Call for Application (CFA): Documentation of Stories of Change and Best Practices

IOM Regional OfficeSRHR-HIV KNOWS NO BORDERS PROJECT

Expression of Interest for Consultancy Service

Documentation of Stories of Change and Best Practices for Improved Community-Facility Linkage and Uptake of SRH-HIV Interventions among adolescents, young people, sex-workers and migrants in cross-border and migration-affected communities in Southern Africa

1.0 Rationale:

The International Organization for Migration (IOM), Save the Children International (SCI) and University of Witwatersrand School of Public Health (WSPH) have been collaboratively implementing the Sexual and Reproductive Health Rights (SRHR)-HIV Knows No Borders project which responds to the high prevalence of HIV and other sexual and reproductive health challenges in migration affected communities within the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region. Funded by the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation of the Netherlands for the period between 2016-2020, the project strives to improve the SRHR-HIV outcomes among migrants, adolescents and young people (AYP) and sex workers (SW) in migration affected communities in six SADC countries namely: Lesotho, Malawi, Eswatini, Mozambique, South Africa and Zambia. This initiative has three result areas:

1. Result Area 1: Demand creation for SRHR-HIV services by migrants, adolescents, young people and sex workers and individuals in targeted migration affected communities.
2. Result Area 2: Supply and Accessibility of responsive SRHR-HIV services for Migrants, adolescents, young people and sex workers and individuals in migration affected communities.
3. Result Area 3: Creating an enabling environment through increased awareness on SRH rights and human rights law, services and practices

The project’s activities include both national and community level initiatives along known migration corridors and cross-border communities in the six mentioned countries. Community level activities include health promotion, awareness raising community referral and linkage to care and mobilization of traditional community structures to address barriers to positive SRH and HIV outcomes. Such barriers include harmful traditional practices. Community level activities are implemented through a carde of Change Agents (peer educators) who reside in the communities they serve.

The early outcomes of this regional initiative indicate that results have been achieved in relation to behavioural change as far as utilisation of SRH and HIV services among adolescents and youth, sex workers, migrant and non-migrant community members. Results have also been achieved in gaining support of traditional and religious leaders to engage in open discussion and mobilizing communities on SRHR HIV issues. Service providers are increasingly becoming responsive to the needs of sex workers and migrants in contrast to the experience prior to the project. Besides, SRHR of migrants and non-migrant community members have been progressively integrated in the bilateral cross-border coordination mechanisms among the implementing countries in the region.

Therefore, IOM in collaboration with project consortium members seeks to engage the services of a consultant for a short term consultancy to document stories of change and best practices .This activity is imbedded within the IOM regional project communications function and will be executed under close and general supervision of the IOM Regional Project Manager as well as support from the Regional Media and Communications Officer and in collaboration with country level project implementation team.

2.0 Purpose

The purpose of this assignment as already mentioned is to bring relevant evidence and experience to bear to help ensure programming strategies under the SRHR-HIV Knows No Borders Project are evidence based and inform future programming developments. The documented stories of change and best practices will be published in a “Best Practices” document for dissemination to various stakeholders.

Documentation of the Change Stories and Best Practices will consist of:

1. Working in collaboration with the project regional team as well as IOM and SC country project coordinators to determine the exact scope of the stories; identify and develop topics/thematic areas of the stories of change.
2. Preparing tools that will be used for documenting the stories of change
3. Reviewing of project documentation including project baseline, mid-term reports, regular progress reports, proceedings of trainings, community dialogue reports, monitoring reports and other relevant compilations including photos and existing video documentaries produced as part of the country level implementation
4. Individual interviews with selected staff of regional and country level IOM, Save the Children, implementing partners and government stakeholder representatives
5. Collate from the field, analyse, consolidate and enhance existing draft stories of change, lessons learnt and best practices for learning purposes and for documentation.
6. A literature review of strategies that improve specific SRH and HIV outcomes, drawing on published on both grey and published literature on SRH-HIV and migration programming.
7. Conduct in-depth interviews among stakeholders to document of identified “best practices” to determine key success factors and development of recommendations/ actions needed to guide programming.
8. Design and facilitation of a half day workshop to bring together strategies being currently employed in the implementing countries, findings from best practice review and key considerations to lead discussions and action planning regarding how to improve this work
9. Support to the dissemination of the Best Practices Document.

