The Convergence Foundation - Program Associate/Senior Program Associate

Program : Associate /Senior Program Associate

Position : Program Associate /Senior Program Associate

Location : Telangana, Hyderabad

About CEGIS :

- The Centre for Effective Governance of Indian States (CEGIS) was co-founded by private equity investor turned philanthropist Ashish Dhawan and economist Karthik Muralidharan in 2019 to improve millions of lives by helping Indian state governments work better. CEGIS believes that improving the effectiveness of public expenditure is the most powerful way of achieving improved development outcomes at scale and will support Indian states by identifying and implementing evidence-based governance and public expenditure reforms.

- We will do this through a dedicated state office co-created with the state and integrated with the Finance and Planning Departments of the state. The staffing model will include CEGIS personnel as well as staff seconded by the state. We aim to build the organization in a "state-led" way, where we focus on deep partnerships with states with an iterative cycle of "thinking" and "doing". The central CEGIS office will aim to curate ideas based on both evidence and experience, support state-level experimentation, and accelerate adoption of successful practices across states.

CEGIS Model of Functioning :

- Weaknesses in state capacity hurt both development and service delivery (and disproportionately affect the poor). CEGIS believes that state capacity ultimately boils down to three key fundamentals, which therefore become the three verticals of our work.

- These are Outcome Measurement, Personnel Management, and Public Finance. High performing organisations measure the outcomes that matter and use this for goal setting and progress tracking.

- They ensure adequate and appropriately skilled staff are hired and given autonomy on processes but held accountable for outcomes. Finally, they allocate their resources in the most cost-effective manner. These principles of allocative efficiency and capacity augmentation are equally applicable to governments.

- CEGIS believes that states are the most important unit for addressing these issues. Therefore, we work with state governments to generate actionable insights, formulate effective solutions and facilitate measurable impact in terms of developmental outcomes.

- Currently, CEGIS is working in Telangana, Delhi, Bodoland Territorial Council, and Tamil Nadu. At the state level, CEGIS identifies sectoral priorities jointly with the state government, and then aims to integrate the three verticals (Outcome Measurement, Personnel Management, and Public Finance) into specific projects to improve governance, service delivery, and development outcomes.

- As mentioned, CEGIS works in an embedded manner with teams being based out of state government premises and engaging with different stakeholders including the department heads and other officials on a regular basis. The support provided involves both long term core projects as well as tactical support to the government in important functions.

Position Summary :

- The Program Associate will work on projects across the life cycle (concept notes, department level diagnostics, solution identification and pilot development, pilot implementation and scale up support). Typically these projects will involve frontline service delivery departments (e.g. local governance, nutrition, education etc.).

- The Program Associate will report to the respective Project Lead(s) and significantly contribute to analytical aspects of the project.

Role & Responsibilities :

- Develop end to end understanding of project across various modules

- Literature review, review of relevant legislation/ GOs pertinent to the project

- Own secondary data analysis (capture, data preparation, analysis and inference/ hypothesis testing)

- Basis the secondary data analysis, provide insights which will guide the team's primary outreach

- Own interface with client side stakeholders across the data process cycle

- Develop a sound understanding of the client (Government)'s issues and understand the relevance of the interventions (project) to these issues

- Participate actively in larger ideation sessions and client meetings and contribute to the overall project progress

Required Qualifications, Skills & Abilities :

Education & Experience :

- Bachelor's degree (Master's degree or equivalent preferred) in Economics, Public Policy, Social Science or related fields from a reputed institution

- 0 to 5 years work experience in India with organizations working in related fields of work i.e. research agencies, policy think-tanks, government or private sector organizations working on government advisory or consulting

- Data analysis ; expertise in STATA, Excel

- Report writing

- Proficiency in English and the local language of the state where CEGIS has partnerships

- Personal Characteristics and Desired Qualities

- Excellent problem-solving skills, with an aptitude for research to formulate solutions

- Fluency in English and excellent writing and communication skills (ability to communicate complex ideas in a meaningful way and across different audiences)

- Ability to be able to set priorities, plan timelines and meet deadlines

- Ability to think creatively, willing to take risks to experiment with new ideas and the ability to turn ideas into action

- High ability to collaborate and actively listen to others, understanding and valuing others' views

- Operating style suited to working independently and in a small-organization setting, where teamwork and resourcefulness are highly valued

Location & Compensation :

- Candidates with a home base in Hyderabad are preferred. In addition to providing remote support to the state teams, the candidate should be willing to travel, as required, to the states that CEGIS will have a presence in.

- Remuneration will be competitive with Indian philanthropy and social sector pay scales and will depend on the candidate's experience levels.

- Pre-reads for the application process

- To learn more about the type of reforms CEGIS is seeking to implement in states, please go through the following materials before sending in your application:

- Podcast episodes with Prof. Karthik Muralidharan - one each on education and healthcare in India.

- Collection of Prof. Karthik Muralidharan's work here.