CHAI’s cervical cancer program works to reduce cervical cancer incidence in LMICs by expanding access to secondary prevention services, thereby preventing mortality and morbidity while lowering cancer treatment costs for health systems. The program complements CHAI’s HPV vaccines work, which supports LMICs to introduce and routinize HPV vaccination for adolescent girls (primary prevention).

The program’s approach rests on three interconnected areas of work: (1) supporting Ministries of Health to introduce optimal tools, integrate services into routine healthcare, update policy, build workforce capacity, and strengthen health systems for scale-up; (2) market shaping to improve the access and affordability of existing and new technologies for screening and precancer treatment; (3) advancing innovation, including AI-based screening, to enable same-day screening and treatment.

The program has supported over 12 countries since 2019 to scale screening and treatment services, reaching more than 1.4 million women, while working to ensure high linkage to treatment and referral, improving the affordability and access of critical tools, and advancing the development of AI-assisted tools for screening. CHAI is now supporting governments to build nationally owned costed elimination plans, identifying sustainability pathways, and bringing low-cost AI-assisted screening tools to market.

Position Overview

The Senior Program Manager (SPM) holds day-to-day operational and technical leadership across country support, costing and financing, and diagnostics strategy and execution. The SPM guides associates, senior associates on the team, quality-assures outputs before Director reviews, and represents the program in technical coordination with CHAI's global diagnostics team and other teams across the matrix. The role combines people management, technical review, and direct workstream ownership, and acts as the critical link between country-facing staff and Director-level strategy and donor engagement.

The SPM works closely with the program’s country teams and CHAI’s global diagnostics, markets, health financing, AIR/research, and HPV vaccines teams.

The role manages some senior relationships, including at Unitaid, WHO, and other major donors, and is recognized as a subject-matter expert in cervical cancer prevention.

The base location is flexible with a preference for the role to be based in a program country, pending country leadership approval. An estimated 20% of international travel time is expected.

Responsibilities

Country support and cross-country learning

• Guide associates and senior associates on the team in responding to country requests across relevant functional areas, including elimination plans, work plans, technical reports, and case studies.
• Review and quality-assure country support outputs produced by associates and senior associates before Director review, including elimination plans, technical reports, donor reports, learning agenda pieces, memos, decks, case studies etc. Provide structured, actionable technical feedback to strengthen outputs.
• Serve as the first point of escalation for country teams before issues reach the Director; quickly identify critical problems, break down and prioritize different parts of complex challenges, and apply lessons and best practices to redirect activities effectively.
• Monitor the volume and pattern of country support requests and propose the team structure best suited to manage demand, whether organized around dedicated country assignments or around functional specialization.

Costing and financing workstream leadership

• Provide technical and managerial oversight on the costing workstream, including on methodology, data quality, and consistency of costing outputs across programme countries. Guide the Associate serving as the costing focal point to deliver high-quality analyses aligned with the programme's broader elimination planning and financing strategy. (This workstream is expected to conclude within the next 6-9 months.)
• Take on ownership of the cervical cancer financing workstream, with guidance from CHAI's global health financing team. Support countries to identify sustainable financing pathways for scale-up, conduct financing analyses, translate costing outputs into formats suitable for donor reporting and national planning, and develop a toolkit of financing approaches that can be adapted across settings.
• Maximize the use of data to identify problems in financing and costing approaches, monitor progress, and develop effective, evidence-based solutions; apply lessons and best practices from across the program to inform or redirect activities.
• Lead on creation of the learning agenda pieces for the costing and financing workstreams. Lead the development of cross-country learning products, work closely with the Senior Associate to track progress on other learning agenda commitments, provide technical reviews, and coordinate the dissemination and socialization of outputs with the communications team.

Diagnostics strategy and AI-assisted screening

• Refine the program's diagnostics strategy, aligning country needs with global market-shaping priorities for screening and precancer treatment technologies, including new technologies entering the market — AI-assisted screening tools and near point of care HPV tests.
• Work closely with the Global Diagnostics Team to ensure country-level and supplier-facing inputs are reflected in the program’s diagnostic strategy; apply knowledge across disciplines to inform approaches that bridge product, policy, and country adoption.
• Flag country-level constraints or opportunities that should inform diagnostic tool selection, procurement pathways, or rollout sequencing.
• Support country teams in scoping and planning for the deployment of AI-assisted screening tools. This would involve working closely with Global Markets team, global project manager for AI-assisted screening tools and the country teams to develop detailed, sequenced work plans that lay the operational groundwork for in-country introduction of such tools, covering regulatory approval pathways, digital health integration requirements, procurement and supply chain considerations, and service delivery readiness. Engage relevant CHAI teams with prior experience rolling out new health technologies to incorporate lessons learned into planning.

