The current COVID-19 pandemic has proven to be devastating for health systems globally. To slow the spread of the virus and to reduce its toll, country leaders must manage strong systems-focused, multi-sectoral coordination, planning, and monitoring. To support countries, Joint Learning Network for Universal Health Coverage (JLN) and the Health Systems Strengthening Accelerator (Accelerator) facilitated a year-long learning collaborative to help country leaders learn from each other on various topics, including how to create and manage the cross-sectoral teams to mount a coordinated response to the pandemic, developing pandemic/epidemic preparedness and response strategies, and strengthening coordination across sectors and across different levels of government to ensure a prompt and effective response.