The University of Oslo is Norway’s oldest and highest rated institution of research and education with 26 500 students and 7 200 employees. Its broad range of academic disciplines and internationally esteemed research communities make UiO an important contributor to society.
The HISP Centre is a global action research project that is considered one of the University of Oslo's greatest international successes. Since 1994, researchers at the HISP Centre have developed the "open source" health information platform DHIS2, which has revolutionized the health sector in the global south. The platform is used to collect, validate, analyze and present aggregated health data. 70 countries use the platform as their national health solution. The system is used by 2.4 billion people. The HISP network further develops the platform thanks to grants from national and international partners. UiO conducts extensive training to enable users in the respective countries to configure and use the software in the best possible way. The HISP Centre based at UiO consists of a global team with 45 employees at UiO and 55 external consultants. In addition, 90 man-years are financed via almost 20 regional HISP groups in Asia, Africa and Latin. Associated with HISP are also 27 recruitment positions and 45 master's students. The HISP Centre has a clear and realistic ambition that DHIS2 will also be used in new areas in addition to health, to continue growth in education, logistics and agriculture, as well as investing in the environment and climate.
About the position
We invite applications for a position as Senior Software Engineer - Data Science, Climate and Health, available at the HISP Centre.
The position is permanent subject to availability of external funding. Starting date no later than October 1st, 2026.
Place of work is the HISP Centre at Department of Informatics, Oslo.
Job description
The HISP Centre is looking for a senior software engineer to strengthen the data science side of its climate and health project. The project develops Chap, an open-source platform that connects climate data to disease forecasting inside DHIS2, enabling countries to run, evaluate, and own their own predictive models for climate-sensitive diseases such as malaria, dengue and cholera. Chap is developed in close collaboration with ministries of health and national HISP partners across 17 countries in sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia, together with the global HISP network. The project is funded by Wellcome Trust.
The position sits at the intersection of software engineering and applied data science. You will work on the modelling and evaluation side of the platform - the components that let external forecasting models be plugged in, run inside a country’s own infrastructure, and be compared under identical, platform-governed evaluation criteria. This includes contributing to the model template architecture, the evaluation and back testing framework, and the pipelines that turn climate, environmental and health surveillance data into forecasts delivered back into DHIS2 dashboards. There are also ambitions to move the analytical methodology towards causal decision support questions, like estimating effects of disease interventions or early warning systems as such.
Because Chap is built as much through participatory action research as through software engineering, the role also has a project-facing dimension: translating feedback from country teams and domain experts into concrete technical requirements and helping shape how the platform evolves as it scales to more countries and use cases.
What skills are important in this role?
Qualification requirements:
In this role you must have:
Master’s degree in computer science, data science, or a closely related field. Extensive practical competence may replace the educational requirement
Strong programming skills, with demonstrated experience building and maintaining production-quality software (Python preferred, given the platform’s stack)
Solid grounding in data science methodology - comfortable working with statistical or machine learning models, evaluation methodology, and messy real-world data, preferably within the biomedical medical domain
A combination of academic and industry experience: experience from academia alongside several years of experience working as a software engineer or applied data scientist outside academia
Leadership experience - planning, prioritising, and coordinating project development and software engineering and data science work
Fluent written and spoken English
Desired qualifications:
PhD in computer science, data science, or a closely related field
Experience with applied data science in the medical domain
Experience with climate and health analysis
Some familiarity with DHIS2 and Chap, or corresponding software platforms built for deployment in low-resource settings
Interest in global health, digital sovereignty, or the operational challenges of taking research models into real-world use
Experience with reproducible computational research
Understanding of a Scandinavian language at a very basic level - at least corresponding to A2 level of Norwegian
All candidates and projects will have to undergo a check versus national export, sanctions and security regulations. Candidates may be excluded based on these checks. Primary checkpoints are the Export Control regulation, the Sanctions regulation, and the national security regulation.
What are we looking for in you?
Personal skills:
Comfortable moving between hands-on development work and higher-level project/technical leadership
Ability to work independently as well as closely with an interdisciplinary team spanning software engineers, statisticians, epidemiologists, and country-based implementation partners
Pragmatic about real-world constraints - interested in what it takes to make a model actually run reliably in the field, not only in a paper
Good communication skills, including the ability to explain technical trade-offs to non-technical stakeholders
Structured, and able to adapt swiftly as project priorities shift
Employment in the position is based on a comprehensive assessment of all qualification requirements applicable to the position, including personal skills.
We can offer you
A central technical role in a platform already deployed with health ministries across 17 countries, with real operational stakes
Opportunity of up to 1.5 hours a week of exercise during working hours. A workplace with good development and career opportunities.
Membership in the Statens Pensjonskasse, which is one of Norway's best pension schemes with beneficial mortgages and good insurance schemes.
Oslo’s family-friendly surroundings with their rich opportunities for culture and outdoor activities
Salary in position as Senior Engineer, position code 1181 in salary range NOK 810 000 – 875 000, depending on competence and experience. From the salary, 2% is deducted in statutory contributions to the State Pension Fund
Inclusive work life and diversity at UiO
Inclusion and diversity are a strength. The University of Oslo has a personnel policy objective of achieving a balanced gender composition. Furthermore, we want employees with diverse professional expertise, life experience and perspectives.
If there are qualified applicants with disabilities, employment gaps or immigrant background, we will invite at least one applicant from each of these categories to an interview.
We hope that you will apply for the position.
More information about gender equality initiatives at UiO can be found here.
How to apply
The application must include:
Brief cover letter with a statement of motivation, relevant to the announced position
CV summarising education, positions, technical projects, and relevant academic or industry work
Contact details of 2–3 references (name, relation to candidate, e-mail and telephone number)
Any other documentation the applicant wishes the evaluation committee to consider (portfolio, code samples, publications)
Application with attachments must be submitted via our recruitment system Jobbnorge, click "Apply for this job".
When applying for the position, we ask you to retrieve your education results from Vitnemålsportalen.no. If your education results are not available through Vitnemålsportalen, we ask you to upload copies of your transcripts or grades. Please note that all documentation must be in English or a Scandinavian language.
General information
Applicants may be called in for an interview.
Applicant lists can be published in accordance with Norwegian Freedom of Information Act § 25. When you apply for a position with us, your name will appear on the public applicant list. It is possible to request to be excluded from this list. You must justify why you want an exemption from publication and we will then decide whether we can grant your request. If we can't, you will hear from us.
