Women at Work - 3 Ways eHA supports women in the workplace

By Favour Oriaku

One of our focuses at eHealth Africa is to increase the number of women in our workforce. While we work on getting more women into eHA, we also focus on retaining the talented women who currently work at the organization. Here are three ways we support women at eHealth Africa. 

Early career programs

As an organization, we are committed to building a more diverse and fair workplace, and we have implemented strategies to increase the number of women in our workforce. We are actively building a pipeline of talent through early career programs to help young women jumpstart their careers. One of these programs is our just concluded all-female paid internship program that lasted for six months. The program exposed young women to an early career within the International NGO space. Juliana Okoro, who was a part of the 2021 all-female internship cohort and now works full time as an associate with the communications team, has this to say

Juliana Okoro

Coming as an intern helped build my confidence and my career path. Before the internship, I didn’t know what to make of my career or which direction to go, but the internship gave me the clarity and experience I needed. My internship exposed me to a lot of opportunities and I am forever grateful to eHA for the opportunity.

Open Door Policy

Past research and society advise women to stand out if they want to get ahead. But taking on visible roles in the workplace may expose women to risk, and we know this. And that is why we have policies in place that promote unconventional forms of leadership, fight implicit bias, and create an equitable working environment where everyone’s ideas are valued and respected. Our Human Resources department maintains an open-door policy that ensures that staff, especially female employees, do not suffer in silence when marginalized or ill-treated, either by their colleagues or bosses. 

We constantly encourage female employees to take on tasks and roles that put them in the spotlight, and this has ultimately reflected on the senior leadership team, as we have just as many women at the decision-making table as we have men. An offshoot of this is that we now have more senior female employees who the younger ones not only look up to but also get mentorship from.

A Work/family balanced life

One initiative we put in place to ensure employee wellbeing, fairness, and gender inclusivity is flexible work (remote) and work/life balance. 

We have constant check-ins between managers and the employees they manage. In these sessions, employees get to discuss issues relating to their overall well-being and how they may affect their productivity at work, and managers help them through it by providing feedback and guidance. We also have a remote working option in certain cases where your job does not require you to be physically present at the office. With this process in place, female employees who’ve completed their paid maternity leave can spend more time bonding with their families while working from home.

At eHealth Africa, we recognize that talent development is crucial to our success as an organization which is why we have invested in programs that continue to up-skill and re-skill employees at all levels. These programs are easily accessible and we constantly encourage employees to take advantage of them so they can stay current and relevant in their fields.  We don’t just pay lip service to gender inclusivity and to building an equitable working environment; we constantly live into those values. 

eHA Academy: The Journey So Far

By Favour Oriaku

If you are someone who’s interested in a tech program that builds the capacity of young people in software development, then you are probably familiar with the name eHA Academy, our brainchild academy that has successfully trained several aspiring tech enthusiasts in software and web development. Here is a walkthrough of our journey so far.

The Birth of eHA Academy in 2016

In 2015, eHealth Africa was one of several organizations working in the three main West African countries that were affected by the Ebola epidemic - Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia. We primarily provided support for the EVD outbreak response by building and customizing software-based solutions for contact tracing and disease surveillance. By the end of 2016, the epidemic was declared over, and as we finalized the response effort in Guinea; we identified a need. Who would maintain and improve the solutions we introduced to Guinea? There were not that many software developers living in Guinea and we decided we needed to build human capacity in-country to maintain or upgrade the digital solutions we introduced in Guinea during the epidemic. This led to the eHealth Africa team designing a program to build the capacity of young people and equip them with the skills needed to do this.  

In-person class session at eHA Academy in Conakry, Guinea

In August 2016, we launched the inaugural eHA Academy in Conakry, Guinea. The software team at eHA designed an eight-week curriculum in software development and network engineering and staffed the course with expert instructors, bringing international software design and development expertise to Guinea. 

The Academy was offered free of charge to all participants who were successfully admitted into the program. By the end of the first cohort, 100% of the participants completed the entire 8-week program, 15 software developers took part in eHealth Academy and three of them were so skilled that we offered them full-time positions with eHealth Africa.

Pioneer graduates, tutors, and management of the eHA Academy in Conakry, Guinea

eHA Academy Re-designed In 2019

After the successful interventions in Guinea, Sierra Leone, and Liberia, we wrapped up operations in those countries. As we focused on our operations in Nigeria and on eradicating the wild poliovirus; we continued to build a larger physical presence in Kano state. Members of a small but growing tech ecosystem often contacted us to provide resources, including space for their meetings, expert speakers, and mentorship. By 2018, we were full members of this community, and our head office was an unofficial meeting space for the monthly tech meetups. Every month we had speakers come and give talks about different topics in tech and people came from neighboring states to attend the meeting in person and several joined online. Again, we noticed a need. 

The need we noticed was the large number of tech enthusiasts seeking additional training for software and web development skills.

Students of the 1st Nigeria cohort of eHA Academy.

