UNV Jobs - 42390- Volunteer Management Specialist

Volunteer Management Specialist

Advertised on behalf of

UNV

Location :

Bonn, GERMANY

Type of Contract :

FTA International

Starting Date :

01-Feb-2014

Application Deadline :

31-Dec-13 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

P-4

Duration of Initial Contract :

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence. UNDP does not tolerate sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, and discrimination. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks.

Background

The United Nations Volunteers (UNV) programme is the UN organization that contributes to peace and development through volunteerism worldwide. Volunteerism is a powerful means of engaging people in tackling development challenges, and it can transform the pace and nature of development. Volunteerism benefits both society at large and the individual volunteer by strengthening trust, solidarity and reciprocity among citizens, and by purposefully creating opportunities for participation. UNV contributes to peace and development by advocating for recognition of volunteers, working with partners to integrate volunteerism into development programming, and mobilizing an increasing number and diversity of volunteers, including experienced UN volunteers, throughout the world. UNV embraces volunteerism as universal and inclusive, and recognizes volunteerism in its diversity as well as the values that sustain it: free will, commitment, engagement and solidarity.

UNV engaged 6,807 UN Volunteers in 2012, on a total of 6,912 assignments. With an average age of 38 years and the requisite professional skills and qualifications of some 5 to 10 years relevant experience, UN volunteers served in 127 countries in 2012 and came themselves from 159. The majority – 79 per cent – come from developing countries themselves. One third of UN volunteers served in their own countries, with the others carrying out international assignments. The financial equivalent of programme activities exceeds US$220 million annually.

UNV is headquartered in Bonn, Germany and has approximately 150 staff positions – with the majority in Bonn and some positions with different UN peacekeeping and political missions, and in other Headquarters locations (e.g. New York and Tokyo). The major organizational groups within UNV are:

The Office of the Executive Coordinator (OEC) comprising the Evaluation Unit (EU) and the Corporate Planning and Performance Unit (CPPU);
The Volunteer Programming and Management Group (VPMG) comprising Quality Assurance Unit (QAU), Volunteer Knowledge and Innovation Section (VKIS), and Peace and Development Division (PDD), which includes the Peace Programming Section (PPS), the Development Programming Section (DPS), and the Volunteer Recruitment Resources Section (VRRS);
The Partnerships and Communications Division (PCD) comprising the Partnerships Section (PS) and the Communications Section (CS);
The Management Services Division (MSD) comprising the Information and Communication Technology Section (ICTS), Finance Section (FS), Human Resources Section (HRS), and the Administration Unit (AU). Additionally the Common Services Unit (CSU) provides support to the UN presence in Bonn.

Organizational setting:

During the past years, UNV has undertaken a series of initiatives and internal projects to improve the core business processes. Some of these initiatives have focused on the improvement of the Volunteer Management Cycle (VMC) and the ICT systems to support it. UNV’s Senior Management Team (SMT) considers the improvement of the VMC a very high priority for the following years.

Duties and Responsibilities

Reporting to the Deputy Executive Coordinator, the Volunteer Management Specialist leads the development of innovative and effective volunteer management practices and supports the capacity building efforts of the provision of sound volunteer management solutions.

Specific duties include the following:

Lead the development and application of the Volunteer Management Cycle concept through innovative and efficient volunteer management practices:

Coordinate and manage the development, dissemination, and implementation of best practices in volunteer management and volunteer management tools, knowledge products and guidelines for all stages in the Volunteer Management Cycle (e.g. Pre-Departure Briefing Pack, End of Assignment Handbook, Handover, etc.);
Oversee the refinement and update of the UNV’s volunteer management principles and approach as well as a detailed volunteer management cycle;
Ensure that “lessons learnt” are integrated in the new tools and knowledge products to enhance the quality of volunteer management;
Provide guidance and inputs into training to UNV staff, Programme Officers, and Programme Managers responsible for management of volunteers;
Provide specialist knowledge, guidance, or propose strategic direction on volunteer management to project development and relevant communities of practice;
Keep abreast of best practices in volunteer management among partners and international volunteer-sending organizations.

