechanism, including institutionalization, development of standards, SOPs, guidelines and policies and capacity-building at all levels.
• Advise on the design of appropriate transition strategies to ensure continuity between humanitarian response, recovery and development and DRR initiatives.
• Advise on the development of appropriate strategies, policies, standards and guidelines for institutionalization of EPR and DRR.
• Work closely with MoPH and development actors to ensure the national ownership and effectiveness on disaster risk management.

- Actively promote the integration of cross-cutting issues into needs assessment and analysis, strategy development, planning and implementation.

- Supervise and monitor the application of standards, guidelines and good practices:
• Advise on the adaptation of relevant policies, code of conduct and standards to local context.
• Promote awareness, agreement and implementation of the common standards and tools amongst the cluster members
• Ensure awareness on relevant Government commitments under international human rights and humanitarian law and advise on a response that is in line with.

- Lead the development and functioning of information management, monitoring and reporting mechanisms for humanitarian action:
• Advise on the development of information sharing and reporting mechanism within the cluster and inter-sectoral (4WS, contact lists, communication matrix, etc)
• Ensure cluster agreement on monitoring humanitarian activities and regularly review the functioning of the cluster.

- Advocacy and resource mobilization
• In charge for the development of CAP, CHAP, Flash Appeals, CERF and other inter-agency funding appeals in line with health sector humanitarian strategies and priorities.
• Establish a transparent and accountable mechanism for grant allocation of pool funds, and financial monitoring

- Managing of staff
• Identify the needs for capacity building of national and international staff to ensure adequate surge capacity within the unit.
• Define with WR the capacity building program for unit staff
• Monitoring and evaluation of performance

Required qualifications

Essential

- Education
• University Degree in medicine and Masters Degree in disaster management or public health, or health related field.

- Skills
• Ability to prioritize, organize, manage and adapt management style according to need
• In-depth knowledge of emergency relief policies and practices within the UN, other UN Specialized Agencies, donor agencies, national and international NGOs
• Sound knowledge about national disaster preparedness and response programs;
• Ability to effectively coordinate and represent with policy makers, program managers, UN agencies, NGOs, and other actors;
• Strong knowledge in program development, implementation, monitoring and evaluation; strong inter-personal and cross cultural skills.

- Experience
• At least 10 years of combined professional experience at national and international level in managing and coordinating emergency health programmes in developing countries and experience in developing and promoting collaborative partnerships

Desirable

- Experience in UN organizations and/or Humanitarian agencies

Competencies

- Producing results
• Creating an empowering and motivating environment
• Building and promoting partnerships across the organisation and beyond
• Ensuring the effective use of resources
• Promoting WHO's position in health leadership

Other Skills

- Word processing
- spreadsheet
- presentation software

Languages

- Excellent knowledge of English.
- Knowledge of another WHO official language is an asset

Additional Information

- Applicants are kindly requested to pay attention to the screening questions as they will be used to screen out unqualified candidates.
- Only qualified applicants with the relevant experience will be considered.
- A written test/presentation and interviews will be used as a form of screening.
- The written test might be used as an eliminatory tool.
- Other similar positions at the same level may be filled from this vacancy notice (this could be the base for rosters)
- Candidates will be interviewed using a competency based approach.
- This vacancy is published in English language only.
- Annual salary: (Net of tax) USD80629 at single rate USD86791 with primary dependants Post Adjustment: 56.7 % of the above figure(s). This percentage is to be considered as indicative since variations may occur each month either upwards or downwards due to currency exchange rate fluctuations or inflation.
- WHO is committed to workforce diversity.
- Any appointment/extension of appointment is subject to WHO Staff Regulations, Staff Rules and Manual.
- Only candidates under serious consideration will be contacted.
- WHO has a smoke-free environment and does not recruit smokers or users of any form of tobacco.