Data Analysis Consultants (3 positions) at Population Services International

Reports to: Sr. Technical Advisor, Research and Learning – A360 Amplify /DISC (depending on the scope of work).

Estimated LOE: 50 days each

Period: July 1, 2022 – December 31, 2023

PROJECT BACKGROUND

Adolescents 360 Amplify

Adolescents 360 (A360), led by Population Services International (PSI), is an adolescent contraceptive service delivery project funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation whose aim is to increase demand of and voluntary uptake and effective use of modern contraceptive methods among adolescent girls (15-19 years old) in Ethiopia, Nigeria, and Kenya. A360 has developed five interventions, two in Nigeria and one intervention each for Kenya, Ethiopia and Tanzania. The project’s initial phase spanned between 2016 and 2020. The current investment phase runs through 2025 and facilitates intervention delivery in Kenya, Ethiopia and Nigeria. The initial phase was evaluated through an external evaluation consisted of a process evaluation, a cost-effectiveness analysis and an outcome evaluation. Additionally, A360 gathered routine service statistics and conducted client exit surveys to understand the experiences of program attendees with the various interventions. Under the current investment, A360 is implementing a comprehensive research and learning agenda co-created with the various stakeholders. The research and learning agenda aims to evaluate the effectiveness of the A360 interventions after the adaptations conducted in 2021, demonstrate the feasibility and implementation outcomes of institutionalizing the A360 interventions into government health systems and to generate learning to advance global adolescent sexual and reproductive health. The agenda will be operationalized through diverse evaluations including household surveys, individual program entry and exit surveys, client exit interviews, mystery client surveys, routine performance monitoring metrics, a process evaluation and prospective cohort studies.

Delivery Innovations in Self Care

Delivering Innovations in Self Care (DISC) project funded by the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF), supports women to take more control over their sexual and reproductive health (SRH) needs. DISC aims to demonstrate that self-care, beginning with contraceptive self-injection, is a viable cornerstone of SRH care and that by offering women increased agency over their health, self-care offers health systems a new and critical partner: consumers themselves. In Nigeria and Uganda DISC is currently designing interventions to improve access and encourage women to self-inject depot medroxyprogesterone acetate (DMPA-SC). DISC’s planned interventions are currently designed to improve access and encourage women to self-inject depot medroxyprogesterone acetate (DMPA-SC). DISC’s planned interventions will focus on building awareness of self-injection, while helping to overcome key barriers throughout the consumer journey. DISC is currently collecting survey data using client exit interviews (prospective cohort study), online surveys, secondary analysis of population based survey as part of its evidence plan to understand the SI user journey among women who initiate use of DMPA-SC. Additionally, the project uses routine service statistics to observe changes in self-inject contraceptive uptake in intervention facilities following implementation of various interventions, The data will enable the project to gain more insight into the client experience over time and the performance of the DISC project’s interventions, enabling course correction as needed over the life of the project.

DESCRIPTION OF NEED

A360 and DISC employs a data and insight-driven adaptive implementation approach to its programming. This entails rapid cycle study design, data collection, analysis and synthesis that informs iterative programmatic course corrections. To ensure insights from collected data are rapidly employed to guide decision making, A360 & DISC seeks the support of three quantitative data analysis consultants to assist in the execution of quantitative data analysis. These consultants will be engaged on specific tasks on a need-by-need basis over the course of 2022, 2023 and probably thereafter. Each task will be clearly defined with a specific scope of work (SOW) with specific activities and a timeline. The SOW will be developed in consultation with the researchers, the program team, and the consultant.

We are looking for someone who

• Experience: Minimum five years of experience analysing data in Stata and R, including experience with diverse datasets. Documented experience creating reproducible analyses in Stata and R, including annotated .do files.
• Communication Skills: Strong communication skills including clear and concise technical writing and ability to communicate the major findings of an analysis in plain language. Published articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals
• Credentials: A Bachelor’s degree in public health, economics, statistics, or a related field. A master’s degree is preferred.
• Language: Fluency in written and spoken English.
• Advanced methods experience: Conversant with descriptive and inferential analysis for different research designs such as difference-in-difference evaluation, interrupted time series, step-wedge design, experience analyzing complex population-based survey data such as DHS including applying survey weights, and cohort data analysis.
• Public Health Experience: Demonstrated experience working on data from various public health issues, including sexual and reproductive health, family planning, malaria, or HIV.
• Experience with data visualization
• Must be authorized to work in Kenya. N.B. PSI will not consider work visa sponsorship for this position.

TASKS

The Data Analysis Consultants will prepare data for analysis, develop a data analysis plan, execute analysis, and document the process for surveys conducted in Kenya, Nigeria, Uganda and Ethiopia. The consultants will work collaboratively with research and program teams to develop a data analysis plan, clean existing and new data from multiple rounds of survey data, coding to generate new variables and execute the analysis in Stata or R. This will include creating detailed tables of study results, revising the analysis plan as needed based on feedback from the researchers, creating do.files for reproducibility of analysis and documenting the final analysis.

DELIVERABLES

• Review Ms. Excel data, clean and import to Stata or R
• Review existing datasets and Stata and R code in the context of the study designs
• Collaboratively generate analysis plans for various studies as requested
• Rapidly perform the recommended analysis coding in Stata or R to accomplish the analysis plan
• Discuss preliminary findings, incorporate feedback from researchers, and revise as necessary
• Thoroughly document the analyses to ensure the data analysis is reproducible