Coordinate the development and documentation of volunteer management business processes and facilitate organization-wide engagement with the development of the Volunteer Management Cycle and associated tools / resources:

Coordinate and provide substantive input and leadership to the teams and task forces to be created in order to validate the current business processes and proposed improvements;
Create and maintain a corporate framework for business processes architecture;
Develop the corporate framework and templates for Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) and standard Service Level Agreements (SLA) related to the VMC.

Lead the definition of coherent systems, tools and processes underpinning various volunteer modalities / schemes:

Set UNV standard for a coherent approach for packaging, promoting and managing multiple volunteer modalities across peace and development programming;
On the basis of identified needs, develop tools to support mobilization and integration of all UN Volunteer modalities into programming;
Identify opportunities for simplification and technical / operational improvements in managing all UN Volunteer modalities;
Analyze and propose effective and manageable cost recovery approaches for UN Volunteer modalities.

Lead the assessment and continuous improvement of support systems for UNV volunteer management cycle – for HQ and Field Units:

Provide specialist advice to senior management on the technological options for the support of the VMC processes;
Coordinate the fit-gap analysis of the current IT systems against the revised business processes considering the current and future developments of UNDP and UN corporate systems;
Assess and select technological options for the future support of the VMC.

Develop innovative volunteering modalities:

On the basis of identified needs and opportunities, field experiences, lessons from programming, and best practices, define innovative volunteer modalities through identification of new/improved services, practices and policies;
Coordinate the piloting of innovative modalities;
Define conditions of modalities’ mainstreaming.

Other related duties that may be assigned.

Competencies

Functional Competencies:

Advocacy/Advancing a Policy-Oriented Agenda

Uses the opportunity to bring forward and disseminate materials for advocacy work.

Building Strategic Partnerships

Identifies needs and interventions for capacity building of counterparts, clients and potential partners;
Displays initiative, sets challenging outputs for him/herself and willingly accepts new work assignments;
Takes responsibility for achieving agreed outputs within set deadlines and strives until successful outputs are achieved.

Promoting Organizational Learning and Knowledge Sharing

Makes the case for innovative ideas documenting successes and building them into the design of new approaches;
Identifies new approaches and strategies that promote the use of tools and mechanisms.

Job Knowledge/Technical Expertise

Understands more advanced aspects of primary area of specialization as well as the fundamental concepts of related disciplines (knowledge management);
Serves as internal consultant in the area of expertise and shares knowledge with staff;
Continues to seeks new and improved methods and systems for accomplishing the work of the unit;
Keeps abreast of new developments in area of professional discipline and job knowledge and seeks to develop him/herself professionally;
Demonstrates comprehensive knowledge of information technology and applies it in work assignments;
Demonstrates comprehensive understanding and knowledge of the current guidelines and project management tools and utilizes these regularly in work assignments.

Conceptual Innovation in the Provision of Technical Expertise

Leverages different experiences and expertise of team members to achieve better and more innovative outcomes;
Develops innovative and creative approaches to meet programme and capacity development objectives;
Participates in dialogue about conceptual innovation at the country and regional levels.

Client Orientation

Anticipates client needs;
Works towards creating an enabling environment for a smooth relationship between the clients and service provider;
Demonstrates understanding of client’s perspective.

Core Competencies:

Promoting ethics and integrity, creating organizational precedents;
Building support and political acumen ;
Building staff competence, creating an environment of creativity and innovation ;
Building and promoting effective teams;
Creating and promoting enabling environment for open communication;
Creating an emotionally intelligent organization;
Leveraging conflict in the interests of UNV & setting standards ;
Sharing knowledge across the organization and building a culture of knowledge sharing and learning ;
Fair and transparent decision making; calculated risk-taking.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Master’s degree in social sciences, political science, public or business administration, or related fields.

Experience:

Minimum 7 years of relevant professional experience, with at least 5 years in an international organization
In-depth experience in managing volunteer programmes and/or in a development context involving volunteers is required.

Language Requirements:

Fluency in English; proficiency in an additional UN language is desirable.