Consultancy Services Needed for Commonwealth Partnerships for Antimicrobial Stewardship Program

Introduction to the Commonwealth Partnerships for Antimicrobial Stewardship

Funded by the UK Department for Health and Social Care’s Fleming Fund and managed by THET and the Commonwealth Pharmacists Association (CPA), the first round of CwPAMS funded 12 health partnerships to tackle the growing challenge of antimicrobial resistance in Ghana, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia. These projects focus on strengthening the capacity of health workers in antimicrobial stewardship within individual health institutions. All activities fed into implementing the governments’ AMR National Action Plans.
The THET Kenya Consultant will carry out activities in Kenya for the Commonwealth Partnerships for Antimicrobial Stewardship (CwPAMS) program, which is being extended until June 2022.
The program extension will be implemented in four additional countries: Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria and Sierra Leone. A total of £250,000 is available for projects running from October 2021 to May 2022. We expect up to 5 grants to be awarded in Kenya.
THET UK is overall responsible and accountable for the delivery of the program. The Grants Management team based in the UK will co-ordinate the selection, contracting, payments and reporting of all grant holders. The UK Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) team, will provide MEL tools and resources for grant holders and the program team to use. These teams will ensure a standardized approach, tools and systems for the delivery in each country, adapted as necessary to the local context.
In each country, an in-country THET representative will support grant holders, ensuring they are implementing quality projects efficiently and effectively and will collaborate between health partners and relevant local stakeholders.

This document serves as a Terms of Reference for the type of work the THET Consultant should expect to carry out as part of this.

Work streams
The activities expected of the Kenya coordinator as part of this scheme will fall into the following work streams:

1. Developing and strengthening coordination between health partnerships and other key health institutions, including the Ministry of Health (MoH), national AMR coordinating bodies and other Fleming Fund actors.
2. Facilitating learning and collaboration between health partnerships
3. Supporting health partnerships to improve their operations
4. Supporting the UK grants team with monitoring of partnerships
   We are interested in exploring the possibility to expand THET’s work in-country and would welcome the consultants’ identification of any appropriate opportunities. Where new projects are introduced in the country, this could lead to opportunities to expand the role of the consultant.

WORKSTREAM 1: Developing and Strengthening Co-Ordination between Health Partnerships, Ministry of Health and other key Health Institutions to align with strategic priorities

Objective: To ensure that project activity is in line with country, Fleming Fund and MoH plans, to strengthen and expand stakeholder buy-in to improve the sustainable impact of the projects and to ensure the program is accountable to national stakeholders.

Activities:

• Establish and promote key relationships between partnerships and national stakeholders (e.g. Fleming Fund grantee, MoH departments, AMR and AMS taskforces);
• Where appropriate, represent partners at meetings with key stakeholders, e.g. at relevant working groups/steering committees;
• Facilitate, where appropriate, partnership involvement in technical working groups;
• Provide regular updates to THET UK on the above, as well as changes in health sector priorities, stakeholder relations, changes in the operating environment, media engagement opportunities and upcoming events.

WORKSTREAM 2: Facilitating Learning and Collaboration between Health Partnerships

Objective: To ensure learning, synergies and sustainability, and to avoid duplication.
Activities:

• Contribute to planning for, and attend, the grant holder inception workshop (currently anticipated to be held virtually in early October 2021)
• Facilitate introductions, and strengthen relationships, between health partnerships and other relevant programs and organizations, ensuring maximum effectiveness and minimize duplication.

WORKSTREAM 3: Supporting Health Partnerships to Improve their Operations and Deliver Effective and Sustainable Projects in line with National Plans

Objective: To facilitate the effective delivery of projects and support partners, particularly the LMIC partner, to have the capacity to take a leadership role within the partnership. Strengthening project management processes will allow partners to spend time more efficiently on achieving their project outcomes.

