Openings at KEMRI-Wellcome Trust Research Programme (KWTRP)

JOB PURPOSE: 
The position’s key role is to provide effective and efficient administrative support to the Health Service Unit. The position is also vital for effective liaison between the Unit, other programme staff, and external partners and stakeholders

JOB DIMENSIONS: The primary responsibility of this position is to provide administrative support to the Health Service Unit.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Coordinate activities (e.g. conference calls, internal and external meetings, travel) by providing administrative, and logistical support services.
• Carry out clerical duties including preparation of correspondence, mailing lists and taking minutes, typing and circulating them to staff and other stakeholders as required.
• Prepare budgets for meetings, fieldwork and travel for HSU staff and field activities
• Maintain efficient and effective communication channels between the Head of Unit, HSU staff, and other internal and external parties
• Maintain the unit heads calendar and schedule of appointments, screen requests for meetings, and synchronize office and personal diaries to ensure that appointments do not overlap
• Organize the filing and retrieval of files and documents in order to ensure that they are secure and accessible.
• Manage HSU head’s professional profile on website and other academic social media sites
• Work with communications team to update programme, Oxford and other sites with HSU related content
• Coordinate the preparation of both local and international itineraries for the HSU /EDD and other external stakeholders, confirm travel bookings and hotel reservations.
• Maintain inventory of office equipment for the unit and asset disposal list, monitor utilization of consumables and requisition for additional supplies with HSU and maintain an overall record of status and allocation of common items to HSU staff and overall CIN hospital sites
• Establish/maintain systems and records (i.e. paper flow, database etc) for project studies and publications for the units research team.
• Facilitate submission and maintains file of submitted HSU scientific proposals through KEMRI scientific and ethical approval process and notify Principal Investigators in advance when ethical approvals expire
• Maintain list of all HSU visitors / external seminar presenters, interns and collaborations to programme for reporting on a bimonthly cluster report
• Maintain updated CIN project contact list and event summary and procure monthly data bundles & airtime for all CIN site staff.
• Managing leave schedule for all CIN hospital site staff.
• And any other duties that may be assigned from time to time.

QUALIFICATIONS:

• A degree in relevant discipline; Degree in Arts in Administration, Office Management or equivalent or related field.
• Business/ Office Management, Secretarial Studies or equivalent.
• At least 8 years’ experience in a similar or related role providing support to top executives and senior management teams
• High level of skill in Computer literacy with proficiency in Microsoft applications-outlook, word, power point and excel

Desirable Criteria:

The Post holder should have:

• Experience in arranging individual and group international travel, Visas and flight bookings
• Considerable knowledge of office procedures and secretarial practices including organization, planning, records management and general administrative skills
• Advanced record keeping skills

COMPETENCIES:

• Strong planning, organizational and administrative skills
• Strong problem-solving skills with keen attention to detail
• Strong report writing, proofreading and editing skills
• High level of confidentiality and discretion
• Tact, poise and excellent communication and interpersonal skills
• Ability to establish and maintain good working relationships
• Effective time management skills with the ability to prioritize workloads and work within tight deadlines
• Team worker, able to work in a multi-cultural environment, punctual and high integrity

PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT/CONDITIONS:

• Office based
• Field work in selected counties
• Willingness to travel throughout the country
• Working hours:
• Requires flexibility in the hours worked, with the priority being meeting the team’s research goals

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KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Develop and manage systems for collecting, storing and analyzing research data including conducting needs assessments to design and create new databases for research and clinical trials.
• Prepare, update and document system requirements: overseeing design, development, testing and implementation of data management systems
• Prepare datasets, code and documentation for archiving and/or publication including cleaning, collating, annotating and de-identifying data.
• Document data management activities and standardize processes and procedure
• Provide user support for the study staff using designed applications
• Manage systems and tools for handling data, collecting, entering, editing, cleaning, storing, archiving, retrieving, organizing, and transferring data.
• Carry out data review, and data validation. This includes discrepancy checking and cleaning of records generated from the database etc.
• Liaise with field workers, site staff, clinicians, data supervisors, data entry clerks, clinical monitors and database administrators to rapidly resolve data queries
• Implement and enforce data security activities such as data backups, archiving and user administration
• Extract and process requested data and generating studies reports to inform study coordination and management
• Prepare data and conduct preliminary and statistical analyses within the department
• Develop reporting and statistical analysis plans in liaison with the Principal Investigator
• Participate in recruitment of data clerks and data supervisors
• Supervise, set objectives, and conduct appraisal of data entry clerks and data supervisors
• Train and prepare work plans for data clerks and supervisor
• Devise methods and procedures to best integrate the current systems with other systems in use across the Programme.
• Physical management of data infrastructure including configuration and maintenance of ICT hardware (including ICT equipment in ‘field’ stations/projects).
• Design and maintain / archive / update data dictionaries and carry out data review, validation including discrepancy checking and cleaning and report generation of records generated from the databases.
• Generate reports including verification error reports, comments reports, constraint reports, and lists of all problems experienced in the projects as regards data collection.
• Undertake data analysis (statistical) under supervision
• Manage data entry staff (permanent or casual) in collaboration with the Principal Investigator and monitor their performance and develop their skills and capacity as may be required – this may include management of ‘field’ teams.
• Document existing processes and participate in staff cross training.
• Provide training to other staff and take part in project development/planning and academic life of research group.
• And any other duties that may be assigned from time to time.

QUALIFICATIONS:

Essential Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Statistics, Computer Sciences/Information Science, or Information Technology or in a relevant field.
• At least 3 years’ experience in a similar position, preferably in the health sciences or clinical trials.
• Experience in data management/data analysis and scientific report writing using STATA, R, Excel, FileMaker, MySQL.

Desired Skills

• Knowledge of MySQL, PostgreSQL, or MSSQL.
• Experienced of Open Clinical, Redcap systems for clinical data management.
• Statistics experience with Stata or R or SPSS or SAS.
• Good Clinical Practice (GCP) certification.

COMPETENCIES:

• Demonstrate high levels of integrity and confidentiality
• Excellent interpersonal, written, presentation and communication skills
• Basic analytical, problem solving and critical thinking skills
• Team working and ability to work in diverse teams
• Flexibility, adaptability, multi-tasking and attention to detail.