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, the UN Women 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.

A key area of concern for UN Women is women’s economic empowerment as expressed in UN Women’s Strategic Plan 2018-2021 as well as in the targets and indicators of the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 5 for gender equality and women’s empowerment and of several other SDGs relating to inclusive growth, decent work, ending poverty, and reducing inequality, and revitalizing the global partnership for sustainable development.

The WeEmpowerAsia programme

The WeEmpowerAsia (WEA) programme is a collaborative effort between the Regional Office of UN Women for Asia and the Pacific (ROAP) and the European Union (EU), which is funding the action under its Partnership Instrument. With this programme the two entities will leverage their joint commitment to enhance women’s economic empowerment globally. They each have longstanding experience and partnerships in the Asian region. UN Women will apply its triple mandate of normative, operational and coordination actions and use its convening power to bring multiple stakeholders together for effective collaboration. EU brings valuable private and public sector partnerships across sectors as well as its solid expertise in trade and economic development.

The overall objective of the WEA programme is that more women lead, participate and have access to enhanced business opportunities and leadership within the private sector to advance sustainable and inclusive growth. The programme will achieve this through three complementary outcome areas to be implemented in seven selected middle-income countries (China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam) in Asia:

• ADVOCACY: Women’s networks, public institutions, and the private sector will collaborate and share expertise and knowledge to build an enabling business environment for women’s economic empowerment in the workplace and in the marketplace,
• ENTREPRENEURSHIP: The capacity of women-owned businesses and women entrepreneurs will be developed to enable them to engage with government and private sector corporations in policy development and dialogues for advancing women’s economic empowerment, and
• BUSINESS ENGAGEMENT: The private sector will be supported to implement gender-sensitive practices and culture within their businesses through the take-up of the Women’s Empowerment Principles (the WEPs – a set of guiding principles to achieve gender equality within companies).

Ultimately, the programme will contribute to the achievement of gender equality through enabling women’s increased participation in the labour force and in the marketplace, improved opportunities for women entrepreneurship and business start-ups, and through strengthening of corporate sector’s commitment and action to ensure gender equality in business culture and practices. 

The guiding platform for the programme is the Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs), a set of seven principles for businesses offering guidance on how to strengthen gender equality in the workplace, in the marketplace and in the community. The WEPs are jointly developed by UN Women and UN Global Compact and seeking the commitments and concrete implementation by private corporations around the globe.

The WE RISE Together project – Advancing gender-responsive procurement in the Mekong subregion

WE RISE Together is a three-year Mekong-Australia Partnership (MAP) project developed by UN Women and funded by DFAT. It sits under MAP’s Economic Resilience Fund (MAP-ERF) and addresses its four drivers of resilience (including macroeconomic, household, business, and government resilience). The project responds to the prioritisation of women’s economic empowerment by expanding market access for Women-owned Businesses1 (WOBs) and Gender Responsive Enterprises1 (GREs) through procurement opportunities.

WE RISE Together tackles the structural gender inequities that exist within the global procurement market in which WOBs secure only one per cent of spending worldwide2. By introducing and advancing increased market access through gender-responsive procurement1 (GRP), WE RISE Together operates with the overall objective to empower more women to equally access, lead, and benefit from expanded market opportunities in the Mekong subregion.

The project works across the Mekong subregion, namely Thailand and Viet Nam, where the concept of GRP is still in nascent stages of development. UN Women has established Country Offices in these countries and is therefore well placed to implement such an innovative programme.

Despite regional and national initiatives prioritising financial inclusion of micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises, there is currently a limited amount of gender-sensitive data available to promote GRP practices and policies in the project’s geographical focus areas.

As such, WE RISE Together (WRT) will introduce GRP as an opportunity to address and attempt to channel more procurement spend towards WOBs /GREs. The project aims to achieve the overall objective: More women are empowered to equally access, lead and benefit from expanded market opportunities in the Mekong Region.

Duties and Responsibilities

II.Duties and Responsibilities

The WeEmpowerAsia (WEA) programme and the WE RISE Together (WRT) Project are seeking to hire an International Junior Monitoring and Evaluation Consultant. Under the supervision and guidance of the Regional Programme Manager, the Consultant will undertake the following tasks:

Support the Regional Team and the WEA M&E Consultant with the monitoring, tracking, coordination and reporting of the WEA Programme portfolio (including but not limited to WEA and WRT), as follows:

1. Monitoring and tracking of programme results at a regional and country levels

• Support with the coordination with teams at regional and country levels to ensure that data collection and analysis from implementation activities are coordinated and standardized
• Support with the monitoring, consolidation and analysis of data from WEA/WRT regional and country offices and partners on a quarterly basis
• Support with the analysis of impact surveys aimed to measure the progress and achievement of WEA activities at regional and country level

