Senior Program Officer, Sustainable and Equitable Health Financing at Results for Development

Senior Program Officer – Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania

Practice area description

R4D’s Health Systems experts works with change agents to shape global and country-level markets and dramatically expand access to affordable, high-quality essential health products and services that help people lead healthier, more productive lives.

R4D’s Sustainable and Equitable Health Financing practice ensures that resources are mobilized, allocated and used more effectively to deliver high-quality, affordable health services and products. Our integrated approach ensures financing aligns with and supports the broader health system, including service delivery and procurement of crucial supplies, with key functions like planning, budgeting and provider payment in sync. We support health system leaders to better understand public financial management systems and influence different stages of the budget cycle, helping ensure that resources are allocated and spent in ways that align with national priorities and deliver measurable results. By applying a holistic systems lens, we consider the incentives, disincentives and institutional dynamics that must align to achieve sustainable health financing and service delivery.

Please visit our website and project page summaries to learn more about this life-saving work.

Opportunity

• Position title: Senior Program Officer
• Practice/department/team: Sustainable and Equitable Health Financing practice
• Reports to: Tanzania Country Director
• Term: 2 years, renewable
• Location: Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania. This role is a hybrid position, with a mix of remote work and in-office days and some domestic and/or international travel, when required.

Position summary: The Senior Program Officer will support a growing health systems and health financing portfolio in Tanzania, providing technical and project management support across multiple engagements. The role will initially be anchored across two projects, contributing to work that spans public financial management, health financing, subnational capacity building, and health system strengthening. The Senior Program Officer will work closely with government counterparts and in-country partners to drive high-quality, impactful results across both workstreams.

Key Responsibilities

Lead internal and external partner engagement

• Participates fully as a member of R4D by contributing, assisting, and participating in projects, activities, and initiatives as requested by management
• Under the leadership and guidance of the Country Director, cultivate new relationships and effectively manage key existing relationships with donors, partners, and external stakeholders globally/regionally and local partners in Tanzania including and not limited to: the Ministry of Health (MoH), Ministry of Finance (MoF), the Prime Minister’s Office, Regional Administration and Local Government (PMORALG), and other actors
• Build and manage relationships across MoH, PMO-RALG, and MoF to foster shared understanding of PFM challenges and collaborate to identify solutions and priority interventions
• Represent health financing and PFM related projects with senior government counterparts and engage technical stakeholders — including PFM systems designers — to support integration and institutionalization of identified solutions
• Present findings and project updates to Funders
• Co-develop and provide input into insightful and engaging thought pieces (e.g., articles, blogs, conference presentations) that can bring attention to R4D’s work globally from key stakeholders such as key funders and audiences we aim to influence with our work

Provide day-to-day technical leadership

• Draw insights from analyses and lead development of high quality and actionable government, donor and partner-facing documents
• Lead assessments and stakeholder consultations to diagnose gaps in planning, budgeting, and resource allocation processes at national and subnational levels
• Design and develop technical tools, models, and frameworks that strengthen evidence-based planning, budgeting, revenue forecasting, and resource allocation across government systems
• Provide technical guidance on health financing mechanisms and PFM processes as they relate to service delivery planning and budget formulation
• Lead or contribute to the development of costed implementation roadmaps, including milestones, accountability structures, and M&E frameworks

Effectively manage high-impact projects

• Develop project workplans and ensure timely execution of activities, including proactively and creatively managing problems that arise and anticipating ways to avoid them
• Track workplan implementation and project impact indicators against expected outputs and outcomes, flagging risks and adjusting plans as needed
• Ensure timely, high-quality production of project deliverables including tools, reports, technical documentation, and policy briefs
• Plan, sequence, and oversee multi-day technical workshops, working group meetings, and capacity-building trainings across national and subnational levels
• Monitor progress toward institutionalization goals, including system integration and government adoption of developed frameworks
• Contribute to the continued evolution of a positive and collaborative team culture

Thought leadership and Entrepreneurship

• Under the leadership and guidance of the Country Director, maintains relationships with potential funders and partners, including country government counterparts to elicit and effectively articulate priority government needs that can then be translated to future opportunities
• Apply an entrepreneurial mindset to expand R4D’s impact, particularly in Tanzania—supporting the Country Director in surfacing new opportunities, designing innovative approaches, and fostering partnerships that strengthen our work and enhance the team's impact

You’re a great fit if you are:

• Genuinely passionate about the potential for health systems strengthening and health financing approaches to deliver health impact equitably and efficiently
• A strong communicator with excellent interpersonal skills, able to vary one’s style based on the audience and distill complex concepts into clear messaging
• Energized by managing and executing on complex projects in a low- or middle-income context
• Highly analytical, and a structured and creative problem solver
• Entrepreneurial and proactive, with a track record of leading initiatives, cultivating relationships, and advancing business development efforts
• A culturally sensitive relationship manager who is enthusiastic about supporting team members’ professional growth
• Collaborative, approachable, and invested in enabling a positive working environment
• Willing to travel domestically and internationally, per project need

Qualifications: The ideal candidate will have excellent interpersonal, written, and oral communication skills, possess a strong work ethic and a ‘can-do’ attitude. They will be expected to successfully manage competing priorities and deadlines in a fast-paced environment while still overseeing technical project work and coaching and mentoring colleagues.

• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including demonstrated ability to develop and deliver compelling presentations
• Ability to think strategically, handle ambiguity and work in a fast-paced, open-structure, multicultural environment
• Track record of building trust, forging partnerships, and conducting advocacy across a variety of actors in multicultural environments.
• Exceptionally detail-oriented, excellent judgment, and ability to deliver high-quality results within tight timeframes
• Significant experience working in Tanzania strongly preferred
• Good understanding of health system blocks
• Fluency in Kiswahili
• Advanced degree in public health, health economics, public financial management, public administration, or a related field
• Minimum of 7 years of experience in public financial management, health systems strengthening, or health financing in low- or middle-income country contexts
• Demonstrated expertise in government planning and budgeting processes, including budget formulation, ceiling-setting, and execution monitoring
• Strong knowledge of health financing mechanisms, including cost-sharing arrangements such as NHIF and user fee systems
• Familiarity with subnational health governance structures and decentralized planning systems, ideally in the East African context
• Experience working with or alongside government and navigating multi-stakeholder institutional environments
• Proficiency in data analysis and evidence-based planning, including working with health information systems such as DHIS2, PlanRep, and FFARS
• Experience designing and facilitating capacity-building programs for government officials at national, regional, and facility levels
• Knowledge of vertical health program structure and the policy and operational challenges of health system integration
• Strong facilitation and stakeholder engagement skills, particularly for technical working groups and high-level validation meetings