Høybråten was granted leave from his duty as Member of Parliament from March 2013 to take up the position as Secretary General of the Nordic Council of Ministers.

In 2018 it was announced that Mr Høybråten will lead the "Truth and Reconciliation committee" regarding the discrimination of the indigenous Sami people in Norway up and until 1980.

While he was born and grew up in Oslo, he lived for three years in Sandnes due to his father working there as a control veterinary.

His father was politically active in the Christian Democratic Party, and was a State Secretary and deputy member of the Parliament of Norway from Oslo 1973–1977.

When the Christian Democrats joined Kåre Willoch's government in 1983 Høybråten became a Political Adviser for Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik in the Ministry of Church and Education until 1986.

It resulted in the adoption by Parliament of a bill banning smoking in restaurants, bars, and cafés that came into force on 1 June 2004.

[8] Høybråten was critical of employers advertising positions for non-smokers, since his he felt the issue ought to be fighting tobacco and its adverse health effects, rather than discriminating against people who smoke.

He succeeded Mary Robinson, Graça Machel and Nelson Mandela in this position, and he is the longest-serving chair of the organisation.

Gavi was set up in 2000 as a global Vaccine Alliance, bringing together public and private sectors with the shared goal of saving children's lives and protecting people's health by increasing access to immunisation in the world's poorest countries.

[17] In 2015, new figures documented that Gavi has helped vaccinate half a billion children and saved 7 million lives since the organisation was funded.