Senior Manager, Risk – COVAX (Temporary)

Position title:

Senior Manager, Risk – COVAX (Temporary)

Location:

Geneva

Purpose of the position:

Responsible for coordinating, facilitating and monitoring the implementation of effective enterprise risk management practices, promoting a risk-aware culture, and establishing risk reporting for strategic, operational, financial and programmatic risks – with a specific focus on risks associated with the COVAX Facility.

Department:

Executive Office

Team:

Risk

Reports to:

Head, Risk

N° of positions supervised (if applicable):

Career step level:

4

Duration:

until June 2023

JOB DESCRIPTION

Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance is a public-private partnership committed to saving children’s lives and protecting people’s health by increasing equitable use of vaccines in lower-income countries. The Vaccine Alliance brings together developing country and donor governments, the World Health Organisation, UNICEF, the World Bank, the vaccine industry, technical agencies, civil society, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and other private sector partners. Since 2000, Gavi has contributed to the immunisation of nearly 822 million children and the prevention of more than 14 million future deaths. At the Global Vaccine Summit in June 2020, world leaders pledged more than $8.8bn to ensure Gavi can immunise another 300 million children by 2025.

The COVAX Facility (“COVAX”) provides a global solution to the equitable distribution of vaccines to the 190 participating countries and economies. The COVAX Advance Market Commitment (AMC) is an innovative financing instrument that supports the participation of the 92 low and lower-middle income economies in COVAX. Self-financing participants (SFPs) have entered COVAX either as Optional (having the possibility to opt-out of a particular vaccine) or Committed Purchasers. Guided by the WHO fair allocation framework, COVAX will equitably distribute doses to help protect the most at-risk groups. Gavi is working with Alliance partners UNICEF and WHO to ensure that the infrastructure is in place, and the technical support available, for COVID-19 vaccines to be safely delivered to all those who need them.

BACKGROUND

COVAX is the vaccines pillar of the Access to COVID-19 Tools (ACT) Accelerator, and it is co-led by Gavi, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), the World Health Organisation (WHO), and Unicef, collectively the “COVAX Partners”. More information about this global endeavour and the principles guiding it can be found at www.who.int/initiatives/act-accelerator.

Gavi pursues an ambitious mission in poor and fragile countries, operates in a dynamic and often uncertain context, and is set up as an Alliance of partners with a lean Secretariat without in-country presence. It is therefore naturally exposed to many risks that could potentially affect its ability to achieve its mission and strategic objectives. It also needs to consciously take calculated risks to achieve impact. Robust risk management is vital for Gavi to confidently take the risks required to achieve its mission, safeguard investments and secure sustainable impact. By systematically understanding, acknowledging and anticipating what might happen (before it actually does happen) and proactively monitoring and managing Gavi’s exposures to potential future events, risk management helps Gavi to optimise its impact and appropriately balance risk and reward. Since 2015, when the Risk function was first established, Gavi has made tremendous progress in enhancing its risk management approach to be a value-adding proactive management tool (instead of being reporting and compliance oriented). Today it is appreciated by Board members, donors and management with the risk lens driving strategic discussions both at Board-level and across the organisation. See for more information on Gavi’s risk management approach: https://www.gavi.org/our-alliance/strategy/risk-management.

The current “Gavi 5.0” strategic period is inherently more risky as it represents a very aspirational ambition requiring more and novel support to countries to reach missed communities and zero-dose children in hard-to-reach areas and challenging operating environments. On top of that, the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed Gavi to new, heightened and rapidly changing risks as Gavi responds to it by supporting countries to maintain, restore and strengthen their immunisation services, and by administrating the COVAX Facility, a global mechanism to pool resources and demand for COVID-19 vaccines with the goal of accelerating the availability of and equitable access to safe and efficacious vaccines. It is critical that Gavi’s risk management framework continues to stay up-to-date by adequately identifying, measuring, monitoring and managing evolving risks to Gavi’s strategy, operations and programmes, as well as specific financial, reputational, operational and programmatic risks associated with the COVAX Facility.

In Gavi, risk management is everyone’s responsibility and an integral part of strategy and operations. Gavi has structured its risk management and assurance functions according to the Three Lines model with first line business functions monitoring and actively managing risks, second line functions providing objective specialist advice and appropriate checks and balances, and a third line audit function to provide independent assurance on the effectiveness of risk management by the first and second lines. Gavi’s Risk function is a key second line function working closely with the core business to enable them to manage the risks they need to take or are exposed to in pursuing Gavi’s objectives. It also plays a key role in ensuring the three lines work together effectively in managing cross-cutting risks across the organisation.

