Location: Global
Hours: Full-time, Non-Exempt
Location: Global
Salary: Commensurate with required experience and qualifications
University Research Co., LLC (URC):
Guided by a strong vision of equitable and resilient systems that respond to people’s needs and emerging threats, URC helps countries and local actors to build, implement, and sustain science-driven, scalable solutions. Established in 1965, URC offers a range of technical expertise to empower governments, communities, and service providers toward strengthening their own health and social systems and improve service quality. We aim to expand access to and improve the quality of services, addressing maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health; global health security and infectious diseases, including HIV/AIDS, TB, and malaria; reproductive health and family planning; nutrition and water, sanitation, and hygiene. In our interactions with each other and our clients, we stay true to our values for transformative change by focusing on:
- Creativity: by unleashing our creativity, we enhance engagement and interaction to improve problem-solving.
- Collaboration: not only our work towards the same vision and mission instill staff with a strong sense of purpose, but also enables us to complement each other’s skills and allocate work to maximize everyone’s strengths.
- Accountability: we hold ourselves responsible for accomplishing goals, completing assignments, and making decisions.
- Diversity, equity, and inclusion: we embrace the importance of a diverse, equitable, and inclusive environment, where our leadership and staff model behavior that enriches our organization, demonstrates respect for all people, and supports opportunities for all staff.
- Transparency: we understand that when employees deeply trust one another and their leaders, they will be more engaged in their roles because they will not be worried about unfair treatment.
Overview:
URC is seeking an experienced Project Director for the upcoming USAID-funded global project, Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) Research and Learning. The five-year project will address key global and country specific WASH issues through a consortium that leads collaborative implementation science research, specialized technical assistance to country programs, and supports the use of evidence for decision making. The Project Director will provide overall technical vision and oversight for the project, manage consortium partnership, and ensure effective contract implementation at the global and country levels to meet the project’s goals and objectives. S/he will ensure compliance with contract terms and conditions, USAID rules and regulations, company policies and procedure and ensure systems are in place to deliver the highest caliber of technical assistance. while managing costs against budgets and identifying and mitigating risks. The Project Director will serve as the project’s principal representative with USAID and will be responsible for furnishing appropriate reports and other deliverables and maintaining regular and ongoing communications, as necessary. S/he will also serve as main liaison with partners and other stakeholders.
Roles and Responsibilities:
- Develop and execute overall project strategy and workplan toward achievement of project objectives to use implementation science to create partnerships between researchers and implementors; build capacity of local and international groups to use data for decision making in the WASH field; and stimulate uptake of learning from project results.
- Provide strategic and technical leadership, consortium management, and administration of the project, ensuring activities are performed to a high professional standard, effectively implemented, and fulfill donor and URC requirements.
- Serve as the primary liaison between URC and USAID, consortium partners, and other stakeholders.
- Monitor project performance to achieve project goals and objectives and ensures effective implementation of the evidence translation and dissemination strategy.
- Provide oversight for budgeting processes, budget tracking, and ensuring expenditures are allowable, allocatable, and reasonable in accordance with USAID rules and regulations.
- Ensure timely submission of high quality and comprehensive project reports and respond promptly to other informational requests by USAID, as needed.
- Serve as a spokesperson and advocate, representing the project to the USG, donors, relevant stakeholders, cooperating agencies and others.
- Ensure appropriate and timely documentation and dissemination of key results using a variety of communication strategies and media.
- Build and maintain strong working relationships with key internal and external stakeholders, beneficiaries, and partners.
- Ensure effective compliance with USAID/USG rules and regulations, and URC policies and procedures, as well as in-country laws.
- Recruit and supervise staff to meet evolving project demands, including management of a roster of technical experts with national and international expertise to contribute to project’s needed as required.
Minimum Qualifications:
- Advanced degree (Masters, or terminal degree, e.g., PhD, Dr.PH) in health, environmental health, engineering, implementation science, or a relevant field.
- Previous experience as a Project Director or similar position for a global activity.
- At least 7-10 years of professional experience managing operational, implementation science and research, programs management, managerial, and administrative duties for USG or other donor-funded projects with similarly complex, large development projects.
- At least ten years of experience implementing programs or researching technical areas, such as: on-site sanitation services and hygiene, sustainable rural water resources and services, urban WASH services and policy environment, WASH sector finance.
- Excellent written and oral communications skills.
- English fluency required; secondary language fluency desired.
Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted. CVs submitted for this opportunity may be retained in our database for other/future opportunities, unless we are directed otherwise.
“Contingent on Contract Award”
URC is proud to be an Equal Employment Opportunity employer.
We value and seek diversity in our workforce.
