Background
The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is the UN’s global development network, advocating for change and connecting countries to knowledge, experience and resources to help people build a better life. UNDP works through 125 country offices to provide development advocacy, advice and assistance to 170 countries globally.
The Effectiveness Group in the Bureau for Policy and Programme Support (EG/BPPS) focuses on assisting UNDP and partners to achieve higher quality development results through an integrated approach that links results-based management and performance monitoring with more effective and new ways of working. It seeks to do so by enabling UNDP and others to be more innovative, and to make more evidence and data driven decisions by identifying, testing, sharing, learning from and institutionalizing what works. It acts as a hub on all aspects of results-based management, development performance monitoring and analysis, as well as identifying, collecting, and sharing ideas on new and better ways of working across the UNDP network, social innovators, and the development community.
Given its mandate, the Effectiveness Group leads and coordinates UNDP’s transparency initiative. UNDP began publishing its project and financial information to the global standard in 2011. Open.undp.org, UNDP's online portal, allows open and comprehensive public access to data on over 5,000 projects and US$ 5 billion in project data.
The Data Quality Analyst (consultant) will support the implementation of the transparency initiative and data publication in UNDP. The transparency initiative in UNDP has increasingly involved a major exercise to ensure data quality both by the country offices and by the headquarters units. The consultant is expected to analyse the quality and quantity of UNDP’s published project and financial data and support country offices and headquarters units to ensure that UNDP’s project data have the highest quality. He/She will work closely with the Results Team of the EG, Office of Finance and Resource Management, Information and Technology Management (IMT) team, regional bureaux and country offices to ensure timely resolution of data quality issues. He/she will also make recommendations about the methods and ways in which UNDP obtains and analyses data to improve quality.
Duties and Responsibilities
Under the guidance and supervision of the Team Leader, Development Results and Performance Analysis , the Data Quality Analyst Consultant will perform the following tasks:
- Support data quality management activities such as;
- Review UNDP project and financial datasets for quality, completion and accuracy
- Monitor and review UNDP Transparency Dashboard to identify and resolve data quality issues in timely and accurate manner
- Review existing internal data collection and monitoring processes and develop process improvements to enhance overall data quality
- Support document review process to ensure UNDP publishes high quality up-to-date project related documents to public
- Work closely with the Office of Information Management System to correct data quality errors
- Support UNDP to ensure adherence to data quality standards to meet reporting requirements such as IATI and OECD CRS reporting – Test UNDP data files with IATI validator and datastore
- Evaluate UNDP transparency dashboard and identify areas of improvement to achieve better data quality
- Liaise with UNDP country offices and headquarters units to carry out the data review exercise
- Support developing or revising data review guidelines and training materials
- Support data submission for the upcoming Aid Transparency Index assessment
- Help determining impact level for data quality issues in the index assessment and support executing data clean-up measures
- Help reviewing the Aid Transparency Tracker to ensure the accuracy of the data submission and reading
- Support the maintenance of UNDP’s transparency portal (open.undp.org)
- Evaluate the portal to ensure the accuracy of data and user-friendly presentation and functions
- Support data automation to ensure regular data updates are done to present most up-to-date information on the portal
- Assist UNDP in rectifying existing bugs and test project portal service to identify system issues and possible inconsistencies
- Contribute to future portal enhancements and improvements
- Contribution to the development of machine learning algorithms in automating narrative analysis and issues findings.
Key Deliverables
- UNDP transparency dashboard is assessed for data quality issues and corrective actions are taken to improve the quality – Sep – Dec 2019
- Support effectively provided to the data review exercise leading to the achievement of the corporate targets of relevant transparency indicators – Sep – Nov 2019
- The tracker reading of UNDP data to the Aid Transparency Index assessment has been reviewed and final data submission is completed Dec 2019 – Feb 2020
- Transparency portal - open.undp.org has been reviewed for functional and design improvements and actionable recommendations are made for future enhancements – Oct – Dec 2019
- UNDP data files are tested with IATI validator and datastore and corrective actions are taken to resolve the issues identified to confirm the compliance to the IATI Standard and high data quality – Oct 2019 – Feb 2020
- Contribute to the successful launch of machine learning algorithms for data quality review - innovative approaches are identified, built, tested and relevant guidelines are prepared – Nov 2019 – Feb 2020
Duration of work / Contracting Arrangements:
- The consultant is expected to be available full-time for the period of 6 months
- The consultant will be given access to relevant information necessary for execution of the tasks under this assignment;
- The consultant will be responsible for providing her/his own laptop;
- If the consultant will be required to work remotely, the consultant will engage with the Supervisor by email and Skype regularly;
- Payments will be made upon submission of a detailed time sheet and certification of payment form, and acceptance and confirmation by the Supervisor on days worked (with a “day” calculated as 8 hours of work) and outputs delivered.
