UN WOMEN Jobs - 45569- EXTENDED DEADLINE - UN Women- Team Leader for Base

EXTENDED DEADLINE - UN Women- Team Leader for Baseline study and Performance Management Framework for regional project “Promoting Gender Responsive Policies in South Eastern Europe and Moldova, Phase 2”

Advertised on behalf of

UN WOMEN

Location :

Skopje, Republic of North Macedonia

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

07-May-2014

Application Deadline :

29-Apr-14 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

International Consultant

Duration of Initial Contract :

30/06/2014

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

estimated 14 working days for the period from 5/07/204 till 30/06/2014

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

Over the past years, UN Women has provided support to national and local stakeholders in strengthening democratic governance and advancing women’s rights through initiatives aimed at mainstreaming gender in policy planning and budgeting.

In 2014, UN Women launched the 3-year regional project on Promoting Gender Responsive Policies in South East Europe and Republic of Moldova financed by Austrian Development Agency (ADA) and Swiss Agency Development and Cooperation. It is a direct follow up of the UN Women CSEE regional project “Promoting Gender Responsive Policies in South East Europe” (2011 -2013) that covered Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Former Yugoslav Republic (FYR) of Macedonia. The final evaluation of this project recommended continuation of activities especially with regard to institutional capacity building and increased involvement of key budget actors at the required decision-making levels. UN Women will share more details about the project with the selected consultant.

The purpose of the consultancy is to prepare performance monitoring framework, methodology and guidance for progress data collection in order to enhance accountability, inform decision-making and contribute to learning on the best ways to achieve women’s empowerment and gender equality through operational and normative work. As a member of the United Nations Evaluation Group (UNEG), UN WOMEN follows its norms and standards. UN WOMEN evaluations are gender equality and rights responsive.

Duties and Responsibilities

UN Women is seeking to recruit team of 5 consultants. The team will consist of Team Leader (Senior Consultant) and four national consultants, who will be supervised by the Team Leader, but based in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, FYR Macedonia and Republic of Moldova respectively. The key responsibility of the team members will be to collect data for the baseline and validate the PMF with the project staff and other stakeholders in their respective countries.

The Team Leader will be responsible for the overall delivery under the TOR.

The team leader will have essential expertise in results based management in the context of international development; expertise in gender and gender responsive budgeting, expertise in leading teams in similar assignments, demonstrated track record in monitoring and evaluation; relevant regional expertise; ability to conduct qualitative and quantitative analysis; requisite skills in facilitation, and language proficiency in English.

The team members will have demonstrated expertise in applied research knowledge of gender issues and public administration. They will be fluent in English and the respective local language/s. All team members need to be familiar with human rights and gender responsive approach to evaluation.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PROJECT

“Promoting Gender Responsive Policies in South East Europe, Phase II” regional project (2013 -2016) is funded by the Austrian Development Agency and the Swiss Agency Development and Cooperation. The project covers Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Former Yugoslav Republic (FYR) of Macedonia and the Republic of Moldova.

The ultimate aim of the project is to contribute to the implementation of commitments towards achieving gender equality. To achieve this aim, three distinct outcomes were anticipated (the logical framework for the project provides more details):

Outcome 1: Sectoral programs and budgets at the central and local levels reflect better gender equality concerns.

Outcome 2: Strengthened oversight of central and local government programs, policies and budgets towards gender equality commitments.

Outcome 3: Exchange of knowledge and learning on GRB facilitates replication of good practices and lessons learned.

In order to achieve these outcomes, the project envisages the following outputs:

Output 1.1.: Increased capability and capacity of Ministries of Finance to institutionalize the integration of GRB.
Output 1.2.: Selected central and local programs (such as rural development, social protection and employment) and budgets are analyzed to respond to gender equality commitments.
Output 1.3.: Strengthened capacities and increased commitment of select number of local governments to make programs and budgets gender responsive.

Output 2.1.: Experts, academia and CSOs have strengthened capacities to analyze programs and budgets from gender perspective.
Output 2.2.: Members of parliament (MPs) and local councilors (LCs) have increased knowledge and capacities to assess the gender-responsiveness of the national and local programs and budget.

Output 3.1.: Networks of GRB experts and public officials are capacitated to respond to country and regional demand for GRB expertise.

