UN WOMEN Jobs - 57917- UN Women: Speechwriter

UN Women: Speechwriter

Advertised on behalf of

UN WOMEN

Location :

New York, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

Application Deadline :

16-Jul-15 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

International Consultant

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

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security. Placing women’s rights at the centre of all its efforts, UN Women leads and coordinates United Nations system efforts to ensure that commitments on gender equality and gender mainstreaming translate into action throughout the world. UN Women is expected to provide strong and coherent leadership in support of Member States’ priorities and efforts, building effective partnerships with civil society and other relevant actors.

The Speechwriter position is located in the Office of the Under-Secretary-General / Executive Director, UN Women. The incumbent reports directly to the Communications Advisor & Speechwriter. The Office of the Executive Director, UN Women is responsible for managing and ensuring the provision of substantive support to intergovernmental processes on gender equality and the empowerment of women on a global level. The Office of the Executive Director is responsible for providing vision, strategic planning and establishing priorities, leading the senior management team, leading advocacy as a global voice for women, ensuring coordination in the UN Common System, providing overall management and oversight and ensuring accountability to governance bodies.

The selected candidate will be offered a part-time consultancy contract and the mode of engagement will be on a retainer / as-needed basis.

Duties and Responsibilities

Summary of key functions:

The Speechwriter will support the Advisor in ensuring that the Executive Director is effectively supported to play her role as the "global voice' for women, including developing communications products so as to most effectively convey the desired information/message to the targeted audiences and promote public understanding of UN Women operations and activities. S/he will have a proven ability to think strategically, and work and act under pressure with discretion in a sensitive and challenging environment. S/he has to have excellent communication and organization skills to manage the substantive and normative agenda.
The Speechwriter will be responsible for the following duties:

Prepare key messages, speeches, talking points and thematic briefings for presentation by the Executive Director in support of external events and the strategic positioning of her leadership and that of UN Women;
Support the Advisor in the management of external and internal communication and as requested by ensuring high quality information on priority issues and/or for major UN Women events, including drafting information strategies, messages, op-eds and statements;
Collaborate with the Communications and Advocacy team in selecting the information transmitted to key constituencies. Develop and maintain up-to-date analysis of the external context and stakeholders relevant to UN Women's mission and objectives;
Undertake daily review of HQ and regional events with implications for the strategic positioning of UN Women, in consultation with the Advisor;
Review drafts and manuscripts for adherence to corporate policy and consistency with UN policy, and provide analysis and recommendations;
Undertake research as required and draft strategic inputs for papers and analytical studies on selected policy issues pertaining to gender equality and women's empowerment to support the Executive Director's external engagements and role, reflecting the direction and vision of UN Women, and undertake other writing as required by the Executive Director.

Competencies

Core Values and Guiding Principles:

Integrity:

Demonstrating consistency in upholding and promoting the values of UN Women in actions and decisions, in line with the UN Code of Conduct.

Cultural Sensitivity/Valuing diversity:

Demonstrating an appreciation of the multicultural nature of the organization and the diversity of its staff;
Demonstrating an international outlook, appreciating differences in values and learning from cultural diversity.

Core Competencies:

Ethics and Values:

Promoting Ethics and Integrity / Creating Organizational Precedents.

Organizational Awareness:

Building support and political acumen.

Communicating Information and Ideas:

Creating and promoting an enabling environment for open communication.

Knowledge Sharing / Continuous Learning:

Sharing knowledge across the organization and building a culture of knowledge sharing and learning.

Appropriate and Transparent Decision Making:

Fair and transparent decision making; calculated risk-taking.

Functional Competencies:

Demonstrated excellent understanding of strategic communications, speechwriting, advocacy and outreach at the international level;
Outstanding written and oral communications and editing skills;
Proven ability to address issues effectively, both orally and in writing;
Proven ability to meet tight deadlines and work well under pressure;
Proven ability to communicate sensitively, effectively and creatively across different constituencies;
Familiarity with UN Women and the UN system;
Familiarity with gender issues.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Master’s degree or equivalent in one or more of the following disciplines: public administration, communications, international relations, social sciences, journalism or other related fields.

Experience:

A minimum of ten years of progressively responsible experience in public information, journalism, international relations, public administration or related area;
Significant prior experience in speechwriting for Executive Heads, Senior officials of UN or other International Development Organizations is essential.

Language requirements:

Fluency in oral and written English is required;
Proficiency in another UN official language is highly desirable.

Application:

All applications must include (as an attachment) the completed UN Women Personal History form (P-11) which can be downloaded from http://www.unwomen.org/about-us/employment;
Kindly note that the system will only allow one attachment, please combine all your documents into one (1) single PDF document. Applications without the completed UN Women P-11 form will be treated as incomplete and will not be considered for further assessment.

Note:

In July 2010, the United Nations General Assembly created UN Women, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. The creation of UN Women came about as part of the UN reform agenda, bringing together resources and mandates for greater impact. It merges and builds on the important work of four previously distinct parts of the UN system (DAW, OSAGI, INSTRAW and UNIFEM), which focused exclusively on gender equality and women's empowerment.