Cambodia: Country director, Cambodia

Established in 1915 with Helen Keller as a founding trustee, Helen Keller International (HKI) is dedicated to saving the sight and lives of the world’s most vulnerable and disadvantaged. Headquartered in New York City, HKI currently conducts programs in 21 countries in Africa and Asia, as well as in the United States. Renowned for its reliability, efficiency and high level of technical expertise, HKI promotes the development of sustainable, large-scale programs that deliver effective preventative and curative services for nutrition, eye health and neglected tropical diseases. The hallmark of the organization’s work is its proven success in developing, testing and scaling-up health interventions, and integrating them within government and community structures to support and build local capacity and sustainable solutions.

Country Program Overview:

Since 1992, HKI has been working to design, test and establish sustainable evidence-based approaches to enhance health and nutrition for Cambodians, particularly women and children. HKI’s work in Cambodia began with a Child Survival project that aimed to address vitamin A deficiency and iodine deficiency through various intervention strategies including supplementation, homestead food production and salt iodization. HKI also implemented a school health project integrating basic eye care messages into the primary school curriculum.

Since then, the HKI portfolio has expanded to include extensive national advocacy and technical support to 25 provinces to improve the vitamin A supplementation coverage, a national nutrition survey to define the problem, testing of an in-home food fortification strategy, extensive work in homestead food production including operations research studies, nutritional support for people living with HIV/AIDS, and a school health program for soil-transmitted helminthes.

HKI’s programs are integrated at all levels of the government health and education structure by helping to develop its human resources and infrastructure, conduct needs assessments, analyze local context to inform program design and monitor and evaluate program progress and impact. HKI also works with government and local partners to ensure community participation and ownership and create demand for nutrition and health services. HKI Cambodia provides ongoing advocacy on nutrition issue and provision of technical assistance to government on nutrition matters and is the lead agency of the Scaling up Nutrition Civil Society Alliance in Cambodia.

HKI-Cambodia is currently implementing a nutrition-focused program comprised of the following nutrition projects and initiatives:

• Projects based on HKI’s Enhanced Homestead Food Production (EHFP) program, an innovative program that integrates homestead food production, a gender transformative approach, and nutrition education/behavior change communication to promote optimal nutrition behaviors among poor rural households: EHFP’s objective is nutrition specific, but it achieves this objective by addressing a wide range of barriers to improve nutrition. The current “Family Farms for the Future” is an operations research project that is testing the scaling up potential of EHFP. HKI is implementing this project in conjunction with the Department of Health, local partners and the University of British Columbia. Another EHFP project being implemented is a randomized control trial that will test the benefits of a women-centered EHFP approach versus a gender-blind approach.
• Supporting breastfeeding through research, advocacy and technical support for the scale up of workplace lactation rooms in Cambodia: The current phase of this program involves the establishment of demonstration lactation rooms in different workplaces and geographic settings and the engagement of government and private sector stakeholders on advocacy efforts to promote adoption and scale up.
• Research to support fortification of salt with thiamine in Cambodia, as a means to address thiamine deficiency in Cambodia.
• The multi-country ARCH program focused on reviewing and collecting data on the promotion of and use of breast milk substitutes and complementary foods, along with delivering advocacy and technical assistance for governments to develop and enforce relevant laws that limit such promotion of such products.

Functional Relationships

The Country Director reports to the HKI Regional Director, Operations (based in Phnom Penh) and works closely with other staff members at HKI’s global management in the Asia Pacific Regional Office and the US, and may be called upon to serve on working groups to develop and review policies and guidelines for the global organization. The Country Director supervises the Deputy Country Director (DCD) for Programs in Cambodia, who leads day-to-day program management, including project design and implementation, oversight of program staff and representation at technical forums.

HKI’s programs require close relations with governments, partner universities and NGOs, private industry, donors, and UN agencies and the Country Director, along with the DCD for Programs will represent HKI at relevant country, regional, and global meetings.

HKI has a matrixed reporting structure that respects both the line management and authority within country office and regional hierarchies; and the accountability and oversight duties of subject matter experts and multi-country program managers wherever they are located. Strong communication skills and a spirit of teamwork among colleagues, both hierarchically and laterally, are essential to thrive within this structure.

