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ABOUT VILLAGEREACH

VillageReach transforms health care delivery to reach everyone. We are driven by a vision of a world where each person has the health care needed to thrive. VillageReach’s goal is to reduce inequities in access to quality primary health care for 350 million people by 2030. We work with governments, the private sector, partners and communities to build responsive primary health care systems that deliver health products, information and services to the most under-reached. As a locally driven and globally connected organization, VillageReach has offices in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique and the United States.

Summary

The Senior Manager, Supply Chain and Advocacy will provide strategic leadership for supply chain advocacy and technical support in Kenya, with a strong focus on integrating community health supply chain commodities into national systems. A core responsibility of this role is to co‑develop and drive plans for the integration of community health commodities into national and county budgets, information systems, supply chain systems, standard operating procedures (SOPs), and training curricula to improve availability of essential supplies at the last mile.

This role forms a critical part of the Supply Chain for Primary Health Care program, which aims to strengthen health systems and ensure that essential health products consistently reach under‑reached and hard‑to‑reach communities. The Senior Manager will serve as the lead national advocate for community commodity integration within government systems and will provide technical and strategic support to advance supply chain strengthening efforts across Kenya.

The position reports directly to the Senior Director of Global Programs (East & Southern Africa) and works closely with the Senior Manager, Supply Chain to support community health supply chain improvement activities as needed. The role will engage regularly with national‑level government partners and decision‑makers to advance the advocacy agenda and influence policy and system reforms.

VillageReach collaborates closely with the Ministry of Health, including the Department of Health Products and Technology (DHPT), the Division of Community Health (DCH), KEMSA, County Governments (including Migori, Homabay, Baringo, Nyeri, Kwale, Turkana, and others as they arise), and the Community Health Unit for Universal Health Coverage (CHU4UHC). The Senior Manager will represent VillageReach in engagements at the national level and support coordinated action across stakeholders.

The role is based in Nairobi, Kenya, with periodic travel to counties in support of supply chain activities as needed. A successful candidate will bring a strong track record of advocacy and influencing policy and process change at the national level, as well as demonstrated experience supporting supply chain improvements at all levels. This will require the political savvy and utmost professionalism to work with the national level and support the other Senior Manager at the county.

Duties and Responsibilities

Essential Duties and Responsibilities include the following. Other duties, responsibilities, and activities may change or be assigned at any time.

1. Supply Chain Advocacy (50%)

• In alignment with Kenya Ministry of Health (MOH) strategies, VillageReach strategic objectives, and overall country priorities, and in close collaboration with the Senior Director of Global Programs (East & Southern Africa), lead and support national‑level supply chain advocacy efforts.
• Work closely with national MOH stakeholders including the Division of Community Health (DCH), the Department of Health Products and Technology (DHPT), parastatal KEMSA, County Governments, and the Council of Governors to develop and execute a clear, evidence‑based advocacy plan to elevate supply chain needs and planning considerations for Community Health Promoters and Assistants (CHPs/CHAs) at national and county levels.
• Advocate for increased and sustained funding for community health supply chain needs, including the integration of community health commodity requirements into national budgets and alignment and inclusion within county budgets.
• Represent VillageReach in national‑level forums, including the Community Health Unit for Universal Health Coverage (CHU4UHC) and other relevant technical working groups.
• Develop and provide evidence-based advocacy materials and technical inputs for national platforms, including CHU4UHC and other relevant technical working groups, to support the integration of CHW supply chain considerations into national systems, policies, curricula, and guidelines.
• Support the preparation of clear, accurate, and timely update presentations, reports, and briefing materials for government and partner engagements to ensure consistent, transparent communication of progress and results.

