Background

UN Women is the United Nations entity dedicated to gender equality and the empowerment of women. A global champion for women and girls, UN Women was established to accelerate progress on meeting their needs worldwide. UN Women supports UN Member States as they set global standards for achieving gender equality, and works with governments and civil society to design laws, policies, programmes and services needed to ensure that the standards are effectively implemented and truly benefit women and girls worldwide.

At this historic juncture, UN-Women’s triple mandate, along with its global reach and deep policy and programming expertise, continues to endow the Entity with an unparalleled capacity to: (i) support Member States to strengthen global norms and standards for gender equality and women’s human rights and to create new ones to respond to new challenges; (ii) promote coordination and coherence across the UN system to enhance accountability and results for gender equality and women’s empowerment; and (iii) undertake operational activities to support Member States in translating global norms and standards into legislation, policies and strategies at the regional and country levels.

The universal adoption by UN Member States of the 2030 Agenda on Sustainable Development and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015 constituted a critical milestone for efforts to advance gender equality and women’s empowerment (GEWE). The Cooperation Framework guidance places emphasis on normative commitments requiring the UN development work to be guided by the principles of GEWE, respect for human rights and focus on those furthest behind.

UNWOMEN is undertaking the preparation of its next Strategic Plan 2022-2025, which aims to guide UN-Women for the next four years – with an eye toward the 2030 deadline to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Based on new corporate requirements, all Strategic Notes and AWPs will need to align with UNSDCF results frameworks for greater coherence.

As a consequence of this new strategic conjuncture, the 8 countries of the West and Central African Region would need to align to the new corporate priorities defined for the period 2022-2025 and adapt their Annual Work Plans and Strategic Notes. Also, 2 countries will be developing their Mid Terms Reviews (MTRs) and will integrate the recommendations of the MTR in their planning processes.

Additionally, a new modality of Bi Annual Work plans will be progressively adopted, and will need a close analysis of partnerships and financial sustainability of COs as well as alignment with UNSDCF budgets projections and results frameworks.

For these reasons, the Strategic, Coordination, Reporting and Planning Unit is seeking the support of a consultant with experience in planning, statistics and budgeting to support this alignment in all SNs, MTRs, AWPs nd Bi AWPs exercises.

The objective of this assignment is to support the Strategic Planning and Coordination Unit in aligning al, the current Strategic notes of the 8 countries under the Regional Office with the Strategic Plan 2022-2025.Concretely, the consultant would technically review narratives and results frameworks including all annexes of SNs, AWPs and Bi AWPs, cf. budget analysis, annexes coherence, respect of the chekclists of the SNs, and AWs and Bi AWPs.The consultant will ensure that results of MTR are well integrated into Planning process.  

In particular, the consultant will also ensure coherence of WCA Strategic note, as well as Cameroon Strategic Note with SP 2022-2025 result framework.

Duties and Responsibilities

Under the guidance of the WCARO Planning and Coordination Specialist, the consultant will undertake the following:  

• Align Results frameworks of the WCA SNs ( of WCARO and Cameroon), and, in particular, to align new SP Outcomes and Outputs with SN outcomes and outputs
• Support the inclusion of the new indicators of the SP 2022-2025 into WCA SNs
• Provide technical support of the WCA SN narratives, Cover notes of AWPs and BI AWPS, to ensure they are updated with current regional challenges
• Ensure coherence of financial projections of SNs, AWPs and Bi AWPs
• Provide technical support in reviewing annexes of all WCA SNs, AWPs and BI AWPs of the region and provide guidance to COs for the elaboration of the annexes
• Support elaboration of quality briefs of SN for the selected countries to undertake this piloting process (Niger and Nigeria)
• Provide technical support to the Mid Term reviews (MTRs) of the Region, concretely to Senegal and Nigeria

Duration of the assignment

The total duration of the contract assignment will be 45 working days on a part-time basis over a 4 months period, between 1st November 2021 and 27th February 2022 (45 working days).

Expected Deliverables

Under supervision of Regional Strategic Planning and Coordination Specialist, the consultant is expected to work with the deliver the following results:

Terms of Payment

The payment will be done in three installments upon reception of the deliverables.

Performance evaluation:

Contractor’s performance will be evaluated based on timeliness, responsibility, initiative, communication, accuracy, and quality of the products delivered.

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

Functional Competencies

• Strong knowledge of gender equality and women’s empowerment issues
• Strong knowledge of UN system and understanding of inter-agency coordination processes to advance gender equality and women’s empowerment
• Strong knowledge of results-based programme planning and management
• Strong analytical skills
• Ability to promote and monitor inclusion of gender-specific objectives, indicators, targets and activities in the UN agencies programmes

• Ability to provide advice and support

Please visit this link for more information on UN Women’s Core Values and Competencies: 

http://www.unwomen.org/-/media/headquarters/attachments/sections/about%20us/employment/un-women-employment-values-and-competencies-definitions-en.pdf

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Master's degree (or equivalent) in international development, public administration, public policy, or other relevant social science field is required.
• A project/programme management certification would be an added advantage.

Work Experience:

• At least 7 years of demonstrable global experience working with inter-agency coordination on GEWE and/or UN system-wide strategic programme planning processes.
• Experience in the program/project development, planning, implementation, monitoring and reporting of programmes- in the UN system.
• Strong knowledge of UN accountability frameworks to advance gender equality and the empowerment of women
• Experience in applying RBM into planning processes is a strong asset
• Experience in budgeting and statistics will be a strong asset
• Experience in the West and Central Africa region is a strong asset.

Language Requirement:

• Fluency in English and knowledge of French is required.