In 2019, our management team reintroduced eHA Academy to address this need. We then redesigned a new version of eHA Academy. This time we focused primarily on building the top requested skill-set, web development. In the redesign version, we introduced self-directed learning. Each participant was required to focus on completing coursework on our eLearning platform, prior to in-person workshops and sessions. We also paired each participant with a mentor, and we matched the most successful participants to an internship opportunity.

The Switch to 100% Virtual Learning Sessions

When COVID-19 Pandemic forced the world to shut down, we were 3 weeks into the 2nd Nigeria cohort of eHA Academy. We quickly pivoted to all online learning sessions, mentoring, and even internships and have a few success stories. Watch Jamiu Musa’s success story here.

After successfully completing two eHA Academy cohorts in Nigeria, we took a pause to re-evaluate the number of students we’ve trained so far, and we realized that over 70% of the total number of students trained were male. As an organization, we recognize the importance of having diversity in all sectors, especially in the technology sector. To address this, we hosted an all-female cohort of the Academy. This attracted several female participants across Africa. We recently completed the all-female cohort and here are a few testimonials from some participants.

Juliet Odogwu, eHealth Africa's Executive Director, with mentors and some graduates of the all-female cohort who attended the graduation ceremony in person.

So what is next for eHA Academy? 

The academy’s primary goal is to create a platform for young people to gain first-hand experience and training in technology. We are also working with partners to expand our curriculum to train more people in more aspects of innovative technology, from data science to artificial intelligence to machine learning.

The schedule of the Academy is to implement two cohorts every year, and young people interested in web and software development are welcome to apply. To better prepare yourself and increase your chances of being selected to be part of the next cohort, here is a free course we recommend for you to take.

We invite you to get involved

We are constantly looking to increase the number of participants we take on for every cohort we implement. eHA Academy needs your donation to increase the number of software and web developers in Africa. We have an ongoing donation campaign on the GlobalGiving platform where you can either make a one-time donation or commit to a monthly or yearly donation. We are also accepting donations on academy.ehealthafrica.org as well.

Another way to get involved is by signing up to be a mentor. To find out more about becoming a mentor and to apply, click here.

How eHealth Africa is implementing the Geolocation Health Facilities Database Initiative (GHFDi) Project in the Republic of Togo

By Friday Daniel, Chinedu Anarado and Munachi Okoro

The public health space has relied on platforms from multilateral agencies and nonprofits to plan interventions. Platforms such as the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap, the WHO Integrated Supportive Supervision (ISS), and electronic surveillance (e-SURV) database, GRID3, and the Global Health mapping platforms were some of the only sources of information on health facility data. But these data sources can be inadequate, rarely reflect the realities on the ground and do not have the imprimatur of relevant government authorities. Equally, Ministries of Health in most WHO countries lack the capacity to curate and manage their health facility data, leaving a critical information gap in the health planning process. 

The WHO conceived the Geolocated Health Facility Data initiative (GHFDi) project as a public good to enhance access to information on the status, location and functionality of health facilities across participating WHO member countries. The overall idea is to deepen capacities in each country to manage this data, ensure its openness and availability in planning public health interventions. 

The GHFD project requires participating countries to grow their capacity to curate and manage their health facility data. But first, an assessment of the existing health facility list or registry is essential. This is expected to provide insight into the efforts required to achieve an ideal scenario which is a database of health facility information, with name, location, unique identifier, geographic coordinates and hosted in an open source platform. Countries may then choose to share this information with a global database managed by the WHO, and then invest in an ongoing process to grow their capacity to ensure the information is updated periodically. 

eHealth Africa is one of the implementing partners of the AFRO region responsible for implementing this project in the Republic of Togo. On the 9th of August 2022, an introductory meeting was held at the headquarters of the Ministry of Health in Togo. This meeting was organized by eHealth Africa in partnership with the Ministry of Health and the WHO country office. 

It brought together various stakeholders responsible for establishing and updating the health facilities database in Togo, including the Ministry of Health (MSPAUS), the National Institute of Statistics and Studies and Demographics (INSEED), as well as the delegate ministry in charge of Territorial Development.

Landscape assessment and data collection session during the workshop in Togo

With an introduction by Dr. Ouedraogo Romain Hilaire, health systems coordinator at the WHO country office, Mr. Compaore Fabris, eHealth Africa representative in Togo and Chinedu Anarado, program manager, eHealth Africa, discussed with the participants on how GHFD seeks to strengthen the capacities of the Ministry of Health to guarantee the availability, quality, accessibility and use of a health facilities master list (HFML) in countries. 

This capacity building should enable the Republic of Togo to have a standardized database open to the public. Participants discussed the seven strategic pathways through which the GHFD initiative will strengthen the Ministry of Health, including governance and policies, partnerships and collaboration, technical capacities, innovation, financial sustainability, communication and advocacy, interoperability, and data management.This introductory meeting led to the conclusion and agreement to hold a participatory landscape analysis workshop on August 30th and September 2nd.

At the end of this workshop, it was discovered that Togo has a unit in charge of the health services mapping, who oversees the health facilities master list (HFML). The Ministry of Health in Togo appreciates the initiative and sees it as an opportunity to strengthen the government's efforts to ensure universal access to care.