Competencies
Corporate Competencies
- Demonstrates integrity by modeling the UN’s values and ethical standards.
- Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of UNDP.
- Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.
- Treats all people fairly without favoritism.
- Client-service attitude and sensitivity in communicating with clients;
- Ability to explain complex and abstract concepts in simple terms and adapt language and content to different target audiences.
- Demonstrated interest and motivation in the field of development;
Functional Competences
- Strong analytical skills with the ability to collect, organize, analyse, and disseminate significant amounts of data with attention to detail and accuracy
- Excellent understanding of databases, data collection systems, data analytics and other strategies that optimize statistical efficiency and quality
- Ability to learn new technologies quickly. Demonstrated willingness to keep technical skills and knowledge up-to-date;
- Ability to think logically and analytically in a problem-solving environment
- Ability to evaluate, transform and model data to derive relevant findings
- Ability to analyze problems and present clear options for solution
- Knowledge of methodologies, tools, systems and apply practical experience in planning, monitoring, evaluating and reporting and ability to apply to practical situations
- Ability to multi-task
- Ability to work independently
- Responsible, responsive and enthusiastic
Required Skills and Experience
Education
- At least Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Data Science, Business Administration, Public administration, or a related filed required.
Experience
- Minimum 3 years of work experience in IT systems, data analytics and/or in related field, required
- Demonstrated experience in handling large datasets and quality assurance, required,
- Experience working with data visualization tools (for example, Microsoft Power BI or Tableau), required
- Familiarity with UNDP financial and project management systems and data is an asset
Skills:
- Knowledge of programming language (Python, C, SQL, JavaScript, etc.), XML (Extensible Mark-up Language) and/or any other analytical tools, required
- Knowledge of the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) and global Aid Transparency Index is an asset.
- Knowledge of Machine Learning Algorithms is an asset.
Language Requirements
- Fluency in English language required (Oral and written)
Application is a two-step process:
STEP 1
Qualified candidates are requested to apply online via this website. The application should contain the TWO following documents, ALL IN ONE FILE:
- DOCUMENT 1: Personal CV or P11, indicating all past experience from similar projects, as well as the contact details (email and telephone number) of the Candidate and at least three (3) professional references.
- DOCUMENT 2: Brief description of why the individual considers her/himself suitable for the assignment. Please submit this information in the same file as Document 1.
- All the information requested above must be submitted in the same file. Candidates who fail to submit all the information requested above will be disqualified.
- Do not include your financial proposal at this stage. Only shortlisted candidates (technically qualified) will be invited to submit a financial proposal.
STEP 2
Financial Proposal
After review of applications, technically qualified candidates will be contacted by UNDP and requested to submit a Financial Proposal.
- The financial proposal should specify an all-inclusive daily fee.
- The financial proposal must be all-inclusive and take into account various expenses that will be incurred during the contract, including: the daily professional fee; cost of travel from the home base to the duty station and vice versa, where required; living allowances at the duty station; communications, utilities and consumables; life, health and any other insurance; risks and inconveniences related to work under hardship and hazardous conditions (e.g., personal security needs, etc.), when applicable; and any other relevant expenses related to the performance of services under the contract.
- In the case of unforeseeable travel requested by UNDP, payment of travel costs including tickets, lodging and terminal expenses should be agreed upon, between UNDP and Individual Consultant, prior to travel and will be reimbursed. In general, UNDP should not accept travel costs exceeding those of an economy class ticket. Should the IC wish to travel on a higher class he/she should do so using their own resources.
- Shortlisted candidates will be asked to submit a financial proposal. UNDP will provide candidates with the financial proposal template.
