L’OMS recrute un Consultant – Agents techniques – Messagerie et engagement communautaire, Congo-Brazzaville
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Background and justification
The COVID-19 Transition Framework, developed by the WHO Regional Office for Africa, is intended to guide Member States to leverage proven COVID-19 response strategies to enhance the response to other public health emergencies, now and into the future and contribute to build more resilient health systems in Africa. The WHO Regional Office for Africa (AFRO) also developed the Community-Based Response Initiative (CBRI). Preliminary evidence shows that early detection, timely isolation and treatment, vaccination and enabling communities to comply with PHSM can greatly contribute to keeping the pandemic under control. Consequently, the Risk Communication and Community Engagement (RCCE) has an important role to play because its main objective is to strengthen public awareness through an integrated and relevant communication and community engagement approach on the COVID-19 and other diseases including a psycho-social component in 47 AFRO Member States. Strengthening the RCCE in the CBRI can obviously contribute to a sustainable engagement of communities contributing not only to the fight against COVID-19 but also any other disease. The evidence is clear: communities play a role in preventing and controlling epidemics, they must be involved in co-designing solutions, and community feedback should guide the adaption of those solutions over time.
In this context, the RCCE Afro is looking for a consultant who will strengthen the RCCE to contribute on the implementation of strategies to better fight against COVID-19 and other diseases in the context where populations are likely to neglect preventive measures.
*Purpose of the Consultancy:
The consultants will liaise between RCCE Technical Leads and country office (CO) staff to ensure communication, coordination, and organisation of meetings, as well as perform other knowledge management tasks necessary to move activities forward. The consultants will also co-facilitate the regional trainings and select country trainings as needed. The consultants will perform the following key tasks:
- Establishing a strong/cohesive RCCE partner coordination at global, regional, and country levels for a more effective response;
- Communicating science information/recommendations in a timely manner that address critical risks and counter misinformation;
- Accelerating priority research and innovation in social sciences to support the implementation of public health measures and to ensure participation of at-risk and affected communities; and
- Enhancing country-level capacity to roll out effective and coordinated RCCE approaches through the identification of capacity needs.
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Job Description
*Objectives of the Programme and of the immediate Strategic Objective
The mission of WHO’s Health Emergencies Programme (The Programme) is to help countries,
and to coordinator international action, to prevent, prepare for, detect, rapidly respond to, and
recover from outbreaks and emergencies.
*Organizational context
Subsequently reporting to the Incident Manager, the consultants will work under the overall leadership of the Health Operations and Technical Expertise (HOTE) pillar lead, under the direct supervision of the RCCE sub pillar lead and in coordination with other personnel at AFRO and WCOs.
*Summary of Assigned Duties
- Strengthen the RCCE in the Community Based Response Initiative by working closely with the project focal points in the 19 countries. This will include ensuring the implementation of the community engagement action plans and providing training in RCCE in these countries where required.
- Strengthen and empower the networks of religious, traditional leaders and traditional medicine practitioners in the fight against COVID-19 and other epidemics.
- Strengthen the capacity of national and local media and communications organizations to communicate accurately about COVID-19 and counter misinformation
- 4.Work with technical leads to assess behaviour and social data established (includes through social media). Work with local authorities to implement feedback mechanisms at community level to address misinformation and other issues around access to factual, real-time information.
- Work in developing evidence-based communication messages and materials. Facilitate pre-testing of context-specific communication materials and messages for priority populations. Support updating and monitoring of the communication strategy, key assets and massages, social data and behaviour indicators as needed.
- Provide support for operation teams for implementation of the RCCE activities and leverage RCCE strategy so they can mobilize partners and communities’ around positive behavioural change.
- Attend relevant meetings and establish relationship with key stakeholders related to RCCE.
- Develop specific advocacy plans to engage with Ministry of Health and other relevant ministries on RCCE issues.
- Lead on developing and implementing effective ways of communicating lessons learnt, good practices, evidence of changes and use them to influence policy and practice changes with various stakeholders including communities, partners, donors etc.
- Assist operation teams in reporting and evaluating for RCCE and perform any other related incident-specific duties, as required by the functional supervisor.
3. Recruitment Profile
Competencies: Generic
Describe the core, management or leadership competencies required
(See WHO competency model – list in order of priority, commencing with the most important
ones.)
- Teamwork;
- Respecting and promoting individual and cultural differences;
- Communication;
- Creating an empowering and motivating environment
Functional Knowledge and Skills
*Describe the essential knowledge and the skills specific to the position
- Proven track record of influential work with partners, government, and civil societies/key stakeholders.
- Demonstrated ability to think strategically, to analyse complex information and offer creative, practical, and effective solutions
- Excellent written and verbal communications skills, and an ability to produce good quality documents, information for a variety of audiences and communicate good practices
- Proven experience in formulating and implementing complex communication strategies
- Practical knowledge and proven skills in emergency/disaster management concepts and tools and their applications, especially related to management of health emergency/disaster operations.
- Experience working nationally and internationally with marginalized communities, and children.
- Expertise of RCCE concepts and guidance; how to strengthen trust between, and amongst communities, understand how communities are responding (who and what they listen to), creating two-way dialogue, etc. Ability to contextualize and provide guidance to different populations and support development and dissemination of relevant RCCE strategies.
- Social Behavioural Change (SBC) expertise, good understanding of SBC concepts and frameworks (formative research, quantitative and qualitative data analysis, SBC Communication).
- Experience in designing and/ or community engagement projects in development and/or humanitarian contexts through participatory approaches
Educational qualifications
- University degree in Health Promotion, social sciences, behavioural sciences, or related fields from an accredited/recognized institute.
- Training in public health, health education, health communication, or health promotion is desirable.
- At least five years of related experience, at the national and international levels, in RCCE part of which working in disease outbreaks or health emergencies. Proven experience in in the development and implementation of RCCEs strategies and plans.
- Previous experience in communication and advocacy for behavioural change is an added value.
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Use of Language Skills
Languages
Essential : Expert knowledge of English or French.
Desirable: Intermediate knowledge of the other language (French or English)
Working knowledge of another WHO official language would be an asset.
Other Skills (e.g. IT)
Knowledge of Microsoft Office software applications.