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 (UNW) will lead and coordinate United Nations system efforts to ensure that commitments on gender equality and gender mainstreaming translate into action throughout the world. It will provide strong and coherent leadership in support of Member States’ priorities and efforts, building effective partnerships with civil society and other relevant actors.

Under UN Women’s first Strategic Plan (2011-2013), the Gender and Humanitarian Action Adviser, under the overall supervision of the Director of the Programme Support Division, is responsible for UN Women’s engagement in humanitarian action.  She/ He will lead in advocating for a coordinated and coherent approach on gender mainstreaming in emergency response and humanitarian action and is responsible for ensuring that specialized technical and strategic support is available to field offices where needed.

The scope of work of the Gender and Humanitarian Action Adviser requires experience and in-depth understanding of gender equality and women’s empowerment issues, as well as expertise on  humanitarian issues, to translate UN Women`s Strategic Plan (2011 – 2013 and updated Strategic Plan 2014 – 2017) into results.  It also requires developing mutually reinforcing partnerships with national entities, civil society, regional institutions and the international humanitarian system, including relevant UN entities and bilateral donors to enhance awareness and commitment as well as visibility and resources to advance gender equality and women's empowerment.

UN Women established a Humanitarian Unit within the Programme Division in October 2012. UN Women’s first Humanitarian Strategy was prepared in early 2013 which will guide the organisations work in humanitarian action (including disaster risk reduction, preparedness, response and recovery) at the country, regional and global levels).

Duties and Responsibilities

• Policy  Guidance and Strategic Planning;
• Coordination and partnership building;
• Evidence-based advocacy and communication;
• Capacity Building and Knowledge Management.
  

Detailed Description of Key Functions:

Policy Guidance and Strategic Planning for the Engagement in Humanitarian Action

• Lead and guide implementation of UN Women’s Humanitarian Strategy based on the Strategic Plan (SP), in partnership with UN system humanitarian actors and  in support of  mainstreaming gender equality and women’s empowerment concerns into humanitarian action;
• Manage UN Women’s Humanitarian Unit and ensure its effective functioning;
• Guide field offices on UN Women’s role and objectives in the humanitarian area;
• Identify strategic programme approaches and modalities that provide value added for UN and UN Women in the humanitarian area both at HQ level and in the field.

Provide support to UN Women Senior Management in the area of Humanitarian Action.

• Support UN Women field offices through direct technical advice via field missions and through rapid short term deployments (using UN Women and/or the GenCap rosters) to provide hands-on support for gender equality programming during and after emergencies, including UN Women’s participation in gender-sensitive needs assessment such as Post Disaster Need Assessments (PDNA);
• Proactively assess trends and identify emerging issues in humanitarian area at the national, regional or international level that are of relevance to UN Women’s mandate;
  
• Undertake specific flagship technical projects as appropriate to UN Women's SP. Conceive, design, staff, direct, and assess these initiatives;
• Contribute to regular review and assessment of UN Women's SP as well as regional and country programming on humanitarian issues. 

• Participate and lead UN Women’s contribution to the existing inter-agency coordination mechanisms and enhance coherence of UN system in promoting gender equality concerns in humanitarian action;
• Substantive participation and support to relevant inter-agency and inter-governmental forums, notably the IASC, the GenCap Steering Committee, the IASC Sub-Working Group on Gender,  donor conferences and others;
• Contribute to strategic thinking and policy decisions on mainstreaming gender into humanitarian action and influence agenda and priority setting in relevant UN system-wide inter-agency tasks forces;
• Work in close partnership with Member States and non-governmental partners for key programming initiatives and build synergies for effective gender equality  programming and advocacy;
• Forge strategic partnerships  and alliances at the country level to promote gender equality and women's advancement through joint projects and interagency efforts;
• Support country offices through direct technical assistance as required.

• Engage in policy debates relevant to gender and humanitarian action, including participation in global knowledge events and support formulation of corporate policy guidance and practice notes;
• Advocate on behalf of UN Women and its mandate to help raise awareness and stimulate action to advance gender equality and women's rights  within humanitarian context and form strategic partnerships with government, UN agencies, NGOs, academia, media and the private sector;
• Ensure information exchange  on crosscutting themes within UN Women, with a particular focus on information chains between the Programme Support  and Policy Divisions, in particular the Peace and Security and the Ending Violence Against Women Clusters,  geo sections, regional and country offices and  other thematic sections;
• Provide support as needed to ensure that UN humanitarian action is done in a gender-responsive manner, and within agreed regional and international frameworks to promote and protect gender equality;
• Actively participate in country-level programming processes where UN Women has presence, ensuring that the UN Women is strategically placed within UN humanitarian context. Assist the RC/HC system to secure expertise that will ensure commitment, quality control and resources for gender equality programming.

