Background

The UN Women Regional Office for the Arab States (ROAS) works to empower and support country offices around the region to effectively deliver on UN Women's mandate, across its normative, operational, and coordination roles. It provides technical as well as operational oversight and quality assurance to ensure timely and efficient mandate delivery at the country level, while also working to deliver on its mandate at the regional level, including by leveraging regional coordination mechanisms and liaising closely with regional bodies.

ROAS is currently engaged in processes to further strengthen and enhance its operational efficiency and effectiveness in order to be able to better deliver its mandate. In this regard, the ROAS is seeking to recruit a consultant for the above duration, whose duties are as articulated below.

Objective of the Assignment:

Under the guidance and supervision of the Finance Specialist, the Finance Consultant provides financial services ensuring high quality, accuracy, and consistency of work. The Finance Consultant promotes a client-oriented approach consistent with UN Women's rules and regulations.

The Finance and Accounting Consultant works in close collaboration with the operations, and programme staff in the Regional Office for the Arab States (ROAS) and Country Offices (CO), Project Offices, and with UN Women HQs staff to exchange information and ensure consistent service delivery.

Duties and Responsibilities

Under the direct supervision of the Finance Specialist, the Consultant will be responsible for the achievement of the following tasks and deliverables:

-Handling of requests for approval of General Ledger Journal Entry (GLJE) prepared by COs in the Arab States.

• Review GLJEs to ensure correctness and completeness in terms of amounts, Chart of Accounts (COAs), and supporting documents as required by UN Women rules and regulations;
• Where required, communicating to the requester on corrections, changes, or additional supporting documents required;
• Timely arranging for completed GLJEs to be approved by the Finance Specialist;
• Preparing GLJEs for RO and project offices.

-Handling of requests for approval of vendor data update in the ERP system submitted by the Regional Office itself and COs in the Arab States region:

• Review requests to ensure the correctness of data update as well as proper and sufficient supporting documents as required by UN Women rules & regulations;
• Where required, communicating to the requester on corrections, changes, or additional supporting documents is required.

-Act as backup for preparation and monitoring of payments made to vendors, staff, and other accounts payable in a timely manner, with high accuracy, and proper supporting documents according to UN Women requirements.

-Act as backup for preparation of Accounts Payable Journal Voucher (APJV) miscellaneous adjustments and corrections as deemed necessary.

-Review of completeness and correctness of expenditures reported in the financial report received from implementing partner organization by performing a verification of its supporting documents (e.g. receipts, invoices, and other details) and recording the expenditures to the ERP system as deemed necessary.

-Providing support to the implementation of the new ERP system scheduled on 1 January 2022. Among other things, the support includes user testing of the new ERP and validation of financial data migration as deemed necessary.

Competencies

Core Values:

• Respect for Diversity;
• Integrity;
• Professionalism.

Core Competencies:

• Awareness and Sensitivity Regarding Gender Issues;
• Accountability;
• Creative Problem Solving;
• Effective Communication;
• Inclusive Collaboration;
• Stakeholder Engagement;
• Leading by Example.

Please visit this link for more information on UN Women’s Core Values and Competencies:  https://www.unwomen.org/-/media/headquarters/attachments/sections/about%20us/employment/un-women-values-and-competencies-framework-en.pdf?la=en&vs=637

Functional Competencies:

• Strong Accounting Skills;
• Strong IT skills and proficiency;
• Knowledge of financial rules, regulations, and accounting;
• Results and cliented approach to work;
• Ability to provide input to business processes re-engineering, implementation of new systems;
• Ability to administer and execute financial and accounting processes and transactions.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Completion of University degree (or equivalent) in Accounting, Finance, Business Administration, or related field.

Experience:

• At least 4 years of relevant finance experience at the national level is required, with extensive experience in the usage of Microsoft Excel and computerized accounting system;
• Knowledge and experience in using ERP systems would be an advantage.

Language Requirements:

• Good verbal and writing skills in English and Arabic is required;
• Working knowledge of another official UN language is an asset.

Evaluation Criteria:

Individual consultants will be evaluated based on the following methodology: Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 49 points in the technical evaluation would be considered for the financial evaluation.

Criteria Weight Technical: 70% (70 points)

The candidates will be evaluated based on the following criteria:

• Education Qualification (15%);
• Experience (55%).

Financial: Lowest Financial Proposal: 30% (30 points)

The points for the Financial Proposal will be allocated as per the following formula:

• The contract will be awarded to the technically qualified consultant who obtains the highest combined score (financial and technical);
• The points for the Financial Proposal will be allocated as per the following formula: (Lowest Bid Offered*)/ (Bid of the Consultant) x 30;
• 'Lowest Bid Offered' refers to the lowest price offered by Offerors scoring at least 49 points in the technical evaluation.

Application:

Interested Individual Consultants must submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications:

• A cover letter with a brief presentation of your consultancy explaining your suitability for the work and link to the portfolio of work;
• UN Women Personal History form (P-11) which can be downloaded from http://www.unwomen.org/about-us/employment;
• Personal CV; and Financial proposal; Proposed inclusive daily rate.

The above-mentioned documents should be merged in a standalone file including all of them since the online application submission does only permit uploading one file per application. Incomplete submission can be a ground for disqualification.

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.