| Posted date | 22nd September, 2026 | Last date to apply | 5th October, 2026 |
| Country | Pakistan | Locations | Islamabad |
| Category | Program Management | ||
| Type | Full Time | Position | 1 |
| Experience | 8 years | ||
This position is open on a rolling basis and will be filled upon the availability of a suitable candidate.
Context
Relief International (RI) 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.
Our team of more than 7,000 staff and local volunteers work in 15 countries across Africa, Asia, and the Middle East, providing Health and Nutrition, WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene), Education and Livelihoods programming that creates the foundation for community resilience.
We do this by working with local actors to develop safe and inclusive local programming that is evidence based, conflict sensitive, climate smart, and reaches those in need.
Relief International is an alliance of four organizations with one shared mission, comprised of Relief International, Inc., Relief International-France, Relief International-UK and Relief International-Europe, which operate under a one-team concept under a single senior leadership team.
In Pakistan, RI works with government institutions, communities, local organizations and humanitarian partners to deliver safe, inclusive and accountable programs across protection, mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS), education, health, livelihoods and WASH, including programming in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.
Job Profile
The Head of Programs (HoP) is a senior member of the Country Management Team and is accountable for program strategy, quality, portfolio performance and growth in Pakistan. The HoP provides executive oversight of the MHPSS and protection project, ensuring that implementation is technically sound, community-led, timely, financially responsible and compliant with donor, government and RI requirements.
The HoP leads program design and technical inputs to business development, working with the Grants team, which coordinates the proposal process, compliance checks, review calendar and submission. The HoP works closely with Finance, Operations, HR, Security, MEAL, technical teams and RI's regional and global functions to translate evidence and community priorities into feasible, high-quality programs.
Key Responsibilities
Strategic and Portfolio Leadership
- Lead implementation and periodic review of RI Pakistan's country program strategy, ensuring alignment with needs, RI's global strategy, government priorities and donor interests.
- Maintain an integrated view of program performance, delivery risks, staffing, budgets, compliance obligations and pipeline, and provide clear recommendations to the Country Director and SMT.
- Ensure programs are evidence based, conflict sensitive, gender and disability inclusive, climate aware and grounded in meaningful community participation.
- Promote complementarity across MHPSS, protection, health, WASH, education and livelihoods so that RI's portfolio addresses needs coherently rather than through isolated activities.
- Represent program priorities in SMT decisions and ensure timely cross-departmental resolution of implementation bottlenecks.
- Hold overall accountability for project inception, detailed work planning, delivery, budget performance, risk management, results, reporting and close-out.
- Ensure that community workers are supported by structured supervision, functional service mapping, documented referral pathways and feedback loops; training alone is not considered a complete intervention.
- Ensure qualified technical and clinical leads establish safe protocols for urgent mental-health concerns, suicide risk, child protection, GBV, PSEA and other protection risks, with clear responsibilities and escalation arrangements.
- Ensure services are culturally appropriate, accessible and available through appropriate in-person, low-bandwidth, offline and remote modalities, including relevant local languages.
- Safeguard informed consent, confidentiality and data minimization.
- Coordinate with the national MHPSS coordination mechanism, provincial health and social welfare authorities, primary health facilities, specialists, UN agencies and protection actors to avoid parallel systems and strengthen sustainable referral care.
- Ensure that project adaptation or targeting remains within applicable government permissions, donor agreements and RI's humanitarian principles.
- Provide technical quality assurance and ensure compliance with relevant RI, IASC, WHO, protection, safeguarding and sector standards, drawing on specialist advisers when clinical decisions are required.
- Approve theories of change, logframes, indicators, MEAL plans, assessment tools, baselines, evaluations and learning agendas.
- Track service quality and outcomes, including competency, supervision, referral completion, response times, follow-up, functioning, satisfaction, equity and adverse events - not only activity or awareness counts.
- Ensure safe, accessible feedback and complaints mechanisms and documented action in response to community feedback.
- Lead regular program reviews and field visits, use evidence to correct underperformance, and document learning for scale-up and future proposals.
- Ensure each award has an approved implementation plan, procurement plan, staffing plan, spending forecast, risk register and reporting calendar.
- Review budget-versus-actual performance and forecasts with Finance and project teams; agree corrective actions for variances, underspending, overspending or cash-flow risks.
- Lead preparation and quality review of project reports with project, technical and MEAL teams, ensuring accurate program content and evidence. Grants coordinates reporting deadlines, donor-compliance review and submission. Provide program inputs to modification requests, audits, evaluations and award close-outs.
- Work with Operations, Supply Chain, HR, Security and Finance to ensure that program decisions are feasible, compliant and appropriately resourced.
- Escalate material program, safeguarding, financial, legal, access or reputational risks promptly and support documented resolution.
- Shape Pakistan funding priorities and donor positioning with the Country Director and Grants team, drawing on program evidence and strategic partnerships. Grants maintains the opportunity pipeline and coordinates opportunity tracking.
- Participate in Grants-led go/no-go reviews, providing analysis of needs, technical suitability, operational feasibility, risk, sustainability and value for money. Lead program design for agreed opportunities, subject to the required management approvals.