• Initiate and manage the process of collecting and disseminating best practices on gender equality programming in humanitarian action and contribute to UN Women’s knowledge management efforts;
• Promote the development and  dissemination  of gender-sensitive tools and methodologies  for humanitarian action at the country levelContribute to the development and maintenance of global, regional and national knowledge networks and practices on mainstreaming gender into humanitarian action;
• Generate ideas for innovative capacity development initiatives and support development of new project proposals for use in resource generation;
• Support country staff capacity development to engage in post-crisis needs assessments and in supporting humanitarian coordination and responses from a gender perspective.

Impact of Results:

The functioning of Humanitarian Unit directly impacts on changing humanitarian practice for the benefit of women and girls.  This takes place through enhancing coordination and accountability for gender mainstreaming in humanitarian action, promoting consistency and sustainability in addressing gender equality concerns and strengthening capacity and effectiveness of UN Women field offices together with national entities and civil society.

Competencies

Integrity:

• Demonstrate 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:

• Demonstrate an appreciation of the multicultural nature of the organization and the diversity of its staff.
  
• Maintain an international outlook, appreciate differences in values and learning from cultural diversity.

Ethics and Values:

•  Promote ethics and maintain integrity among staff.
  

Organizational Awareness:

• Build support and political acumen within the organization.
  

Planning and organizing: 

• Successfully plan strategic direction;
• Ability to organize and service inter-agency bodies and international technical meetings.

Developing and Empowering People/Coaching and Mentoring:

• Build staff competence and encourage an environment of creativity and innovation.
  

Team Work:

• Build and manage successful teams;
  
• Creating an enabling and collaborative work environment;
• Effectively recruit, lead, supervise, mentor, develop, and evaluate staff.

Communicating Information and Ideas:

• Create, promote and enable an environment for open communication.

Self-management and Emotional Intelligence:

• Possess a proven ability to create an emotionally intelligent organization.

Conflict Management/Negotiating and Resolving Disagreements:

• Leverage conflict in the interests of the organization & setting standards;
  
• Ability to interact and negotiate with high-level government officials are required.

Knowledge Sharing  and Continuous Learning:

• Share and disseminate knowledge across the organization;
  
• Successfully build a culture of knowledge sharing and learning.

Commitment to Continuous Learning: 

• Willingness to learn and practice new developments in the field of gender equality thematic areas.

 Leadership:

• Proven track record of excellent management and technical leadership skills;
• Delegate appropriate responsibility, accountability and decision-making authority.

• Substantive knowledge and experience related to current policies and practices in the fields of gender equality and humanitarian action;
• Ability to conceptualize and convey strategic vision from the spectrum of development and humanitarian experience.
• Possess strong communications skills, with proven expertise in writing persuasive, convincing Policy and Programme documents;
  
• Proven analytical and problem-solving skills;
• Implement strong planning, goal-setting and prioritization skills;
• Effectiveness in establishing and fostering good relations with government counterparts, UN agencies, donors, and NGO partners;
• Ability to utilize information technology, executive information systems, management techniques and tools, with a view to optimizing office performance.
  

Required Skills and Experience

• Master degree (or equivalent) in development-related disciplines, gender issues, public policy or other social science fields.

• A minimum of 10 years of experience in management and humanitarian programming, including in conflict, post-conflict and natural disasters’ settings and gender equality;
• Programme and policy analysis, strategic planning, monitoring and evaluation and field experience in developing country contexts;
• Substantive and technical experience in inter-agency coordination, experience working with governments, donors and civil society  organizations internationally and in the field.

• Written and oral proficiency in English is required;
• Knowledge of another UN working language is an asset.

Application:

• Candidates are required to complete the UN Women Personal History Form (P-11)  form;
  
• Applications submitted without the UN Women Personal History Form will be treated as incomplete and will not be considered for further assessment;
• The UN Women Personal History form (P-11) cand downloaded from http://www.unwomen.org/about-us/employment.;
• Kindly note that the system will only allow one attachment.
  

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