DELIVERABLES

The Team leader shall be responsible for the following deliverables:

•   Inception report. The report will contain:
o   Work plans for all members of the evaluation team with clear timelines and responsibilities
o   Brief overview of overall approach
o   Suggested structure/format of a baseline study
•   Methodology and guidance for data collection for baseline and mid-term data collection
•   Consolidated baseline study for 4 project countries based on inputs from project staff and national experts
•   Updated/validated project performance monitoring framework (PMF) that reflects availability of data and feedback of UN Women project staff
•   Template for the quarterly process/progress reports of the project (with linkages to the PMF)
•   Final report (invidual) summarising the results of the assignment and recommendations to UN Women.
All deliverables should be submitted to the Regional Project Manager. The reports should be written in English, in a succinct and user-friendly language.

Competencies

•    Excellent interpersonal, communication and interview skills
•    Excellent writing skills in English
•    Capacity to act as a team leader of multinational teams, demonstrated cultural sensitivity
•    Knowledge of the local languages (Bosnian/Serbian/Croatian; Macedonian; Albanian; Romanian; and Russian) will be considered an advantage

Values:

•   Demonstrates integrity and fairness by modeling UN values and ethical standards.
•   Demonstrates professional competence and is conscientious and efficient in meeting commitments, observing deadlines and achieving results.
•   Display cultural, gender, nationality, religion and age sensitivity and adaptability.

Required Skills and Experience

Academic Qualifications:
•   Master’s degree in a relevant field (social sciences, e.g. sociology, political science, international relations, legal studies, public policy, international development) field, PhD an advantage.

Experience:
•   At least 7 years of demonstrated experience in results based management of international development projects and programs
•   Demonstrated work experience on gender issues incl. gender responsive policies, public administration, familiarity with GRB is an asset
•   Track record (at least three instances) of managing international teams for similar assignments (applied research studies, evaluations), ideally with a focus on gender/GRP and/or relevant regional coverage
•   Demonstrated work experience in/on South Eastern Europe and Moldova/Eastern Europe/CIS
•   Demonstrated experience with applied research with data collection, analytical and presentation skills and demonstrated ability to structure information
•   Previous experience working /consulting for UN agencies

DOCUMENTS TO BE INCLUDED WHEN SUBMITTING THE PROPOSALS

Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications:
1.   Cover letter (1 page) stating your interest in and qualifications; explaining why they are the most suitable for the work
2.   A 2-page methodology/overall approach description (how they will approach and conduct the evaluation)
3.   Financial proposal (for details see further below)
4.   UN P11 form including past experience in similar projects and at least 3 references
Please note: All documents have to be uploaded in 1 file.

FINANCIAL PROPOSAL
Financial proposal should consist of a lumpsum (total) in USD for the assignment. The consultant will be responsible for office space, administrative support, telecommunications, printing of documentation and implementation of tools. In case the consultant would be required to travel, UN Women will cover the associated cost.

EVALUATION OF OFFERS
UN Women applies a fair and transparent selection process that takes into account both the technical qualification of potential consultants as well as the financial proposals submitted in support of consultant applications. Candidate applications will be evaluated using a cumulative analysis method taking into consideration the combination of applicant qualifications and a financial proposal. The contract will be awarded to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:
•   responsive/compliant/acceptable, and
•   having received the highest score out of below defined technical, interview and financial criteria.
Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 30 points in the technical evaluation will be considered for an interview. Top 5 candidates (with highest number of points in the technical evaluation) will be interviewed. The maximum number of points assigned to the financial proposal will be allocated to the lowest price proposal among those candidates who have reached at least 30 points in the interview. All other price proposals receive points in inverse proportion.

Criteria:
Technical Evaluation – documents based (40%)
Out of which:
Evaluation related work experience/expertise – 20 percentage points
Gender Responsive Policies related work experience/expertise – 10 percentage points
Regional experience/expertise – 5 points
Applied research, writing, international organizations experience/expertise – 5 percentage points
Technical evaluation – interview based (40%)
Out of which:
Evaluation related work experience/expertise – 20 percentage points
Gender Responsive Policies related work experience/expertise – 10 percentage points
Regional experience/expertise – 5 percentage points
Applied research, writing, international organizations experience/expertise – 5 percentage points
Financial Evaluation (20%)

Evaluation of submitted financial offers will be done based on the following formula: S = Fmin / F * 30

S - score received on financial evaluation;
Fmin - the lowest financial offer out of all the submitted offers qualified over the technical evaluation round;
F - financial offer under the consideration.

Qualified women and members of minorities are encouraged to apply. UN Women applies fair and transparent selection process that would take into account the competencies/skills of the applicants as well as their financial proposals.
Due to large number of applications we receive, we are able to inform only the successful candidates about the outcome or status of the selection process.