2. Technical Support (30%)

• In close collaboration with the Senior Manager, Supply Chain; Ministry of Health; and key partners including Lwala, Amref, and other CHU4UHC members, provide technical support to:
• Finalize national community commodity supply chain SOPs and mentorship modules for integration within broader community health SOPs.
• Support the rollout and adoption of the national quantification tools.
• Support the integration of supply chain modules into the updated eCHIS platform.
• Support the integration of community health commodities into the national LMIS.
• Collaborate closely with VillageReach program teams, MOH departments, KEMSA, and implementing partners to ensure coordinated and high‑quality delivery of technical activities.
• Provide inputs to the Senior Manager Supply Chain on, and support as needed, supply chain strengthening activities, including supply chain assessments, system design, warehousing and inventory management, transportation and distribution, forecasting and supply planning, and supply chain performance management.
• Provide inputs to the Senior Manager Supply Chain on curriculum development, supervision approaches, and training delivery and support as needed.

3. Business Development (10%)

• In collaboration with the Senior Director of Global Programs (East & Southern Africa) and other VillageReach team members, contribute to business development efforts by identifying, cultivating, and securing funding opportunities to advance community health supply chain work in Kenya.
• Support proposal development and donor engagement efforts to enable continued program growth and expansion.

4. Stakeholder Engagement (10%)

• Engage respectfully and collaboratively, in line with VillageReach values and competencies, with national‑level MOH entities (DCH, DHPT, KEMSA), County Governments, the Council of Governors, CHU4UHC partners, and other stakeholders to strengthen community health supply chains.
• Represent VillageReach in CHU4UHC monthly meetings and maintain regular coordination with key partners, including holding monthly meetings with Lwala and Amref.
• Work closely with the Senior Manager, Supply Chain to provide written updates and presentations to DCH and DHPT on a monthly basis, highlighting progress, challenges, and upcoming activities.

Competencies:

VillageReach has ten (10) Organizational Competencies that describe how we work together and get things done that are grouped into three strategic areas of Achieving Great Results, Setting Direction and, Bringing Others With you. For a full description, please download our Organizational Competency document.

Achieving Great Results:

1. Risk Taking and Innovation

· Key Behaviors: Comfort with ambiguity, curiosity, adaptability, unconstrained and undeterred creativity, resourcefulness.

2. Business Judgement

· Key Behaviors: Getting to root causes, understanding environment, navigating complexity and ambiguity, entrepreneurial energy.

3. Building Strong Teams

· Key Behaviors: Trust in Subject Matter Experts (SME’s); radical candor to resolve conflict, hold each other accountable as colleagues, focused on results, commitment to mission.

Setting Direction:

4. Compelling Communication

· Key Behaviors: Clear and evidence-based communication, audience adaptability, curious listener.

5. Resilient Self Leadership

· Key Behaviors: Self-aware, plan how one shows up, emotionally intelligent, use one’s own agency and takes accountability.

6. Stewardship and Personal Alignment

· Key Behaviors: Take ownership, display ethical conduct, effective at resource management, alignment of personal objectives with organizational goals and mission, focus on continuous improvement and sustainability.

Bringing Others with You:

7. Influencing Leadership

· Key Behaviors: Cultivate trust, influences to make change, navigate the matrix structure.

8. Radical Partnership

· Key Behaviors: Share information and credit, address conflict, increase impact through collaboration, political and contextual awareness.

9. Cultivates a Growth Mindset

· Key Behaviors: Seek out diverse input, demonstrate flexibility in thinking and curiosity, embrace challenges, demonstrate persistence, seek learning opportunities.

10. Cultural Intelligence and Inclusion

· Key Behaviors: Continuous learning and ally-ship across cultural lines, challenge prejudice and bias, modeled in one’s own behavior.

To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily. The requirements listed below are representative of the knowledge, skill and/or ability required. Reasonable accommodation may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Supervisory Responsibilities:

This position has no supervisory responsibilities.

Education & Experience:

· Bachelor’s or graduate degree or equivalent in supply chain management, public health, international development, business or related field. Additional education in advocacy highly preferred.

· 5-7 years’ work experience working with global health policy and advocacy (preferably in supply chain).

· Minimum 7 years’ work experience working in supply chains within public or private sector.

· Demonstrated experience working closely with governments to adopt policy reforms.

· Demonstrated experience developing advocacy briefs and presentations to influence policy makers.

· Demonstrated experience interacting with government agencies, host country governments and counterparts, and international donor agencies; excellent networking and partnership building skills.

