Health Innovation Lead

Job Posting Organization:
Relief International is an international non-profit organization that partners with communities impacted by conflict, climate change, and disaster to save lives, build greater resilience, and promote long-term health and wellbeing. Established to address the urgent needs of vulnerable populations, Relief International operates across Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, delivering essential programs in Health and Nutrition, WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene), Education, and Livelihoods. The organization is dedicated to developing safe, inclusive, and evidence-based programs that are conflict-sensitive, climate-smart, and responsive to local needs. With a commitment to building a representative and inclusive workplace, Relief International encourages applications from candidates with diverse backgrounds and lived experiences relevant to the contexts in which they work. The organization has a significant presence in multiple countries, including the UK, France, Kenya, Türkiye, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, and employs a diverse workforce to achieve its mission.

Job Overview:
The Health Innovation Lead position is a pivotal role within Relief International's Quality, Impact, and Innovation Department, focusing on shaping and leading the organization's global health innovation agenda. This role is designed for individuals who are passionate about addressing pressing health and health-system challenges in fragile, conflict-affected, and resource-constrained settings. The Health Innovation Lead will be responsible for driving practical, evidence-based innovations that improve health outcomes, access, quality, efficiency, and resilience. The position emphasizes the importance of identifying real-world problems and developing scalable solutions rather than pursuing innovation for its own sake. The successful candidate will work across Relief International's global portfolio, identifying promising innovations, adapting successful approaches from other contexts, testing new ideas, and building the necessary evidence to support adoption and scale. Collaboration is key, as the Health Innovation Lead will engage with country teams, communities, academic institutions, governments, private-sector actors, donors, and research partners to ensure that innovations are impactful and sustainable. Reporting to the Director of Quality, Impact, and Innovation, this role offers significant autonomy to shape strategy, develop partnerships, mobilize resources, and establish Relief International as a recognized leader in health innovation for humanitarian and development settings.

Duties and Responsibilities:
The Health Innovation Lead will have a comprehensive set of responsibilities, including but not limited to: leading the development and implementation of Relief International's Health Innovation Strategy; creating a focused portfolio of evidence-based innovation opportunities aligned with organizational and country priorities; identifying and prioritizing health and health-system challenges where innovation can improve outcomes, quality, equity, efficiency, and resilience; designing, adapting, and overseeing innovation initiatives using an evidence-based approach that supports testing, learning, and scale-up in fragile and conflict-affected settings; scanning global evidence, technologies, products, and service-delivery models to identify innovations that can be adapted to low-resource and humanitarian contexts; generating evidence on effectiveness, feasibility, cost, acceptability, equity, and scalability to inform adoption and investment decisions; leading resource mobilization efforts and identifying funding opportunities; contributing to the development of innovation-focused concept notes, proposals, and strategic partnerships; building and maintaining strategic relationships with ministries of health, donors, research institutions, innovators, private-sector organizations, and implementing partners; providing technical leadership, mentoring, and hands-on support to country teams to strengthen innovation capacity; and promoting cross-country learning, knowledge sharing, and thought leadership to position Relief International as a leading voice in health innovation for humanitarian settings.

Required Qualifications:
Candidates for the Health Innovation Lead position must possess an advanced qualification in Public Health, Global Health, Health Systems, Health Policy, or a related discipline. Additionally, significant experience working in global health, particularly in low- and middle-income countries and/or fragile, conflict-affected, or humanitarian settings, is essential. Strong expertise in health systems strengthening and a deep understanding of the interactions between health services, financing, workforce, governance, communities, and supply chains are critical. The ideal candidate will have a proven ability to identify complex health-system challenges and develop practical, context-appropriate solutions that can be implemented and sustained. Experience in identifying, adapting, testing, and scaling health innovations, along with evidence of successfully moving approaches beyond pilot stages toward adoption, is also required. Demonstrated experience in designing or overseeing evaluations, implementation research, pilots, or evidence-generation initiatives is necessary, as well as a strong track record in partnership building, donor engagement, and resource mobilization. Excellent communication, influencing, and stakeholder engagement skills are essential, with the ability to build relationships across governments, communities, donors, academic institutions, and technical partners. Experience with digital health, AI, diagnostics, health technologies, implementation science, operational research, or health economics would be highly desirable.

Educational Background:
The educational background required for the Health Innovation Lead position includes an advanced degree in Public Health, Global Health, Health Systems, Health Policy, or a related field. This educational foundation is crucial for understanding the complexities of health systems and the challenges faced in low-resource and humanitarian contexts. Candidates should have a strong grasp of health policy frameworks, public health principles, and the ability to apply this knowledge to real-world situations in diverse settings.

Experience:
The position requires significant experience in global health, particularly in low- and middle-income countries and/or fragile, conflict-affected, or humanitarian settings. Candidates should have a proven track record of working in health systems strengthening and a deep understanding of the interactions between various components of health services. Experience in identifying, adapting, testing, and scaling health innovations is essential, along with a history of successfully moving approaches beyond pilot stages toward broader adoption. The ideal candidate will also have experience in designing or overseeing evaluations, implementation research, and evidence-generation initiatives.

Languages:
While the job description does not specify mandatory languages, proficiency in English is likely essential given the international nature of the organization. Additional language skills relevant to the regions in which Relief International operates, such as Arabic, French, or Turkish, would be considered advantageous and could enhance communication and collaboration with local partners and communities.

Additional Notes:
This position is classified as remote and is a 12-month contract. It is open to candidates based in any Relief International country of operation within 3 hours of the Central European Time (CET) zone. The organization emphasizes its commitment to safeguarding all individuals it interacts with through its work and expects all staff and volunteers to uphold the values and behaviors outlined in its Code of Conduct. Recruitment for this role includes a criminal records self-declaration, references, and other pre-employment checks, which may include police and qualification checks. Due to the nature of this role, applications will be reviewed on an ongoing basis, and the position may be filled before the closing date of October 16, 202

• Early applications are encouraged. If shortlisted, salary discussions will occur during the HR interview stage, and successful candidates will be subject to national terms and conditions.