Position Title: Gender Expert (Consultant/Fixed-Term) – HRH Optimization Project

Workplace: Addis Ababa / Hybrid (with field travel to regions – Oromia, Southwest Ethiopia, and others)

Duration: 12 months (renewable based on performance and project needs)

Level of Effort: Approximately 25% LOE, with varying degree of engagement across project phases

Salary: Negotiable

Background

MERQ is implementing a three-year Gates Foundation-funded project to enhance the productivity and efficiency of the health workforce in Ethiopia’s Health Extension Program. In close partnership with the Ministry of Health and Regional Health Bureaus, the project begins with a comprehensive review of HRH challenges to identify systemic bottlenecks and opportunities. Using a Human-Centered Design approach, MERQ will then facilitate the co-creation of contextually relevant interventions with key stakeholders, ensuring solutions are grounded in local realities. The project involves a rigorous evaluation of these priority interventions, contributing to sustainable HRH solutions and improved health system performance.

Gender intentionality is a cornerstone of this investment. MERQ emphasizes that all programs that we involve ourselves in should be gender intentional or gender transformative, ensuring that women and men benefit equitably and that systemic gender barriers are addressed. We are therefore seeking a Gender Expert who will guide the integration of gender perspectives throughout the project lifecycle — from diagnostic design to national scale-up.

Purpose of the Assignment

The Gender Expert will ensure that gender perspectives are systematically embedded across all project phases and deliverables. This includes ensuring that each stage of the project — from evidence synthesis to co-design, validation, piloting, and evaluation — applies a gender lens that reflects the lived realities of both women and men in Ethiopia’s health workforce and communities.

Key Responsibilities

• Lead the application of a gender lens at every stage of the project to ensure equitable representation, participation, and benefits for women and men.
• Ensure that gender considerations shape all design, testing, and validation processes, and that gender insights are reflected in final intervention packages.
• Conduct a comprehensive gender analysis of the HEP workforce to identify barriers and opportunities affecting motivation, performance, and career advancement.
• Apply contemporary frameworks (e.g., GF Gender Equality Strategy, Gender Integration Continuum, Gender Analysis Matrix) to guide the project’s gender intentionality.
• Provide a synthesis of gender findings and recommendations during the diagnostic and co-design phases.
• Work closely with MERQ’s technical team and design committees to ensure gender responsiveness in research tools, workshops, and data interpretation.
• Develop guidance and conduct learning sessions to enhance staff and partner understanding of gender intentionality and intersectionality.
• Develop gender-sensitive indicators for measuring productivity, motivation, and equity outcomes.
• Guide the inclusion of sex-disaggregated data and gender-responsive analysis in the project’s MEL framework.
• Ensure that lessons on gender equity are synthesized and shared with MOH, RHBs, and GF.

Deliverables: Review of the proposal before IRB approval, Gender Analysis Report and Action Plan (first 6 months), Technical note on integrating gender into HRH optimization, Inputs into HCD workshops, and Quarterly updates on gender integration.

Qualifications and Experience

• Advanced degree in Gender Studies, Sociology, Public Health, Social Policy, or a related field.
• At least 5 years of experience in gender integration and analysis within public health, development, or health systems research.
• Demonstrated expertise in applying GF and global gender frameworks and best practices on gender and health systems.
• Experience conducting gender analyses, developing indicators, and ensuring gender-responsive MEL systems.
• Strong familiarity with the Ethiopian health system and community-level structures.
• Excellent writing, facilitation, and communication skills in English (Amharic or other local languages an asset).

Level of Effort and Engagement

• This position requires an estimated 25% Level of Effort (LOE) distributed across the project’s phases as follows:
  • Phase 1 (Diagnostic & Evidence Synthesis): ~30% of LOE – gender analysis and framework integration.
  • Phases 2–3 (Co-Design & Prototyping): ~40% of LOE – ensuring gender perspectives in workshops, prototype design, and tool development.
  • Phase 4 (Validation): ~20% of LOE – facilitating stakeholder validation and refining gender dimensions.
  • Phase 5 (Pilot Testing & Evaluation): ~10% of LOE – gender analysis of results, MEL synthesis, and policy recommendations.

How to Apply

Interested applicants are invited to submit:

1. A cover letter (max 2 pages) describing relevant experience and approach to ensuring gender intentionality.
2. An up-to-date CV (max 5 pages).
3. Two professional references or sample gender analysis reports previously completed.

Interested and qualified applicants who meet the requirements should submit their updated CV and Cover letter addressed to the office should be attached on the MERQ online application form with the subject line “Application – Gender Expert (HRH Project).” through the following link:

Click here to start job application

Applications received after November 20, 2025 will not be considered and only those candidates that are short listed for interviews will be notified.