3.0 Expected Deliverables

The selected consultant will be expected to deliver on the specified scope of work below. Before commencing on the assignment, the consultant will deliver a concept note outlining the detailed approach and methodology for this consultancy. Specifically, the expected outputs of the assignment are:

1. Expected output 1: Develop a compendium of 7-10 best practices on effective and scalable approaches to promote community-facility linkages and access and use of SRH-HIV services among migrants, AYP, sex workers and mobile populations in cross-border and migration-affected communities. The best practices will be guided by identified themes such as Health Promotion; Strengthening supply; Referral and Linkage to care; Coordination and collaboration; policy advocacy.
2. Expected output 2: Design and conduct a half day workshop for project team during the annual planning and review meeting in September 2019. The workshop will serve as a validation exercise for the draft
3. Expected Output 3: Develop a short abstract of the work for submission to scientific conference and a 15-slide PowerPoint (.ppt) presentation, with speaker notes, covering a summary of the best practice compendium.

4.0 Roles and Responsibilities

IOM and SC (Regional Offices)

• Manage the procurement process for the recruitment and placement of consultancy team
• Cover all the necessary costs of the assignment and process payments based on agreed schedules
• Avail relevant project documents for reference
• Coordinate the logistics arrangements for travel to implementing countries
• Approve the work plan and time frames in consultation with country teams
• Establish the contents of the documentation in consultation with country teams
• Establish linkages with country teams regarding facilitating the work of consultants
• Providing necessary guidance and support to consultancy team throughout the process
• Provide technical feedback and approval of all the deliverables/products

Country teams of IOM, SC Members, Country Offices and Implementing partners

• Avail necessary information related to the project
• Organize the necessary logistics during the in-country presence of the consultancy team
• Dedicate time for discussion among concerned staff members and individual interviews with the consultant including for video recording as part of the documentary production
• Facilitate linkage with stakeholder representatives for recording of interviews
• Facilitate the meetings with concerned stakeholders for recording of information and testimonies
• Provide feedback on draft products

5.0 Duration and Location of assignment:

It is envisioned that the documentation exercise will be undertaken within 35 working days. The final product is expected to be submitted by September 30, 2019. The Consultant will be home based but expected to spend 30% of the duration of the assignment at IOM Pretoria regional office.

6.0 Deliverables and Deadlines

• Initial discussion with concerned IOM and SC regional staff members to clarify assignment, Plan of Action & discussion with IOM/SC Regional technical team (3 days) – To be accomplished within 5 days of the contract starting date
• Draft compendium of 7-10 best practices on effective and scalable approaches to improve community-facility linkage and SRH-HIV services and rights for migrants, AYPs and mobile populations (10 days)
• Proposal for workshop design (concept note, expected outcomes, agenda) for discussion (3 days)
• Execution of Workshop, with technical inputs from the project team for incorporation into the final draft document (1 day)
• Final compendium of 7-10 best practices on effective and scalable approaches and Abstract (4 days) – To be accomplished by 30^th September 2019

7.0 Required Qualifications & Experience

1. Master’s degree in public health, social sciences, monitoring and evaluation, or a related field from an accredited academic institution; or University degree in the above fields with 5-8 years of relevant professional experience.
2. Previous experience in documenting best practices in the field of sexual and reproductive health, migration and advocacy
3. Experience working with the UN and international NGOs in the humanitarian and development contexts especially in areas of migration, health, HIV and SRH
4. Samples of best practices documented from previous similar assignments
5. Excellent technical report writing skills with demonstrated ability to meet deadlines
6. Fluency in English is required. Knowledge of the languages commonly spoken in the project sites will be an added advantage.

Interested individual consultants should submit their applications to Human Resources Unit through [email protected] with clear reference of the advert in the subject line by Friday, August 23, 2019. The application should include a cover letter indicating the consultant’s daily professional fees (in USD) and 5-pager technical proposal (including initial graphic) on your capacity and approach to the assignment and the CV of lead consultant. All application files should not exceed 2MB. Only shortlisted consultants will be notified.