Scope of the Position:

The Country Director provides strategic leadership and develops action plans that further the mission of HKI and meet the evolving conditions in Cambodia. S/he has overall responsibility for ensuring adequate program funding is available at all times and for the technical and operational excellence in the delivery of all activities to achieve the objectives established in grants and strategic plans. The Country Director serves as HKI’s primary representative in Cambodia. This position is based in Phnom Penh with travel to project sites required, and periodic international travel.

Specific Responsibilities:

Overall Management and Leadership

• Provide strategic vision and direction for the HKI Cambodia country program, including the nutrition program and critical operations support for functions such as procurement, financier and Humans Resources.
• Identify opportunities and generate funding from international and bilateral agencies, and donor agencies.
• Develop and nurture in-country donor relationships and identify potential partners to participate in joint proposals.
• Lead and prepare concept papers and proposals and provide other information as needed for submission to donors and others for fundraising and marketing purposes.
• Lead and oversee the implementation of HKI-Cambodia programs and the management of the office.
• Represent HKI in formal and informal meetings with government officials, international donor agencies, and national technical advisory groups pertinent to HKI project activities. Note that the DCD will take the lead on technical program representation, and the Country Director will support this aspect of representation work as needed.

Financial and Administrative

• Provide oversight to finance and administrative services including procurement, property management, human resources management, vehicle and facilities management, and staff safety and security.
• Work with regional office and headquarters to manage the development and implementation of annual country budgets.
• Authorize expenditures for grant or contract allocations and ensure compliance with procedures required by grant or contract agreements.
• Ensure the preparation and accuracy and timely submission of financial and narrative reports that comply with grant or contract agreements and ensure compliance with all aspects of donor funding and HKI policies.
• Hire and manage personnel and lead initiatives to develop staff capacity.

Programmatic

• Oversee the program portfolio to ensure the highest level of project quality and accountability, while fostering continuity through building local capacity.
• Keep the national partners and others informed about progress of the projects, plans for the development of new programs/projects/activities and donor involvement in the overall program.
• With the DCD, provide technical input to the government, international donors, and technical advisory groups pertinent to HKI project activities; ensure implementation of strong program monitoring, evaluation and learning functions; oversee research design, methodology and dissemination of information needed to monitor and evaluate project activities and/or advance programmatic and policy changes; and disseminate findings from HKI projects that are of importance to decision-makers in a position to fund or implement projects in Cambodia and internationally.

Qualifications:

Essential

• Minimum master’s degree in public health, development, nutrition or related field plus minimum seven years of experience leading international public health or nutrition programs or equivalent combination of education and experience.
• Demonstrated ability to undertake high-level representation and advocacy;
• Experience and skills in leadership, strategic planning, staff management, program development and management, monitoring and evaluation and public speaking;
• Ability to develop and create budgets and monitor financial status
• Capacity to mobilize program funding including donor cultivation and proposal design and writing; and
• Knowledge and experience managing compliance for diverse donors (USAID, DFID, CIDA/GAC, EU, etc.,);
• Excellent interpersonal skills, including an ability to effectively lead and mentor a team, communicate a vision, make timely and transparent decisions, and manage conflict.
• Very good oral and written English language skills, including the ability to quickly synthesize complex technical and programmatic issues into concise communications.

• Well established and practiced organizational and planning skills;

• Computer literate in use of word-processing, spreadsheet and statistical software; experience in data analysis and interpretation is highly desirable

• Ability and willingness to travel at least 25-30% within Cambodia and periodically internationally. Highly Desirable

• Experience working in Cambodia and/or elsewhere in Asia, with Ministries, international and local NGOs, and donors based locally, is a substantial asset.

• Ability to design and implement events such as workshops and seminars.

• Research and monitoring and evaluation experience, including surveys, monitoring systems and evaluations. Additional experience in research design, data analysis and interpretation is desirable.

• Technical knowledge in an area related to HKI’s mission and programs.

• Experience managing staff security and safety.

The initial contract is for two years with possibility of renewal.

Qualified candidates should submit a cover letter and resume to HKI.Recruitment@hki.org noting the job title in the subject line. Applications will be accepted until the position is filled.

Helen Keller International is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, genetic information, disability, or protected veteran status.