Lead Software Architect needed at World Food Programme

Responsibilities and deliverables

• This assignment aims to develop a user-friendly, intuitive, and interactive software application and web-based user interface that will enable users to visualize historical outbreak events, run the ARC epidemic risk models for filovirus and meningitis to generate customized views of event catalogs, examine the potential human and financial losses, and guide decision-making through effective visualizations/infographics.
• ARC has documentation that shows how the epidemic risk models for filovirus and meningitis work, and how the corresponding event catalogs are generated using simulations produced by the disease spread models. After the completion of event catalog generation, all model output can be analyzed using the provided R-helper functions in the arcdsm package. The arcdsm package is a collection of functions, data, and compiled code, which provide the following functionality:
• Generate event catalogs for selected countries by running disease spread model simulations for covered pathogens.
• Analyze the event catalogs to obtain the estimated frequency and severity of the covered pathogens (filovirus or meningitis) for selected countries.
• The Consultant is expected to use the documentation and the server infrastructure provided by ARC to develop the application that users can interact with. The Consultant will work under the supervision of the Lead Advisor, Outbreaks and Epidemics, and work closely with other ARC teams and regional partners to develop a web-based application that should specifically allow users to perform the following tasks:
• Visualize historical outbreaks and epidemics event for filovirus (Ebola virus disease and Marburg virus disease) and meningitis in Africa.
• Visualize countries most at risk for the emergence of filovirus and meningitis events.
• Display the probabilities of experiencing filovirus outbreaks and meningitis epidemics of various sizes in any given year.
• Display losses associated with filovirus outbreaks in terms of infections, hospitalizations, and deaths; and visualized average annual losses.
• Display losses associated with meningitis epidemics in terms of number of districts in alert and number of districts in epidemics; and visualized average annual losses.
• Calculate and visualize the potential disease burden (e.g., DALYs) and the economic losses.
• Calculate and visualize the potential benefits of early outbreak intervention and rapid containment: e.g., reduced disease burden (cases and deaths averted); reduced direct cost of outbreak response (health systems cost-savings); reduced indirect cost of illness (households cost-savings); reduced secondary effects on the economy (sustained investments).
• Estimate the amount of medical countermeasures or other health systems interventions that may be needed under different potential scenarios.

Deliverables

The Lead Software Architect will deliver on the following:

• Provide an inception report that outlines how the incumbent will carry out the development of a web user interface for outbreaks and epidemics risk analytics in the African region.
• Develop an operational web-based application for ARC’s filovirus and meningitis epidemic risk models.
• Report on how the software application was developed (including the software architecture and functional design).
• Document the source code for the software package developed.
• Package the software for easy installation, including creating installation scripts and documenting; and installation procedures.
• Install the software package on a cloud-based server provided by ARC (ARC servers are currently hosted by Amazon Web Services).
• Develop graphical interfaces for selected epidemic risk analytics as defined in the tasks section above, in collaboration with the UI/UX designer, ARC teams, and partners.
• Train the ARC teams on the functionality of the software developed.
• Set up registration and login functionality to ensure that the application is protected from authorized users.

Qualifications and experience required

• Education: The prospective candidate must have at a minimum a master’s degree in computer science or similar relevant discipline with a strong expertise in developing web-based applications with user-friendly interactive interfaces.
• Experience: Minimum of 8 years of demonstrated experience in software development, particularly developing web-based user interfaces, with proficiency required for programming languages such as Python, PHP, or JavaScript. The prospective Consultant must have relevant experience in developing similar applications, especially GIS-based applications. Professional software development certifications are an added advantage. Knowledge of mathematical modelling of infectious diseases will be a strong asset.
• Experience working with African countries and regional African public health institutions.

Knowledge & Skills:

• Strong knowledge of software architecture concepts, design principles and architectural models.
• In-depth understanding of programming languages, frameworks and technologies related to IT systems.
• Ability to design robust, scalable, and high-performance software architectures in line with business needs and objectives.
• Ability to break down complex problems into simpler components and define the interactions between these components.
• Familiarity with geographical information systems datasets and basic web-based mapping.
• Ability to manage projects and deliver in a fast-paced environment.
• Critical thinking and strong communication and presentation skills.
• Experience working in multi-cultural and multi-disciplinary teams.