Senior STTA - HR Policy Expert with strategic and policy-level expertise

KP TA - Support to DOH on Legal Framework Reforms to Enhance Governance and Health System Outcomes in KP

Programme Overview 

Evidence for Health (E4H) is a Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO)-funded programme aimed at strengthening Pakistan's healthcare system, thereby decreasing the burden of illness and saving lives. E4H provides technical assistance (TA) to the Federal, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), and Punjab governments, and is being implemented by Palladium along with Oxford Policy Management (OPM). 

Through its flexible, embedded, and demand-driven model, E4H supports the government to achieve a resilient health system that is prepared for health emergencies, responsive to the latest evidence, and delivers equitable, quality, and efficient healthcare services. Specifically, E4H delivers TA across three outputs:

Output 1: Strengthened integrated health security, with a focus on preparing and responding to health emergencies, including pandemics.

Output 2: Strengthened evidence-based decision-making to drive health sector performance and accountability.

Output 3: Improved implementation of Universal Health Coverage, with a focus on ending preventable deaths. 

Position Summary 

The goal of this technical assistance is to strengthen the health sector’s legal and regulatory framework by removing redundancies, eliminating overlaps, and clarifying governance pathways through the revision of Acts and development of standardised Rules and Service Structures, ensuring effective enforcement and improved governance, health system outcomes and service delivery in quality standards, rehabilitation, public–private partnerships, and human resource management.

We will achieve this by pursuing two objectives: 

Objective 1: Revise selected health-related Acts to remove redundancies, resolve overlapping functions, and align with current governance, service delivery, and regulatory priorities.

Objective 2: Develop Rules and Service Structures to establish clear mandates, strengthen enforcement mechanisms, and support effective implementation across quality standards, rehabilitation services, public–private partnerships, and human resource management.

Strategic Approach 

Contributions to health systems strengthening

This technical assistance will address priority governance challenges in the health sector by revising and operationalising selected legal instruments. Updated Acts and accompanying Rules will clarify institutional mandates, streamline institutional mechanisms, and align regulatory frameworks with the DOH’s current priorities and reform roadmap. The revisions will remove redundancies, resolve overlaps, establish consistent service structures, strengthen enforcement capacity, and embed clear quality standards. The resulting framework will enhance rehabilitation services, improve the governance of public–private partnerships, ensure effective workforce deployment, and create enforceable mechanisms for accountability. By aligning legislation with operational realities, the intervention will strengthen governance, improve regulatory compliance, enhance institutional responsiveness, and support equitable, high-quality health service delivery ultimately contributing to a more coherent, stable, and effective health system.

Alignment with other E4H TAs/investments

This technical assistance will provide the strategic foundation for standardised service structures and strengthened governance mechanisms, supporting the implementation of other E4H-supported reforms such as Human Resource Management Information System (HRMIS) validation, facility-level budgeting, and governance platform operationalisation. It will also align with the Health Foundation (HF) evaluation of outsourced health facilities, using its evidence alongside the multi-sectoral health workforce strategy to ensure the revised Acts enable practical implementation, including “One Health” approaches. Furthermore, findings from federal scoping reviews of laws will inform the drafting process, ensuring that the Acts are evidence-based, aligned with national legal frameworks, and positioned to support integrated, high-quality service delivery across the health sector.

Alignment with other donors & partners

This technical assistance will coordinate with other donor-funded projects by mapping who is active in legal, governance, and human resource reforms, and aligning timelines, priorities, and technical approaches. It will use partners’ evidence, tools, and lessons learned to shape the revision of Acts and development of rules, ensuring consistency and complementarity across programmes.

Scope of Work and Methodology 

This technical assistance will be delivered by a team under the support and guidance of the Health Sector Reform Unit (HSRU) and the Office of the Director General Health Services (DGHS), working closely with both through phased stages from review to adoption to ensure continuous stakeholder engagement and consensus building.

Checkpoint 1– Diagnostic Review and Gap Analysis

• Undertake a comprehensive legal review of the four Acts requiring revision, namely the PIPOS Act, the Act for Regulating Paraplegic Center Peshawar, the KP HCC Act, and the KP BTA Act.

• Assess the existence, adequacy, and applicability of Rules and Service Structures for the nine identified Acts, including the PIPOS Act, Paraplegic Act, Independent Monitoring Unit (IMU) Act, BTA Act, Regional Blood Centre (RBC) Act, KP Employees Regularization Acts of 2017 and 2018, and KP Employees (Erstwhile FATA) Regularization Acts of 2021 and 2022.

• Identify specific provisions that are outdated, inconsistent, or contradictory to current governance and service delivery priorities. 

• Engage with key stakeholders including the Law Department, Establishment Department, Finance Department, Department of Health units, and institutional boards to validate identified gaps and collect additional inputs.

Checkpoint 2– Drafting and Technical Review

• Prepare revised drafts of the four Acts, incorporating updated provisions that address current governance challenges, strengthen regulatory and enforcement mechanisms, establish quality standards, support rehabilitation services, enhance public–private partnerships, and align with overall health sector priorities, including human resource standards.

• Draft Rules and Service Structures for the nine Acts, ensuring these define clear organisational mandates, institutional mechanisms, quality assurance measures, and service delivery pathways.

• Integrate feedback from relevant legal precedents, federal scoping reviews of laws, sectoral evaluations such as the HF evaluation, and other evidence-based assessments to strengthen the drafts.

• Conduct structured technical review meetings with the DOH, HSRU, the Office of the DGHS, legal experts, technical specialists, and institutional stakeholders to refine and finalise the drafts.

Checkpoint 3– Validation, Finalisation, and Submission

• Organise validation workshops with all relevant stakeholders, including those engaged through the E4H-supported intersectoral coordination mechanism, to secure consensus on the revised Acts and newly developed Rules and Service Structures.

• Incorporate all agreed changes from validation sessions to produce finalised legislative and regulatory documents.

• Submit the complete set of final drafts to the Law Department for legal vetting, legislative processing, and approval, ensuring DOH/HSRU oversight throughout the process.

Sustainability: Capacity Building, Institutionalisation, and/or Transition Planning 

• Capacity building will be embedded through on-the-job mentoring of DOH staff, enabling them to interpret, apply, and periodically review revised Acts, Rules, and Service Structures. 

• Institutionalisation will be achieved through the HSRU by incorporating the revised Acts, Rules, and Service Structures into DOH and HSRU policy manuals, integrating them into the HRMIS, and issuing formal notifications through official government channels.

Sustainability will be reinforced by linking this TA with existing reform processes, such as the HF evaluation follow-up, the multi-sectoral health workforce strategy, and federal scoping reviews of laws, ensuring that the legislative and service structure reforms remain relevant, evidence-based, and adaptable over time.

Responsibilities

The HR Expert will work to achieve the following: 

1. HR policy and service structure sections.

2. Technical recommendations for HR alignment in revised Acts. 

3. Participation in validation workshops to finalise HR-related provisions. 

Timeline and Days

The level of effort (LOE) for the role is 50 days from August 2025 – January 2026. 

Requirement 

Technical Expertise

• Expertise in public sector HR policy, workforce planning, and service structure development.

• Knowledge of job classification systems, career pathway design, and human resource regularisation frameworks.

• Familiarity with HRMIS integration and operationalisation of HR policies in government settings.

• Experience in aligning HR provisions with broader governance and legislative reforms

Competencies

• Strong policy drafting and analytical skills.

• Ability to design fit-for-purpose HR structures that address institutional needs.

• Stakeholder consultation and capacity-building abilities.

• Organisational and change management skills.