Group photograph of the workshop participants

eHealth Africa has since implemented a landscape assessment and is currently developing a report and cost work plan that will itemize the efforts required to bring Togo to the ideal scenario. 

To learn more about the GHFD initiative: https://www.who.int/data/GIS/GHFD 

Conducting successful Remote Energy Survey in security/network challenged environment

By Mohammed Bello, Tope Falodun and Busayo Fashoto

Remote Assessment of Energy Gaps in Selected Health Facilities: Identifying Potential for Alternative Energy Sources (Part 2)

Energy access is needed to maintain health, especially during pandemics. A prompt emergency response also depends on reliable energy access; health facilities have two main energy requirements: electricity for health services and medical equipment and thermal requirements related to sterilization, space and water heating, and incineration. However, lack of energy access poses additional challenges for the provision of emergency care services and the functioning of intensive care units.  When basic energy services are unavailable, essential components of emergency responses become compromised, including night-time care, refrigeration to keep samples, sterilization facilities, or electricity to power simple medical devices.

This expanded phase was implemented in Nasarawa states and is also part of the Nigerian Energy Support Programme (NESP), a technical assistance program co-funded by the European Union and the German Government and implemented by the Deutsche Gesellschaft fürInternationaleZusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Power (FMP), in partnership with eHealth Africa. It was conducted in close cooperation with geospatial data experts from INTEGRATION energy and environment. Still part of the effort of the NigeriaSE4ALL to bring you the most up-to-date, ground-truthed, electrification data available in Nigeria.

Following the successful first phase remote survey of 291 health facilities in Kano and Osun states in September 2020, INTegration contracted eHA to conduct a second phase of the remote survey in 300 Health facilities (HFs) of Nasarawa state.  This next project phase analyzes the energy status of communities in Nasarawa state.

In recent times Online surveys have been the most popular way of conducting survey research as opposed to the traditional face-to-face surveys widely used before now.  Although the face-to-face survey gives you more advantages in capturing additional emotional and behavioral clues, online surveys are cheaper.  The migration in recent times to remote surveys is a result of the migration of many organizations to digital solutions. This type of survey is less expensive and gives you some of the elements obtainable in the traditional face-to-face survey, such as the accuracy and efficiency of the data gathered.  It is also reliable in security-challenged environments. This result cannot be achieved without the expertise of agents trained to perform all the aforementioned.  At eHealth Africa (eHA), we have specially trained helpdesk agents specifically for these purposes.  In addition, our specially trained GIS and program delivery staff for the same purpose. They work collaboratively with stakeholders/beneficiaries to get accurate and efficient data based on planned activities.  The methodology and learnings from the first successful survey led to the successful planning of activities to conduct the grid supply quality in this second phase.

The following activities led to the success of the second phase survey in the 13 LGAs in Nassarawa State;

• Engagement with the state Team; Trained program staff to conduct a high-level stakeholder engagement with the state to introduce the project to the state team, get their buy-in, and discuss necessary data needed for the successful survey implementation.

•  Identification of Health Facility OICs Lead; following the high-level engagement is the identification of the health facilities officers in charge leads.  These are chairpersons of each LGAs OICs responsible for all OICs under their jurisdiction.  They assist in reaching out to the OICs to pre-inform the OICs of the implementation commencement and are relevant in following up with the OICs where the latter are unreachable.

• Health facility data gathering, verification/validation, communication with the LGA leads for HFs list sharing. HFs were then sorted, and some HFs not included on the list were verified following validation of all the selected HFs.

•  Training helpdesk agents for a successful survey;  The eHA helpdesk agents experts were trained on the survey tools and how to administer them. This includes what to look out for, understanding the tools, and further probing where necessary.

•  Conducting remote Survey; We completed the survey within three weeks of the project implementation with the helpdesk team working collaboratively with the GIS and program team to ensure the activity's success.

•  Continuous communication/collaboration with the state team;  The program team continued to communicate with the state team regularly to escalate issues encountered and collaboratively sought solutions to such problems.

Challenges:

There is no activity without its peculiar challenges; however, the excellent collaboration between the program team and the LGA/State team enabled the team to proffer solutions to address challenges such as unreachable OICs, wrong numbers of OICs, wrong OICs in actual HFs, non-network communities, etc.

Despite the challenges mentioned above, the lessons from the first phase of the project and other similar projects gave room for the team to be prepared for risks and challenges ahead of implementation.  This led to about 85% HFs data gathered at the end of the first two weeks, with only the unreachable HFs due to the earlier listed factors.  Communication platforms include Whatsapp chat, voice calls, SMS messages, etc. Intensive follow-up and the positive relationship between the team and the state team assisted greatly in successfully implementing the survey. At the end of the 3rd week, the group gathered the entire 300 HFs data, including geo-coordinate for HFs initially without geo-coordinates.  You are assured of the cost efficiency, especially considering Nigeria's current insecurity challenges.

The Program Partners