Program Manager – American India Foundation

The American India Foundation is committed to improving the lives of India’s underprivileged,with a special focus on women, children, and youth. AIF does this through high impact interventions in education, health, and livelihoods, because poverty is multidimensional. AIF’sunique value proposition is its broad engagement between communities, civil society, and expertise, thereby building a lasting bridge between the United States and India. With officesin New York and California, twelve chapters across the U.S., and India operations headquartered in Delhi NCR, AIF has impacted 12.9 million lives across 35 States and Union Territories of India. Learn more at www.aif.org

Background of the Program:
AIF has designed a program that will address anemia and menstrual hygiene among school-going adolescent girls of age 11-19 years in the Madhepura district of Bihar. The major interventions include awareness on anemia, and hygienic practices during menstruation, followed by Hb testing, and distribution of lucky iron leaves and reusable sanitary pads among the girls.

Job Summary:
The position is responsible for leading the program implementation, fostering partnerships and liaison with the government at the district and state levels. Towards this, the position will hire and manage a team of dedicated professionals in the project location. The position will support in identifying partner organizations who will have specific roles in program implementation and monitoring activities.

Roles & Responsibilities:

Key Responsibilities:
1. Program Management:

• Oversee the implementation of the program in the Madhepura district of Bihar.
• Prepare and manage a dynamic project implementation plan, in consultation with key team members and the government.
• Support community facilitators in the selection and capacity building of Sakhi (champions) at the school level.
• Ensure correct selection of target beneficiaries among the target population.
• Ensure correct dissemination of knowledge related to the program interventions among adolescent beneficiaries.
• Undertake supportive supervision of block-level teams in the routine implementation of planned activities. A total of around 6 team members are expected to be part of the program.
• Ensure accuracy in program data collection and reporting.
• Ensure appropriate distribution of lucky iron leaves and reusable sanitary pads among the beneficiaries.
• Guidance to community facilitators on adequate documentation of users/beneficiaries’ feedback on the usage of lucky iron leaves and reusable sanitary pads.
• Undertake documentation of the program for internal learning and donor reporting purposes.
• Engage with government and donor(s) for program planning, review and reporting.
• Facilitate day-to-day project management tasks including financial management, human resources management, procurement and office administration.

2. Government Engagement and Relationship:

• Facilitate a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with state or district government for ensuring co-operation from all departments concerned towards the program.
• Establishes and maintains regular contact with the government officials and decision-makers, program implementing partners at district level for program review, sharing of learnings and contribute to policy influence.
• Work towards AIF representation at government meetings.
• Engage with district governments to encourage adoption of best practices demonstrated in the program including providing support to budget planning.

3. Building Partnerships and Resource mobilization:

• Network with alliances and other like-minded organizations for replication of the program.
• Support in proposal development and donor engagement, in co-ordination with the Strategic Partnership team and government engagement team at AIF.

4. Capacity Building:

• Facilitate and coordinate high-quality and timely training of program staff and other stakeholders.

5. Monitoring and Evaluation (in co-ordination with LEI team at AIF):

• Coordinate with the government in seeking approvals for conducting routine monitoring, baseline, end-line surveys, and needs assessment studies, as necessary.
• Coordination with the MIS person (from agency/AIF) for Data Quality, Analysis and generation of periodic reports.
• Facilitate the development, implementation and strengthening of program MIS.
• Undertake field visits to monitor programs as well as conduct periodic program reviews with government counterparts and other partners.
• Prepare regular monitoring reports, both for AIF, donors and internal audiences, on the progress of the program.

Key Skills and Competencies:

• Masters in social sciences/public health management or a related field.
• Minimum of 5 years’ experience in program monitoring and implementation.
• Relevant sectoral knowledge concerning adolescent health and well-being.
• Understanding of state and district government structures and previous experience of working with state and local governments.
• Demonstrated skills to mentor staff in delivering their job responsibilities
• Ability to network and negotiate effectively with a wide range of stakeholders to achieve the objectives of the program.
• Fluency in written and spoken Hindi and English.
• A self-starter who can perform with minimal supervision.
• Willingness to travel for at least 30% of time within the state .

Other: Salary shall be commensurate with experience.

Position Availability: Immediately

Application Process: To apply for this role please send your CV to ph.career@aif.org with a subject line “Program Manager”.

Only short-listed candidates will be contacted