News

Health Research and Social Development Forum (HERD) calls for Director – Research and Evaluations, primarily responsible for leading, managing, coordinating research and evaluation projects at HERD for 2 years.

Director – Research and Evaluations will work closely with Executive Director, Research and M&E team and will be directly supervised by Executive Director of HERD. The engagement will be highly demanding – in terms of dedication towards entire management of research and M&E projects. We are currently implementing output-based funding projects and therefore, no compromise will be made in terms of meeting gold quality standards.  The Director will be primarily based in HERD’s office in Kathmandu with frequent field visits to the project districts.

Are you the right fit?

We expect applicants to be exceptional in the sector of health research and evaluations, especially handling technical and managerial aspects of the research continuum effectively. He/She should be:

• a DREAMER who envisions the future opportunities for the organisation and works towards achieving those opportunities defining strategic pathways
• a DESIGNER who designs high quality frameworks and tools addressing the project aims and objectives
• a MANAGER who coordinates with national and local authorities effectively during the project start-up, implementation and completion phase as well as monitor and supervise performance of the project teams
• a TRAINER who orients the conceptual and practical aspects of research and M&E projects to the data collectors (Research Officers and Research Assistants)
• an ANALYST who analyses the collected data and present it in a high quality report
• a COMMUNICATOR who communicates the research and evaluation findings at the policy level effectively

Most importantly, we are looking for a LEADER who works in the team, takes risks – being proactive in thinking, takes ownership of the projects, does effective planning, forecasts the possible challenges, devises appropriate mitigation measures and above all, takes his/her role seriously.

What should you do?

The Director – Research and Evaluations will have the following four major roles and responsibilities to perform:

Initiation of Project Preparation by

• assisting the Executive Director, Research and M&E Team in outlining the project objectives by providing technical expertise
• coordinating with our partners regarding expected role and Scope of Work of HERD as an implementing agency
• leading the M&E design/framework of various projects

Oversight of Data Management by

• coordinating with local organisations, stakeholders, partners and government officials to ensure effective project implementation
• monitoring and supervising the data collection teams – Senior Research Officers, Research Assistants and Field Researchers through field based and desk monitoring
• communicating with our partners regularly with key agreed deliverables and other major issues occurred during the field implementation
• ensuring that team performance and output (field data collection procedures including ethical considerations) meet the desired gold quality standards

Assurance of high quality product outputs by

• ensuring that high quality data management procedures are followed with detailed oversight on transcription, translation and coding of qualitative data; database management, coding, double data entry, labelling and cleaning of quantitative data
• ensuring that there is rigorous analysis of the data with constant reflection about whether the findings are in line with the set project objectives
• ensuring that the final products (activity reports and final study reports) are highly standardised in terms of outlook, language, structure, coherence and presentation

Contribution to organisational development by

• developing organisational strategies and pathways identifying potential areas of research and M&E in close coordination with the Executive Director and Business Development Team
• being the face of HERD – leading HERD’s visibility in national and international forums along with Executive Director through presentations, speeches and other medium
• developing a high performing research and M&E team – motivating the existing members, exploring potential members and devising strategies attracting them to work at HERD

What should you have?

We are looking for high performing and high performed professional in the field of health/social sciences/ development studies and similar disciplines preferably with a PhD with minimum 2 years of experience or a Masters Degree holder with at least 5 years of experience in management of health related projects.

Must Skills

The following skills are a must to be considered a potential for this post:

• Demonstrable experience in leading and managing research/evaluation studies and programmes of national scale
• Quantitative and Qualitative research design and analysis skills
• M&E framework design and implementation skills
• Exceptional report writing skills
• High-quality training and presentation skills
• Efficient use of software (MS Office, Atlas.ti/NVivo, SPSS/CSPro)
• Superb communication skills (both verbal and written)

Contact Us:

If you think you can handle this major responsibility, email us with your Letter of Intent and updated CV at: vacancy@herd.org.np/info@herd.org.np with the subject line: ‘Application: Director – Research and Evaluations’ by 5pm, January 21, 2015.