· Demonstrated leadership qualities, depth and breadth of technical, management expertise for complex programs in resource-constrained countries.

· Excellent planning and prioritization skills as well as creative problem-solving and analytical skills.

· Experience working with government partners at the national and county level.

· Demonstrated knowledge and understanding of supply chain systems and data flow at the community level.

· Experience providing consulting services, specifically supporting the implementation of changes to Ministry of Health processes and systems.

· Experience working with geographically distributed teams.

Other Qualifications:

· Established cultural competency in partnering with racial, cultural and linguistically diverse groups.

· Ability to work professionally and communicate effectively with government, partners, and VillageReach staff.

· Ability to work in the best of interest of VillageReach as an organization, rather than with a program lens.

· Can carefully navigate complex political dynamics with the MOH and other partners.

· Eligibility to work in Kenya and excellent understanding of country health system

· Demonstrated understanding of challenges with working in rural, underserved and low-income context; experience living in and/or working in a low-income country a plus.

· Proficient in Microsoft Office Suite (Word, PowerPoint, Outlook, Excel) and comfortable in a fast-paced technical environment.

· Fluency in English and Swahili with professional proficiency in writing and speaking

· Communications skills to present convincingly to senior government officials, TA partners and conference audiences.

Environment and Physical Demands:

VillageReach employees typically work in a shared, open environment with task and conference rooms accessible to employees for privacy and meetings. The noise level in the work environment is usually quiet. Due to the time zone differences across our USA, Kenya and Country Offices and location of other global staff, we have established core collaboration hours between 6am Pacific Time and 18:00 South Africa Time (GMT+1) Monday through Thursday. All staff, regardless of location are expected to be available between these hours. During Daylight Savings Time, this allows for 12 hours per week (3 hours/day) of collaboration time and during Standard Time, 8 hours (2 hours/day). We do not hold cross-office meetings on Friday.

COMMITMENT TO DIVERSITY & INCLUSION:

VillageReach is an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer committed to workforce diversity. We believe that diverse, equitably weighted perspectives foster an organizational capacity to create novel solutions that improve health in the most under-reached and hard-to-reach areas. To align our values, innovations and impact, VillageReach is committed to recruiting and retaining a diverse global workforce.

APPLICATION INFORMATION:

This is an immediate hire and therefore resumes will be reviewed on a rolling basis until the position is filled. To apply, please submit your resume and cover letter to our online portal: http://www.villagereach.org/join-us/. In your cover letter, please address (1)Why you are interested in this position, (2)What is one reason you think you’d be a good fit for this position and, (3)what is one strength you would bring to this position?

Hiring Process:

The hiring process will include the following steps:

1. Review submitted applications

2. Conduct 20-30 minute screening interviews for shortlisted candidates

3. Conduct skills and value-based interviews for 3-5 candidates.

4. Request that top candidates submit a practical assessment (designed to take no more than two hours to complete). Sometimes the assignment will occur before the interview.

5. Conduct final interview if necessary

6. Request references

7. Make offer

8. Conduct background check

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted, but candidates who proceed to step 2 will be notified if they are not chosen for step 3.

Safeguarding:

VillageReach is committed to promoting the welfare of children, young people, adults, and beneficiaries with whom it engages. We expect everyone working with us to share this commitment through our code of conduct.All offers of employment will be subject to satisfactory references and appropriate screening checks, which may include criminal records. VillageReach participates in the Misconduct Disclosure Scheme and, in line with this Scheme, we will request information from job applicants’ previous employers about any findings of sexual exploitation, sexual abuse, and/or sexual harassment during employment, or incidents under investigation when the applicant left employment. By applying, the job applicant confirms his/her understanding of these recruitment procedures.

Compensation & Benefits:

VillageReach has an established compensation structure that is based on the relevant market and internally transparent. The annual range for this position is $77,000 to $100,400. We hire people into the established range based on one’s experience and education and considering internal equity. We do not inquire about salary history. Please refer to our compensation overview on our website for more information and for more information on employee benefits.