Job Openings Senior Program Associate

About the job Senior Program Associate

About CEGIS

Centre for Effective Governance of Indian States (CEGIS – pronounced See-Jis) aims to improve lives by helping Indian state governments deliver better development outcomes. We believe that the most impactful lever for accelerating national development is to improve governance and state capacity to better deliver core public services at scale.

Informed by cutting-edge research and evidence as well as a practical orientation toward implementable ideas, CEGIS works with state governments in India to enable a transformative improvement in their functioning. CEGISs vision and Theory of Change (ToC) are an outcome of extensive research done by Prof. Karthik Muralidharan (CEGIS Co-Founder and Scientific Director) and outlined in his multiple award-winning, national bestselling book Accelerating India's Development, and enabled by strategic philanthropic support provided by Ashish Dhawan (CEGIS Co-Founder).

CEGIS Approach and Model of Functioning

CEGISs solutions to enhance governance are co-created with state governments in a state-led way, where we focus on deep partnerships with states using an iterative cycle of think-demonstrate-document-transfer. We work closely with the top bureaucratic leadership, front-line workers and public officials in Finance, Planning, Human Resources and a few other priority line departments. Many of our solutions reflect ideas outlined in the book Accelerating India's Development, and these solutions are constantly refined based on real-time feedback and are designed to both be customized to the contexts we are working in, and to create templates that can provide the starting point for replication across contexts.

Our focus areas reflect evidence that key characteristics of high-performing organisations include (a) measuring outcomes through reliable, high quality data that enables goal setting and progress monitoring; (b) strategic use of personnel – competency based hiring and training, skilling, and performance appraisals to determine job assignments, pay, and promotions – to achieve the goals above; (c) strategic budgeting where resource allocation and revenue collection are based on evidence and cost-effectiveness; (d) and creating efficient systems to leverage external actors (including for-profit and nonprofit organisations). CEGIS partners with states to improve capacity by focusing on these pillars of State effectiveness, and aims to also integrate these horizontal governance improvements into integrated sectoral roadmaps to accelerate the achievement of state and national development outcomes.

Internally, CEGIS is organized into “solutions” teams that lead the design and technical quality control of our research and evidence-backed approaches to improving governance and state capacity; “delivery" teams that lead state-facing work to contextualize the solutions, and support governments in implementing them; and “enablement” teams that enable the organization to function smoothly.

CEGIS@6 to CEGIS@10: Building on Momentum to Catalyse National Development

Since its incorporation in 2019, CEGIS has gained significant momentum in building strong collaborations with state government(s) as a trusted partner who can provide both thought leadership and implementation support on key governance reforms. CEGIS position as a non-profit that does not take any funding from the government (other than in-kind contributions of office space/staff) has been a key enabler in earning this trust.

Beginning with 1 state government engagement in 2019, today CEGIS is working across 9 Indian states (Assam, Chhattisgarh, Delhi, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Odisha, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, and Uttar Pradesh). We also partner with union agencies/ministries such as Capacity Building Commission, Ministry of Women & Child Development (MoWCD), and Ministry of Statistics & Programme Implementation (MoSPI) to share insights from our state-level work to inform national-level guidelines and dissemination to other states. Finally, we also take on selected work at the district level to design and test implementation templates.

From a small group of founding members, we have grown to become a team of 150+ members located across the country, and expect to grow to over 200 in the coming year. Led by a former senior civil-servant with deep governance experience; state and solution team leads with decades of domain expertise; and enabling functions led by professionals with considerable corporate experience, the team at CEGIS brings together knowledge and experience that spans various sectors – from development economics, research, governance, management consulting, and social entrepreneurship.

Over the last 6 years, CEGIS has also garnered support for our vision and theory of change from several foundations and philanthropists whose partnership has enabled us to build our organisational capacity as well as continue to experiment and improve our solution design to augment state capacity and governance. With the rapidly growing demand for CEGISs offerings, CEGIS is well-positioned to play a key role in accelerating India’s development.

To explore what the mission of CEGIS is and the impact we hope to have, please take a look at this video of our CEO, Dr Vijay Pingale.

About the Vertical – Strategic Public Finance (SPF)

The Strategic Public Finance (SPF) team at CEGIS works at the intersection of evidence and governance to strengthen the quality of public financial management across Indian states. The team’s core problem statement is that state governments often lack the data infrastructure, analytical capacity, and institutionalised processes to make evidence-based fiscal decisions leading to inefficiencies in revenue mobilisation, budget planning, and public expenditure.

The SPF team’s theory of change is anchored in institutionalising data-driven decision-making within key government departments by building robust data systems, analytical capacity, and repeatable solution stacks that enable better goal-setting, monitoring, and strategic resource allocation.

SPF operationalises this through three core solution stacks that together address the full fiscal lifecycle:

  1. Quality of Expenditure Stack (QoE) - Focuses on improving efficiency of public spending through diagnostics, improving the efficiency and effectiveness of welfare spending through better targeting and strengthening outcome linkages between expenditure and service delivery.
  2. Revenue Stack - Aims to strengthen state’s revenue mobilisation through analytics, process improvements in revenue administration, compliance nudges, and institutional capacity building to enhance state own revenues.
  3. Macrofiscal Analytics Stack - Focuses on strengthening fiscal strategy through better visibility into economic activity through an integrated view of growth, employment, and productivity by combining data on labour supply, firm demand, and land and property markets to inform urban planning and revenue potential.