- Lead technical inputs to expressions of interest, concept notes and full proposals, including narratives, theories of change, logframes, implementation arrangements and staffing. Work with Finance on realistic budgets; Grants coordinates proposal development and the compliance package.
- Agree technical responsibilities and deliverables with Grants and ensure program teams meet the internal review timetable. Grants coordinates country, regional and global reviews and submission of the complete proposal through approved channels.
- Develop strategic partnerships and consortia with national and international organizations, academic institutions, technical actors and private-sector partners, with proportionate due diligence and clear roles.
- Strengthen donor relationships through concise capability materials, briefings, field evidence and follow-up, while protecting RI's independence and avoiding commitments that cannot be delivered.
- Build the capacity of program and technical teams to develop strong proposal inputs and maintain a reusable evidence base of assessments, results, learning, unit costs and past performance, in collaboration with Grants and MEAL.
- Represent RI's Pakistan program portfolio with donors, government authorities, UN agencies, relevant sector coordination bodies and strategic partners, as delegated by the Country Director, with particular attention to the MHPSS and protection project.
- Maintain constructive federal and provincial relationships across the program portfolio, including with MHPSS, health, social welfare and protection stakeholders.
- Ensure RI's assessments, service-gap analysis and implementation learning contribute appropriately to sector planning and referral mapping while protecting confidential information.
- Support advocacy based on verified program evidence and ensure external communications are accurate, principled and approved.
- Set clear objectives, delegations and performance expectations for direct reports and ensure consistent supervision, coaching and performance management.
- Ensure the program structure has the technical and management capacity required for safe delivery, including appropriate clinical supervision for MHPSS services.
- Promote collaboration, mutual respect, accountability, inclusion and staff wellbeing across program and support teams.
- Identify capacity gaps and implement practical learning, mentoring and succession plans for staff and partners.
- Support timely recruitment, onboarding and responsible transition or close-out of positions in line with program needs and funding.
- Maintain the highest standards of behavior inside and outside work and uphold RI's Code of Conduct, safeguarding policies and humanitarian principles.
- Model ethical leadership and create an environment in which staff and communities can raise concerns safely.
- Ensure that their own actions and those of managed teams do not compromise the safety, dignity or rights of RI staff, partners or the communities RI serves.
- Ensure staff, partners and external stakeholders understand RI's expected standards of conduct and available reporting mechanisms.
- Report and respond to concerns promptly through the appropriate RI channels, maintaining confidentiality and protection from retaliation.
Person Specification
Skills, knowledge and expertise are required for the role.
Essential criteria
- Master’s degree in public health, clinical or counselling psychology, psychiatry and mental health.
- At least eight years of progressively responsible humanitarian or development programme experience, including a minimum of three years in a senior programme leadership or management position.
- At least five years of substantive MHPSS and/or protection programming experience, including oversight of layered community-based services, structured psychosocial interventions, safe referrals, competency-based supervision and quality assurance.
- Demonstrated experience managing complex, multi-location programmes and multidisciplinary teams, including recruitment, performance management and coaching; ability to distinguish programme, technical and clinical responsibilities and secure qualified clinical supervision where required.
- Proven project-cycle, financial and grant-management experience, covering assessment and design, implementation planning, staffing, budget monitoring and forecasting, risk management, donor compliance, reporting, modification and close-out.
- Proven experience developing technical inputs for institutional-donor concept notes and proposals, including theories of change, logframes, implementation arrangements and budgets, with a record of contributing to successful submissions in collaboration with Grants and Finance.
- Strong knowledge of safeguarding, PSEA, child protection, GBV risk mitigation, suicide and self-harm escalation, informed consent, confidentiality and responsible handling of sensitive information.
- Demonstrated experience in programme quality, MEAL and accountability, including outcome measurement, data quality, community feedback, evaluation, learning and evidence-based adaptation.
- Effective coordination and representation with government, donors, UN agencies, sector bodies and partners, supported by strong analytical, negotiation, facilitation and written communication skills.
- Fluency in written and spoken English and Urdu.
- Willingness and ability to travel regularly to RI programme locations in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.
Desirable criteria
- Technical familiarity with Pakistan's Hamdard MHPSS Model, WHO mhGAP, IASC MHPSS guidance or comparable stepped-care systems.
- Experience designing programs for Afghan refugees, returnees, displacement-affected populations or vulnerable host communities in Pakistan.
- Experience with Dutch MFA, EU/ECHO, FCDO, USG, UN, GIZ or other major institutional donors.
- Working knowledge of Pashto, Dari or Balochi.
- Experience using digital or low-bandwidth systems for referral, supervision, case follow-up or program data.
RI Values
Guided by the humanitarian principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality, and independence, as well as “Do No Harm,” Relief International Values:
- Integrity
- Adaptability
- Collaboration
- Inclusivity
- Sustainability
Requirements
- Requires a minimum of 8 years of experience
Teletaleem is hiring candidates for the position of Program Officer- Lah....
JOB DESCRIPTION....
A national non-profit organization is inviting applications from eligible candida....
Teletaleem is looking for candidates for the position of Program Coordin....
General Position Summary TBS is a self-motivated individual who will skillfu....