Senior Demand Promotion for Immunization Consultant

The consultant will provide comprehensive technical support for demand promotion across routine immunization, new vaccine introductions, and vaccine-preventable disease outbreak response campaigns in Ethiopia. The role includes coordination with the Federal Ministry of Health and partners to promote vaccine acceptance and uptake through evidence-based social and behavior change interventions.

Responsibilities

• Provide technical support to the Immunization Service Desk (ISD) of MOH and the Communication Technical Working Group (C‑TWG) to design, coordinate, and implement demand promotion strategies aligned with Gavi 6.0.
• Coordinate and liaise with ISD/MOH, UNICEF, and partner agencies to organize and facilitate C‑TWG meetings, including preparation of agendas, documentation of minutes, and follow-up on agreed actions.
• Support the development, operationalization, and monitoring of national immunization demand promotion strategies integrating evidence-based approaches such as behavioral insights and human-centered design.
• Ensure C‑TWG supports planning and implementation of activities promoting vaccine acceptance and uptake under Gavi 6.0 strategic period.
• Provide technical support on implementation, monitoring, and evaluation of demand promotion and risk communication interventions.
• Facilitate development, review, pre-testing, and endorsement of multi-channel communication materials at federal level and support subnational contextualization and translation.
• Coordinate with government and media partners to strengthen social listening and public opinion monitoring systems.
• Support scale-up of innovative and evidence-based demand strategies including digital engagement, HCD interventions, and social listening approaches.
• Strengthen community engagement systems by working with HEWs, VHLs, community leaders, CSOs, and other local community structures.
• Provide capacity-building support for frontline health workers, social mobilizers, media professionals, and hotline operators on interpersonal communication, demand generation, and risk/crisis communication.
• Facilitate and participate in monitoring, evaluation, and learning activities including behavioral and social drivers studies, rapid assessments, social investigations, and field visits.
• Ensure all SBC approaches are inclusive, participatory, and gender-transformative.
• Document and disseminate best practices and human-interest stories related to immunization in coordination with UNICEF teams.
• Prepare and submit required technical reports and deliverables to UNICEF and MOH in line with agreed work plans.

Requirements

• Advance university degree in social science, public health, sociology, anthropology, psychology, communication for development/Social and behavioural change communication.
• Minimum of seven years of relevant SBC/demand promotion experiences in immunization or health sectors at national/federal level.
• In-depth understanding of Ethiopian communities and SBC/demand promotion for immunization key stakeholders at national/federal level.
• Capacity in the designing, planning, monitoring, evaluation, training and skills-transfer of participatory governance in demand promotion for immunization interventions.
• Excellent communication skills with fluent English and Amharic languages.
• Proven ability to work effectively with government/MOH and multi-stakeholders.
• Experience in generating evidence around social and behaviors around immunization practices.
• Capacity in documentation of best practices and lessons learned around demand promotion for immunization interventions.
• Application of Human Centered Design or Behavioral Insights for immunization.
• Experience in SBC evidence generation including facilitation of Behavior and Social Drivers (BeSD) of vaccination in different context.
• Experience in developing, implementing, and monitoring on demand aspect of new vaccine introduction.
• Experience in addressing service delivery, gender and system level barriers around immunization uptake (desirable).

Skills

• Social and Behaviour Change Communication
• Demand Promotion for Immunization
• Immunisation Programme Planning
• Monitoring and Evaluation
• Training and Skills Transfer
• Participatory Governance Design
• Stakeholder Engagement
• Evidence Generation for Immunization
• Documentation of Good Practices
• Human Centered Design
• Behavioral insights application
• Behavior and Social Drivers Facilitation
• New Vaccine Introduction Monitoring
• Service Delivery Barrier Analysis
• Gender Barrier Analysis
• System Level Barrier Analysis
• Government Collaboration
• Stakeholder Coordination
• Public Health Communication

Languages

English, Amharic