Antecedentes

The UNDP JPO Service Centre is looking for an international consultant to provide advice on and support to strengthening the cross-cultural management competencies of Junior Professional Officers assigned to UNDP.
 
The UNDP Junior Professional Officer (JPO) Programme supports the fight against poverty through fielding of young professionals to developing countries to provide technical and managerial services. Through their assignments, these young professionals are exposed to and trained in best management practice in an international, multi-cultural setting, good governance in management and development, as well as poverty alleviation in practice.
 
The UNDP JPO Service Centre (JPOSC) is an end-to-end service centre dedicated to the management and administration of the JPO Programmes of UNDP and of several other UN Agencies. It manages the full cycle of the JPO assignment, including recruitment, appointment, assignment, learning, career development and counselling as well as separation. Composed of 16 staff members, the JPOSC aims at being a centre of excellence. For more information on the JPO Programme and the JPO Service Centre, please visit our website at www.jposc.org.
 
The UNDP JPOSC provides support to JPOs in preparing to take up the JPO assignment in a new country and culture, and with a multi-cultural organization like the UN, and to strengthen their cross cultural competencies throughout their assignment.  As part of this support, the UNDP JPOSC intends to develop a dynamic, interactive website to inform JPOs about cross cultural management and to assist them and their families in strengthening their cross-cultural competencies.
 
It is envisaged that the website will:

  • Inform on what culture is.
  • Inform and help understand how ones own culture influences acceptance of and responses to new, foreign cultures.
  • Suggest ways to recognize how other cultures perceive our reactions, thereby helping us reflect on own behaviour.
  • Inform on what culture shock is.
  • Assist in recognizing the symptoms of culture shock.
  • Give guidance on possible ways to deal with culture shock.
  • Give guidance on possible ways to share concrete cultural experiences past and present.
  • Provide information on the importance of local as well as working culture in an international environment.
  • List bibliography and links to further information and resources.

In addition to the above support planned by the UNDP JPOSC, JPOs are currently already introduced to cross-cultural management in a UNDP context during the UNDP Programme and Policies Orientation Course, which takes place in New York 3-6 months into the JPO assignment.

Deberes y responsabilidades

The UNDP JPOSC is seeking a consultant to prepare the content and design of the website which should be based on recognized theories on culture. It is expected that the assignment will take a maximum of 20 working days. It is further expected that the website will be ready for use by end of March 2010.
 
The consultant will report to the Manager of the JPO Service Centre and will undertake the following duties:

Create a JPO Cross Cultural Management interactive section, within the framework of the existing JPO website, which will:

  • provide information and self learning opportunities
  • provide JPOs and their families with tools for recognizing culture shock
  • provide JPOs and their families with tools for developing cross cultural management skills
  • provide guidance on ways to share concrete experiences of culture shock past and present
  • Conduct research for content to Cross Cultural Management JPO website
  • Prepare and finalize content for Cross Cultural Management website
  • Provide suggestions for design and layout of website

Competencias

  • Experience in cross cultural management and communications, preferably from a development cooperation context.
  • Experience with web-design and web-communication.
  • Excellent communication and writing skills.
  • Excellent research and analytical skills.
  • Fluency in English is a requirement, including excellent English writing skills.

Habilidades y experiencia requeridas

Qualifications:
  •  Post graduate university degree in social sciences, communications, intercultural communication, management or development or other relevant field.


criteria for Selection

  • Expertise of consultant
  • Quality of proposal
  • Cost
 
Instructions to candidates:
 
  • The candidate shall bear all costs associated with the preparation and submission of the proposal
  • Applications must offer services for the total assignment. Partial applications will be rejected. 
  • The application shall be written in English and all prices shall be quoted in USD excluding all taxes and VAT. The costing should include a clear breakdown of services.
  • UNDP shall effect payments to the candidate after acceptance by UNDP of the invoices submitted by the candidate and upon successful achievement of the agreed tasks.
  • Estimates for cost-reimbursable items, if any, such as travel and out of pocket expenses should be listed separately.
  • No application may be modified subsequent to the deadline for submission. 
  • A two-stage procedure is used in evaluating the applications:

All submitted applications will be examined for completeness and relevance as well as evaluated on the criteria above.

Three proposals will be shortlisted and consequently the prospective candidates will be invited for an interview. The final selection will be based on the result of the interview.
 
How to apply:
 
Interested candidates are requested to submit/upload an application (in English only), including CV, a brief proposal for how to undertake the assignment, including methodology, hourly rates and total costs, as well as links to or samples of previous work.
 
Applicants will only be contacted if under serious consideration.