Social Listening Technical Support Officer, Band Level A at World Health Organization

Background  

The overall objective of the Communications Unit is to lead and coordinate WHO/AFRO'S efforts to advocate for resources and actions on key health issues in the African Region and showcase the impact of its work on health outcomes, securing the organization's position as the regional health leader and facilitating its ability to shape health policies. The unit also manages the internal communications function to create an optimal work environment reinforcing the common purpose of staff members.
In 2020, the Africa Infodemic Response Alliance (AIRA) was created, a WHO-hosted Network that includes 14 governmental and intergovernmental operational agencies as well as non-State actors/entities mobilised to respond to the COVID-19 Infodemic, to share safe, proven facts on health and to counter dangerous health misinformation. Today, AIRA continues to lead efforts to promote healthy information ecosystems and manage mis/disinformation to support health emergency responses, health preparedness efforts and to promote Universal Health Coverage more broadly. The AIRA team is composed of a social listening analyst, a country support lead, a capacity building officer, an operational researcher and a social media content production team.
The social listening analysis technical support lead will monitor and provide comprehensive assessments of real-time data affecting health initiatives in the African region, in particular in Francophone countries. This includes analyzing trends, identifying key issues, and evaluating public sentiment and engagement. The insights gathered will be used to inform and optimize health strategies, improve communication efforts, and address emerging health concerns more effectively. Through detailed reporting and analysis, the analyst will play a crucial role in enhancing the impact and reach of health initiatives across the region. 
The incumbent will also support capacity building efforts to country teams in a wide range of areas, from social listening to infodemic insights reporting to broader infodemic management in francophone countries. This work will be done under the supervision of the Technical Support lead who’s in charge of capacity building activities in the whole region. 
The AIRA Secretariat is housed at WHO under the Communications Unit, and also work very closely with the WHO Emergency Preparedness and Response (EPR), Universal Health Coverage and Healthier Populations (UHP) clusters, as part of the WHO Community Protection and engagement regional strategy. 

Deliverables 

The incumbent will be expected to perform the following duties: 

• Utilize social media analytics tools to gather insights, analyze social trends, segment audiences, and develop strategies to mitigate the spread of misinformation and disinformation in the African region (francophone countries).
• Monitor and provide real-time data and robust analytics on media coverage in relation to WHO’s programmatic priorities and humanitarian emergencies to better understand audience’s perception on key issues such as vaccination, in relation to key performance indicators, including the volume of media coverage, sentiment analysis, engagement metrics, conversation drivers, among other key metrics.
• Generate reports with key trends and insights to present to senior management teams, colleagues and partners from the African region, providing a quick overview of the coverage of interest for presentation and alert reports.
• Collaborate with the communication team to develop social media strategies that align with social listening findings and utilize social listening insights to refine messaging strategies and enhance predictive intelligence.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams, including content creators, designers, and developers, to ensure cohesive and impactful social media campaigns.
• Engage with Infodemic managers, partners, team members to help identify the most concerning trends and triangulate information on a weekly basis.
• Support capacity building activities at country and regional level on social listening, infodemic insights generation and reporting, and broader infodemic management for Francophone countries in line with Infodemic Management HQ training guidelines and packages.
• Provide technical guidance to country counterparts as requested. 

Qualifications, experience, skills and languages

Educational Qualifications 

Essential

• First university degree in communications, journalism, sociology, anthropology, social sciences or related field.

Desirable

• A master’s degree in communications, public health or related field

Experience 

Essential 

• Minimum of 2 years in infodemic management/health communication or risk communication and community engagement with demonstrated work in social listening or data analysis or equivalent.

Desirable

Experience conducting training and capacity building activities in support of country offices in social listening and infodemic management.

Skills/Knowledge

• Strong understanding of social media platforms, their functionalities, and best practices.
• Good understanding of infodemic insights analysis and reporting.
• Ability to design, adapt and conduct training on social listening and infodemic management across a range of stakeholders in support of country WCO.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Ability to work independently and meet deadlines in a fast-paced environment.

Languages and level required 

• Essentiel : Expert knowledge of French.
• Desirable : Intermediate knowledge of English and basic knowledge of Portuguese.