Across these stacks, SPF engagements typically involve:

  • Partnering with government stakeholders & donors in designing, testing, and scaling revenue augmentation and expenditure efficiency interventions, for example, budget analysis, expenditure tracking, and performance-linked reforms.
  • Supporting state finance departments to build in-house analytical capacity and enable data driven interventions.

This stack-based approach allows SPF to address fiscal challenges in an integrated manner - linking revenue, expenditure, and macroeconomic insights to enable more strategic and sustainable public finance management.

Position Summary

As a Senior Program Associate (SPA) within the Strategic Public Finance team, you will play a central role in managing and delivering state-level public finance engagements across the full project lifecycle – from diagnostic and concept development through to pilot implementation and scale-up support. Working closely with the Senior Program Manager and government counterparts in states such as Punjab and Uttar Pradesh, you will lead analytical workstreams, synthesise insights from complex fiscal data, and translate them into actionable policy inputs and stakeholder-ready communications. The role demands a researcher-practitioner orientation: equal comfort with rigorous data analysis and hands-on project coordination, the ability to navigate multi-stakeholder environments, and a genuine interest in building state capacity for evidence-based governance. You will operate with a high degree of ownership, manage ambiguity well, and contribute meaningfully to the SPF team’s documentation, knowledge management, and cross-state learning.

Roles & Responsibilities

Research & Analysis

  • Conducts independent research, root cause analysis, and quantitative and qualitative analysis of state fiscal systems, revenue mobilisation, and public expenditure to surface policy-relevant insights
  • Designs data collection tools, cleans and organises datasets, and turns complex findings into clear recommendations for strategic and departmental decisions.

Solution Design & Technical Work

  • Collaborates with solution and delivery teams to develop and refine technical approaches tailored to the specific capacities and needs of government counterparts
  • Assesses alternative strategies and frameworks, and prepares structured notes for project leads and senior government stakeholders


Stakeholder Engagement & Communication

  • Prepares high-quality presentations, policy briefs, and concept notes for senior government officials and internal leadership
  • Builds and deepens working relationships with government counterparts, anticipates stakeholder needs, and contributes proactively to sustained partnership development


Project & Delivery Management

  • Manages day-to-day coordination across central engagements — working with internal teams and external partners — ensuring accountability for timelines, deliverables, and output quality

  • Proactively flags project risks and escalates issues in a timely manner


Knowledge Management & Documentation

  • Produces project documentation — including progress reports, analytical summaries, and lessons-learned notes — for internal and external audiences
  • Maintains the project knowledge repository and develops replication templates and cross-state playbooks, ensuring learnings from Punjab and UP engagements are systematically captured and made transferable

Education & Experience

  • A Master’s degree (or equivalent) in Economics, Public Policy, Public Finance, Social Sciences, or a related field from a reputed institution; bright graduate applicants with exceptional demonstrated ability may be considered
  • 3–6 years of relevant work experience in India, with organisations working in research, policy, government advisory, consulting, or public finance reform
  • Demonstrated experience in analytical project contributions – including data analysis, diagnostics, and solution design – in government or government-adjacent contexts
  • Experience in client-facing or government-engagement roles is strongly preferred
  • Proficiency in STATA, R, or equivalent data analysis software; experience handling large and complex datasets and econometric analysis
  • Strong written communication skills including report writing, presentation design, and policy documentation; proficiency in MS Office and related tools

Required Competencies

Domain Competencies

  • Understands how Indian state governments manage money — budgeting, revenue administration, public expenditure, and fiscal federalism
  • Aware of the reform landscape — knows the challenges Finance and Planning departments face and what governance reform looks like in practice

Functional Competencies

  • Analyses data independently — comfortable with quantitative methods and statistical tools (STATA/R preferred, proficiency in Microsoft excel / spreadsheet tools is mandatory) — and translates findings into policy-relevant insights
  • Breaks down complex fiscal problems into clear, manageable steps and actionable workstreams
  • Communicates technical analysis clearly — in presentations, briefs, and notes — for diverse audiences

  • Manages multiple workstreams and delivers to deadlines

Behavioural Competencies

  • Ownership – takes responsibility for outputs and follows through proactively without constant supervision
  • Learning agility – curious, open to feedback, and willing to adapt approaches in dynamic reform environments
  • Collaboration – actively listens, values diverse perspectives, and works effectively within cross-functional teams
  • Stakeholder sensitivity – understands the political and institutional context of government engagements and navigates them with tact and professionalism
  • Comfort with ambiguity – able to operate with incomplete information and adapt to evolving project needs, which is inherent to governance reform work

Role Logistics

  • Location: New Delhi

  • Language: Proficiency in English (written and spoken) is required

  • Travel: Travel to project states (Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, and others as needed) is expected, approximately once a month or as per project requirements

Pre-reads for the Application Process

Please go through the following materials before sending in your application:

Recommended listening:

  • Karthik Muralidharan: India’s Roadmap for Effective Governance — FED Dialogues: Podcast Episode.
  • Karthik Muralidharan on Making Governance More Effective — Sushasan | Podcast.

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