Overview

• The Head of Technology is a mission-critical leadership role, responsible for driving our technical strategy that contributes to our mission of transforming maternal healthcare across Africa. This position offers the opportunity to lead and grow a world-class team, advance AI-driven solutions, and make a tangible impact on millions of lives. You’ll optimize platform performance, ensure seamless health-system integration, and establish key strategic partnerships—all with zero tolerance for downtime and data errors. Only seasoned professionals who can hit the ground running should apply.

What You’ll Do

• Technical Leadership & Vision:
• Drive ‘Effective, Simple, Cheap’: Champion solutions that maximize impact for mothers and babies, ensuring every technical decision is cost-effective, scalable, and high-impact.
• Architect for Excellence: Provide the roadmap for best-in-class engineering (agile, CI/CD, QA). Expect rigorous execution and a culture of ongoing improvement.
• Embrace Cutting-Edge Tech: Deploy and support the latest in AI/ML, cloud computing, and digital health tools—always pushing the boundaries for better healthcare outcomes.
• Seamless Integration: Lead integration with national health systems (EMRs, DHIS2, FHIR), ensuring our technology slots in effortlessly and reliably.
• Data Security & Compliance: Maintain 100% data accuracy, ensure bulletproof security, and 100% compliance with the Kenya Data Protection Act.
• Strategic Leadership & Partnerships:
• Set the Tech Strategy: Define a forward-thinking Kenya-centric roadmap, positioning Jacaranda as a global leader in digital health innovation.
• Influence Policy: Advocate for our solutions in government and international forums, shaping digital health policy at the highest levels.
• Expand & Scale: Drive national and international expansion of Jacaranda’s platforms, bringing our solutions to millions more mothers in sub-Saharan Africa.
• Cross-Functional Collaboration: Integrate efforts with Product, Research, Data, and Programs to ensure technology solutions align with organizational goals.
• OKR Ownership: Lead annual planning, set ambitious OKRs, and enforce a results-focused mindset across your teams.
• Build Strategic Alliances: Support high-visibility collaborations with global technology giants (Google, AWS, OpenAI, Meta) and proposal development for grants and impact reporting.
• Team Leadership & Development:
• Hire & Inspire: Recruit top technical talent and foster a culture of collaboration, creativity, and high performance.
• Mentorship & Growth: Conduct thorough annual performance reviews, offer candid feedback, and champion the professional development of every team member.
• Visionary Leadership: Create an environment where engineers feel empowered to test new ideas, fail fast, and iterate for success.
• Operational Excellence:
• Reliability & Uptime: Aim for 99.9% system uptime and zero tolerance for any preventable downtime.
• Advanced Monitoring: Establish automated systems for rapid issue detection and resolution.
• Scalable Infrastructure: Build robust cloud solutions that can handle explosive user growth and large data sets, without compromising on cost efficiency.
• Data Governance: Enforce strict protocols to safeguard sensitive health information and maintain trust with our users.
• Financial Management:
• Budget Planning & Monitoring: Own the annual and monthly technology budget planning to ensure optimal resource allocation.
• Accountability: Maintain strict budget adherence, promptly addressing any deviations and upholding full transparency with senior leadership.

What we are looking for

• Education: Bachelor's or master's in computer science, Software Engineering, or related field.

Experience:

• 7+ years in technology leadership, with deep engineering expertise.
• Proven success scaling technology to millions of users across multiple countries.
• Experience with end-to-end design, development, and deployment of scalable tech platforms.
• Demonstrated track record of near-zero downtime in mission-critical systems.