2. Internal UN Women reporting and external donor reporting

• Support with the coordination, consolidation and preparation of results-based monitoring, reporting and planning in compliance with the UN Women’s result monitoring system (RMS) including the quarterly report, annual report of results and annual workplan
• Support with the coordination, consolidation and preparation of the WEA/WRT end of Programme donor report, with inputs from regional and country programme team and implementing partners
• Support with the coordination, consolidation and preparation of the WE Rise Inception Report
• Support with the identification and consolidation of relevant findings, conclusions and recommendations from the programme reviews, studies or research into programme reporting
• Support with quality checking of programme reports to ensure full compliance with operational reporting rules and regulations of UN Women and the donor

3. Development and alignment of Monitoring and Evaluation frameworks under the WEE (WEA/WRT) portfolio

• Support with the development M&E frameworks under the WEA/WRT portfolio
• Alignment and mapping of results-frameworks in line with UN Women Strategic Plan 2022-2025
• Support with activities pertaining to the alignment and mapping of the WEA/WRT portfolio results-framework, work plan and performance indicators, in line with UN Women Strategic Plan 2022-2025
• Support with the process of developing the new SP 2022-2025 for Women’s Economic Empowerment (WEE)

4. Final or monthly programme evaluation, WEPs activities and coordination with implementation partners

• Support with the review of reports, surveys and other documents submitted by partners and provide feedback to ensure results-based reports and analysis and capturing of data
• Support with the management and maintenance of the WEPs database of companies, including the sign-on process, verification of companies and logo/media enquiries
• Support with activities related to the final evaluation of the WEA Programme
• Support with the due diligence process for WEPs Awards applicants
• Support with activities related to the development of WEA impact stories, research and external publications

III.Expected Deliverables

Payment Plan and Modality

• Daily rate: 150 USD/day for 12 days/months = 1,800 USD/month for 12 months = 21,600 USD
• Part-time (for 12 working days per month)

A monthly rate will be paid upon submission of deliverables with an approval of the Regional Programme Manager

Competencies

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 understanding and knowledge of programme formulation and implementation and Results Based Management
• Strong understanding and knowledge of monitoring and evaluation, evaluation design, data collection and analysis, and reporting
• Strong experience managing multi-country reporting and evaluation
• Ability to synthesize program performance data and produce analytical reports
• Very good analytical and results-based drafting skills
• Knowledge of UN programme management systems

IV.Contract period and work location

The consultant will work on a full-time basis remotely, and a monthly rate will be paid upon satisfactory completion of tasks and deliverables.

Required Skills and Experience

V.Required qualifications

Education

• Master’s degree in Business, Management, Statistics, Political or Social Science, Economics, International Development Studies, Gender/ Women’s Studies
• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Management, Statistics, Political or Social Science, Economics, International Development Studies, Gender/ Women’s Studies with a combination of 2 years of relevant work experience will be accepted in lieu of Master’s degree.

Experience

• Relevant experience in monitoring and evaluation and conducting research, in the context of international development projects, particularly on gender and women economic empowerment.
• Strong knowledge of various data collection methods is required.
• Experience with UN Women and other UN agencies is required.
• Experience working with EU donors and/or Australian DFAT is an asset.
• Experience working in the Asia Pacific region is an asset.
• Experience working in Knowledge Management, organizing and delivering trainings and private sector is an asset.

Language and report writing requirements

• Strong proficiency in English. Other UN languages an asset.
• Strong results-based drafting skills (including progress reports, concept notes, analytical papers) to be assessed through a writing sample.

VI.Evaluation

Applications will be evaluated based on the cumulative analysis.

• Technical Qualification (100 points) weight; [100%]

Technical qualification evaluation criteria:

The total number of points allocated for the technical qualification component is 100. The technical qualification of the individual is evaluated based on following technical qualification evaluation criteria:

Only the candidates who have attained a minimum of 70% of total points will be considered as technically qualified candidates who may be contacted for validation interview.

VII.Submission of application

Interest candidates are encouraged to submit electronic application to UNDP website: https://jobs.undp.org/cj_view_jobs.cfm or UN Women website: https://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/about-us/jobs or to hr.bangkok@unwomen.org with dollaporn.intrroong@unwomen.org in copy, no later than 5 March 2022, COB.

Submission package includes:

• Cover letter outlining relevant work experience

• Personal History Form (P11) which can be downloaded http://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/about-us/jobs;
• Portfolio and writing sample (max 3 pieces) related to the assignment (e.g. project proposals, concept notes, research/analytical papers, briefs), etc.

At UN Women, we are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment of mutual respect. UN Women recruits, employs, trains, compensates, and promotes regardless of race, religion, color, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, ability, national origin, or any other basis covered by appropriate law. All employment is decided?on the basis of?qualifications, competence, integrity and organizational need.?

If you need any reasonable accommodation to support your participation in the recruitment and selection process, please include this information in your application.?

UN Women?has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UN Women, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination.? All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to UN Women’s policies and procedures and the standards of conduct expected of UN Women personnel and will therefore undergo rigorous reference and background checks. (Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check.)