The Risk function is situated in the Executive Office and is responsible for monitoring risk on an enterprise-wide and strategic level, promoting a risk-aware culture and effective risk management practices throughout the organisation, and establishing regular risk reporting including to the Gavi Board (with risk being a standing agenda item). It also facilitates the Secretariat’s Risk Committee (chaired by the CEO with senior leadership from across the organisation) and supports risk owners with risk analysis and structuring of strategic discussions on Gavi’s top risks in Risk Committee and Board meetings.

MAIN DUTIES/RESPONSIBILITIES

The Senior Risk Manager position is a full-time temporary role based in Geneva, Switzerland. It provides a great opportunity to help lead Senior Management’s strategic thinking on mission-critical risks and to work across all key areas of Gavi’s strategy and operations – and contribute to saving millions of children’s’ lives each year. Working closely with the Head of Risk as part of a small team within a dynamic organisation, the role will provide ample opportunity to take initiative and shape the future direction of Gavi’s evolving risk management approach, helping Gavi to better understand and proactively manage its key risks.

The Senior Risk Manager position is a full-time temporary role based in Geneva, Switzerland. It provides a great opportunity to help lead Senior Management’s strategic thinking on mission-critical risks and to work across all key areas of Gavi’s strategy and operations – and contribute to saving millions of children’s’ lives each year. Working closely with the Head of Risk as part of a small team within a dynamic organisation, the role will provide ample opportunity to take initiative and shape the future direction of Gavi’s evolving risk management approach, helping Gavi to better understand and proactively manage its key risks.

Main duties and responsibilities include:

• Act as risk management liaison for the COVAX Facility and engage actively in COVAX Facility workstreams and discussions to identify new risks, provide constructive check and challenge, and advise on risk-related issues and questions as they arise;
• Maintain and continue to enhance a robust enterprise-wide risk management framework for Gavi’s strategy, operations, and country programmes, and maintain the COVAX Facility risk register with regular updates to the COVAX Facility Leadership Team;
• Help to drive change across the Alliance by instilling a risk-aware culture and enable scale-up and integration of risk management practices in strategic and operational planning and decision-making;
• Assist in the preparation and facilitation of Risk Committee meetings by supporting risk owners with deep dives on top risks, including by data analysis and research, and drive strategic thinking on implications and trade-offs;
• Engage actively with internal risk-related functions (e.g. Legal, Finance, Audit), external risk management advisors (e.g. investment banks, insurance industry), and other relevant stakeholders (e.g. Alliance partners) as required to ensure cross-cutting and end-to-end risk management;
• Prepare actionable and insightful risk reporting for internal reviews and reporting to Gavi Board and Committees as required;
• Assist in discussions on Gavi’s current risk management capabilities and Three Lines model, identifying potential improvement areas across teams as well as in the overall model used.

Note: The essential functions listed in this section are not exhaustive of the job responsibilities; other duties may be assigned consistently with the department needs.

QUALIFICATIONS

ACADEMIC

• University degree in business or public administration, science or engineering, or related fields;
• Further qualifications in enterprise, operational or financial risk management are an asset.

WORK EXPERIENCE

• Minimum of 8 years experience in (enterprise-level) risk management, strategy, or related fields;
• Consulting experience combined with excellent practical experience in applying risk management pragmatically in complex organisations, global health, pharma and / or international development is an asset.

SKILLS/COMPETENCIES

• Excellent analytical and systems thinking and demonstrated problem-solving skills;
• Well-honed interpersonal and influencing skills across seniority levels and a thoughtful listener;
• Pragmatic hands-on management style and the ability to reduce complexity and deliver results;
• Ability to develop a strategic perspective and creatively think outside the box;
• Interdisciplinary mindset with a broad interest in various fields and eagerness to learn;
• Ability to work autonomously, under pressure, demonstrating initiative and flexibility;
• Team player able to establish working relationships with many teams in a multicultural environment;
• Excellent writing skills and attention for detail;
• Competence with digital tools and ability to work quickly and accurately with them;
• Willingness to work in a fast-paced, ambiguous and constantly changing environment;
• A positive, can-do attitude and a sense of humour.

LANGUAGES

• Written and spoken fluency in English;
• French and other languages are an asset.

CONTACTS

• Collaboration with all teams in Gavi Secretariat and the Office of the COVAX Facility;
• Frequent interactions with Head of Risk and Chief of Staff;
• Regular exposure to Senior Management, including CEO and Deputy CEO;
• As required interactions with Alliance partners, COVAX Facility stakeholders and Gavi Board constituencies.