Resource mobilization and fundraising

• Lead on the development of proposals for multi-country and country-level funding opportunities, coordinating input from cross-functional and cross-country teams.

Program reporting and financial management

• Work with the senior associate and finance manager to prepare and finalise the periodic program and financial reports to key donors.
• Work with the finance manager to develop annual budget revisions for donors, as well as forecasts and re-forecasts for the program; understand and flag the implications of over-spend or under-spend, and track obligations, commitments, and expenditure of funds in detail.

People management

• Directly manage and mentor a small team of associates and senior associates, ensuring appropriate workload distribution, training, and performance feedback; bring individuals together to function as a cohesive and productive unit; provide guidance to other managers on staffing decisions and development plans where relevant.
• Coach and support the professional development of associates and senior associates on the team, providing structured feedback and contributing to succession planning.
• Lead cross-functional coordination across CHAI’s matrix, including with Global Diagnostics Team, Analytics and Implementation Research, Global Markets Team, health financing, and HPV vaccination teams.

Program strategy

• Direct the team in shaping materials and key messages for senior stakeholders; support development and tailoring of program presentations at global and country level, translating technical content into accessible formats suited to relevant audiences for fundraising, internal and external strategy discussions, and dissemination of program learnings.
• Support refinement of CHAI’s screening and treatment program strategy and CHAI’s integrated cervical elimination strategy; advise senior management on program objectives and strategy to achieve results.
• Contribute to ideation and design of data visualizations and technical presentation of program data.
• Evaluate the program’s current network of partners and technical advisors for relevance and effectiveness; identify and initiate new connections with senior external stakeholders that facilitate achievement of strategic goals, including collaborating with senior-level technical staff external to CHAI.

Additional responsibilities

• Represent CHAI in WHO’s cervical cancer Guidelines Development Group, compile relevant updates from CHAI country global teams to feed into the GDG meetings, and report back progress and updates from GDG to program senior management.
• Take initiative to address emerging priorities and respond to evolving program needs.
• Undertake additional tasks as requested by the line manager to advance program objectives.

Qualifications

We seek an experienced and highly motivated program manager who is passionate about eliminating cervical cancer. An ideal candidate will be described as:

• Strong strategic and analytical thinker: You understand the big picture and can translate complex challenges into clear, actionable workplans. You are comfortable working with large amounts of quantitative and qualitative data and can extract logical conclusions and recommendations to guide program direction.
• Effective project and people management skills: You are adept at managing complex, multi-workstream initiatives from design to completion with clarity and accountability. You can guide and develop junior team members, foster collaboration across a matrixed organization, and ensure high-quality outputs under tight deadlines.
• Entrepreneurial mindset: You are resourceful, proactive, and driven to find solutions, with a strong bias for action and a track record of delivering results in fast-paced, ambiguous environments.
• Excellent interpersonal and relationship management skills: You have strong written and oral communication skills and can work effectively with a wide array of internal and external partners. You can respectfully and effectively navigate varied and sensitive stakeholder environments, including in-country teams and senior leaders.
• Fundraising and resource mobilization experience: You are comfortable contributing to proposals and concept notes, coordinating input across teams, and supporting efforts to mobilize resources for program expansion.
• Results driven: You remain engaged and motivated until a task is successfully completed, and you hold yourself and others accountable for delivering high-quality work

Experience:

• Master’s degree (for example, MBA, MPH, or a related discipline) with 7–8 years of progressively responsible experience in global health, management consulting, or a related field.
• Demonstrated experience leading global or multi-country teams and managing complex, high-value grant portfolios.
• Proven track record in country programs, product access, or health financing within LMIC contexts.
• Recognized expertise in the program’s technical area.
• Excellent relationship management skills, including experience navigating senior, political, and multilateral stakeholder relationships.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including experience with creating and delivering high-quality presentations/ decks, with the ability to represent CHAI at high levels externally.
• Willingness to travel internationally, approximately 20% of the time.

Advantages:

• Experience working remotely with a decentralized team
• Experience working in and/or supporting low- and middle-income countries.
• Professional fluency in additional languages.

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Originally posted on Himalayas