Activities:

• Work with the THET Grants Management team to ensure that in-country partners understand what is required of them with regards to project management (including M&E, finances, activity plan and reporting, partnership relations, procurement etc.) and support them where necessary to overcome identified challenges.
• Advise grant holders on how activities can be scaled up, and support linkages with the MoH, appropriate regulatory bodies, other donors and programs , ensuring that projects are embedded into the health system.
• Provide logistical support around health partnership events/visa processes/ethical approvals, UK volunteers,
• Attend or present at health partnerships’ events.

WORKSTREAM 4: IN-Country Monitoring of Partnerships and Risk Management

Objective: To accompany the progress of the projects and to ensure any potential challenges and risks are identified and mitigated as soon as possible.

Activities:

• Conduct at least one visit to the partner institutions throughout the program, and hold regular phone calls, to accompany progress, ensure that challenges identified through reports and monitoring visits are being successfully overcome and that any new challenges, concerns, developments or opportunities are identified quickly.
• Contribute to the review of the final grant holder reports (UK-led activity) and provide feedback to the THET Grants Management team
• Identify any changes to the personnel amongst the grant holders
• Maintain country risk registers to monitor the operational, delivery, reputational, safeguarding and fiduciary risks, in conjunction with the London team, alerting the UK team and grant holders to heightened risks as appropriate.

Proposed timeframe
10 consulting days from August 2021 to May 2022. The Consultant will be expected to work one day a month, although there will be some flexibility within this (some months will require much more capacity, others less).

Contractual Responsibilities

Reports to: THET Head of Grants Management, based in London. The Consultant will be responsible for managing the workload and conducting the activities in a timely and efficient manner as set out in this document. Given the number of activities and the small amount of time, the Consultant will agree with the Head of Grants Management on which aspects to prioritize. The Consultant will have regular reporting points with the Head of Grants Management, largely through quarterly reports and meetings, and will be expected to keep them informed on progress and key issues.

The Consultant will also liaise with the Kenya CPA Consultant, who will provide technical support relating to antimicrobial stewardship to the grant holders.

Knowledge Skills and Experience for the Consultancy

To successfully undertake this assignment, the Consultant should meet the following minimum requirements:

• Recent experience of liaising with the Ministry of Health in Kenya
• Strong project management experience in the health sector in Kenya.
• Experience in working in partnership with others to promote capacity building.
• Degree level education. [Public health or related discipline preferred.]
• Analytical skills and demonstrable ability to think strategically
• Excellent representational, written and verbal communication skills in English and other local languages• Proven financial skills (budget preparation and monitoring)
• Proven organizational and administrative skills with sound IT skills (Word and Excel)
• Flexibility and adaptability in the context of working within a small organization and in a complex environment.
• Well organized with the ability to work independently and take the initiative.
• Experience in proposal development
• Experience of working in a senior position in an INGO context (desirable)
• Knowledge or experience in antimicrobial resistance or stewardship (desirable)
• Experience in managing security and risk in an INGO context (desirable)

ANNEX 1 – Tropical Health and Education Trust (THET)
One billion people will never see a qualified health worker in their lives. For over thirty years, THET – www.thet.org – has been working to change this, training health workers to build a world where everyone has access to affordable and quality healthcare. We do this by leveraging the expertise and energy of the UK health community, supporting health partnerships between hospitals, colleges and clinics in the UK and those overseas.
From reducing maternal deaths in Uganda to improving the quality of hospital care for injured children in Myanmar, we work to strengthen local health systems and build a healthier future for all. In the past ten years alone, THET has reached over 100,000 health workers across 31 countries in Africa, the Middle East and Asia in partnership with over 130 UK institutions and UK health workers who have contributed over 60,000 days of their time as volunteers. Health partnerships have contributed to more effective and efficient health systems in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).

They also benefit the UK health sector through improved health professional competencies, motivation, health service innovations and global influence.2 THET is a fund manager for health partnership grants programs on behalf of the UK government and corporations. Health partnerships are long-term, institutional relationships between health organizations in the UK and their counterparts in LMICs, and are based on ideas of co-development, reciprocal learning and mutual benefit. Staff from UK health institutions volunteer their time developing and carrying out health systems strengthening activities at their LMIC partner institution, be that training, curriculum development, leadership and governance, etc.