- If the Offeror is employed by an organization/company/institution, and he/she expects his/her employer to charge a management fee in the process of releasing him/her to UNDP under a Reimbursable Loan Agreement (RLA), the Offeror must indicate at this point, and ensure that all such costs are duly incorporated in the financial proposal submitted to UNDP.
- The Financial Proposal is to be emailed as per the instruction in the separate email that will be sent to responsive and qualified candidates.
Scope of Price Proposal and Schedule of Payments:
- Financial proposals must be all inclusive and must be expressed on the basis of “a daily fee” in USD.
- Payment will be made upon submission of a certificate of payment request, at a schedule agreed based on deliverables, indicating outputs achieved and days worked to be verified and cleared for payment by the supervisor.
- Any official mission travel expenses will be duly paid for directly by UNDP and should not be included in the price proposal.
- Incomplete applications will not be considered. Please make sure you have provided all requested materials
- Qualified women are encouraged to apply.
Due to the large number of applications we receive, we are able to inform only the successful candidates about the outcome or status of the selection process.
CRITERIA FOR SELECTION OF THE BEST OFFER:
The selection of the best offer from the shortlisted candidates will be based on a Combined Scoring method – where the qualifications and experience will be weighted a maximum of 700 points and combined with the price offer which will be weighted a max of 300 points out of 1000 points.
Method: Cumulative analysis method will be used to evaluate proposals.
- When using this weighted scoring method, the award of the contract will be made to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:
- Responsive, compliant, acceptable; and
- Having received the highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the solicitation.
Technical Criteria weight: 70%
Financial Criteria weight: 30%
Technical Evaluation (700 points, Weight 70%)
All applicants will be initially screened against the minimum qualification requirements as specified above.
Responsive candidates will then be further evaluated against the following criteria:
DESK REVIEW OF TECHNICAL CRITERIA AS EVIDENT IN THE SUBMITTED APPLICATION:
- Relevance of the experience in handling databases, data collection systems, data analytics and other strategies that optimize statistical efficiency and quality (150 points)
- Relevance of the experience in dealing with data quality assurance (100 points)
- Extent of the knowledge of programming language (Python, C, SQL, JavaScript, etc.), XML (Extensible Mark-up Language) and/or analytical tools (75 points)
- Proven track record of working with data visualization tools (for example, Microsoft Power BI or Tableau) (50 points)
- Familiarity with UNDP financial and project management systems (25 points)
The maximum points that can be achieved in the desk review is 400 points.
Only the top 3 ranked candidates of those obtaining a minimum of 280 points (70% of points obtainable in the desk review) will be considered as technically suitable.
The total obtainable score on the interview is 300 points bringing the total points for the technical evaluation to a maximum of 700 points. Candidates obtaining less than 210 points during the interview (70% of points obtainable during the interview) will be disqualified.
Only those candidates who obtain a total technical score of 490 points and above on the technical evaluation will be considered for financial evaluation and will be asked to submit a financial proposal.
Financial evaluation (300 points, Weight 30%)
The following formula will be used to evaluate financial proposal:
p = y (µ/z), where
p = points for the financial proposal being evaluated
y = maximum number of points for the financial proposal
µ = price of the lowest priced proposal
z = price of the proposal being evaluated
For the General Conditions of contracts for the Services of Individual Contractors, see http://www.undp.org/content/dam/undp/documents/procurement/documents/IC%20-%20General%20Conditions.pdf.
Payment:
Payments to individual contractor will be made based on the actual number of days worked, deliverables accepted and upon certification of satisfactory delivery of services by the Team Leader.
Note:
- Please visit http://procurement-notices.undp.org/view_file.cfm?doc_id=22291 to view the Individual Contract (IC) General Terms and Conditions (for Individuals/Free Lancers who will sign the UNDP contract on behalf of themselves).
- For Individuals who will be represented on behalf of a company, a Reimbursable Loan Agreement (RLA) will be signed between UNDP and the company. To view the RLA's terms & conditions, please see http://procurement-notices.undp.org/view_file.cfm?doc_id=22292 Reimbursable Loan Agreement (RLA): A legal instrument between UNDP and a Company/institution, according to which, the latter makes available the services of an individual delivering time-bound and quantifiable outputs that are directly linked to payments
- UNDP Personal History form (P11) required of all applicants
http://www.undp.org/content/dam/undp/library/corporate/Careers/P11_Personal_history_form.doc