Background
The Strengthening Capacity and Effectiveness of the People’s Assemblies System in Laos (STEPS) project is a five-year initiative (2022-2026) implemented by UNDP together with the National and Provincial People’s Assemblies (NA and PPA), with financial support from the United States Agency for International Development.
The overall goal of STEPS is to strengthen capacity of the Legislature in Laos to effectively represent, engage and respond to citizen’s needs. The project will support the national and provincial assemblies (members, technical committees and staff) in enhancing their mandates and ability to revise and approve legislation, monitor implementation of the country socio-economic development plan and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), better analyse societal concerns and communicate with citizens, and enhance the overall accountability and transparency system.
The STEPs project provides support in three broad areas:
1. To enable the NA and PPA members to fully exercise their responsibilities as envisaged by the Constitution and laws of the Lao PDR: Members will have a clear understanding of their legislative and oversight responsibilities, establish feedback practices to effectively and regularly communicate with their constituents so as to be better able to respond to their needs. Procedures and systems will be clearly defined and firmly established within each PPA.
2. To enable the technical committees, staff and members of both the national and provincial assemblies to fully discharge the roles assigned to them by the Constitution and laws of the Lao PDR: STEPS will provide technical assistance to the plenary and committees, including staff, in conducting budgetary oversight, research, and fact-finding missions.
3. To increase understanding and integration of gender sensitive approaches within the NA and PPAs practices: Support mainstreaming GESI across the activities of the NA and PPAs, including in budget review, legislative review and oversight activities by committees. Leadership capacities of women members and staff
OBJECTIVE AND OUTPUTS
The STEPS project is seeking to engage a number of Parliamentary Technical Advisors as consultants to provide long term support for the work of the STEPS project in the following technical fields:
1. Leadership, planning, strategy and development of parliamentary services.
2. Procedural reform and legislative drafting.
3. Committee development.
4. Budget literacy and public financial management, including gender budgeting.
5. Gender equality and social inclusion.
6. Parliamentary outreach and civil society engagement
7. Research for parliaments.
8. ICT for parliament.
9. Human resources, training and adult education.
The objective of this Call for Expressions of Interest is to establish a pool of pre-selected consultants in the above fields. When technical assignments are agreed with the NA and PPAs, terms of reference for the assignment will be shared with the pre-selected consultants in the relevant field and they will be invited to submit their financial offer, and if selected for the assignment an IC contract is issued directly. An individual consultant may be contracted under more than one technical area and may hold more than one contract at the same time. See Section 6 below for further details.
The advantage of this process is to enable the project to engage technical consultants to support the NA and PPAs with minimal delay, while reducing administrative burden for both UNDP and the consultants.
Please note: if you are already registered on a UN roster as a parliamentary expert you do not need to apply here. When assignments arise we will solicit CVs from the roster managers and your experience and fee will be compared with other pre-selected Technical Advisors. See additional note How to Apply below
Duties and Responsibilities
The Parliamentary Technical Advisors will be responsible for any combination of the following tasks:
1. Providing contextualised expert technical advisory services in parliamentary strengthening, both to the STEPS Project and to the national and provincial assemblies in Lao PDR.
2. Undertaking research, surveys, assessments and reviews to support the development of effective strategies for providing parliamentary assistance in Lao PDR.
3. Developing knowledge products and organizing knowledge events that promote awareness and understanding of international standards and best practice in parliamentary practice.
4. Designing and delivering training, workshops, seminars, coaching and mentoring to build institutional and human capacities.
The outputs expected from these consultancies are as follows:
1. Advisory services provided to the STEPS Project team and the parliamentary committees, staff and members.
2. Research, surveys, reviews and assessments undertaken regarding parliamentary practice and institutional capacities.
3. Knowledge products drafted: visioning or strategy papers, concept notes, analytical and briefing papers.
4. Programmes of training planned and delivered.
5. Knowledge events organized, such as workshops, briefings and seminars.
Competencies
- Good facilitation and coordination skills
- Good political and networking skills
- Strong research, analytical and written skills
- Result oriented, patient, and hands-on with good teamwork skills
- Knowledge of Lao PDR’s development situation and key related issues
- Knowledge of UNDP rules and procedures (desirable but not necessary)
- Excellent computer skills (word, excel, power-point, internet, and other related matters)
- Strong data collection and analytical skills
- Capacity development techniques
- Mature personality with experience working in mixed cultural teams
- Strong interpersonal skill and experience in relation building
Required Skills and Experience
Educational qualifications
- Minimum of a master’s degree in political science, law, or other relevant social science. Experience and skills
Experience and Skills
- Minimum 7 years of relevant experience in provision of technical advisory services and/or research on democratic governance issues in a low income country context.
- Minimum 4 years of relevant professional experience in parliamentary assistance, preferably in the Southeast Asia region, in one or more of the 9 technical areas outlined in Section 2 above.
- Excellent analytical and drafting skills, and experience of providing policy advice at the international, regional or national levels.
- Experience planning and delivering training and coaching as part of a programme of institutional strengthening.
Language requirements
• High level of fluency in English language
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HOW TO APPLY
Requirements for submission of proposals
All interested and qualified International Consultant should apply on-line using the following links:
UNDP Lao PDR Country Office website at https://www.undp.org/laopdr/jobs or
In order to make your submission, please read the relevant documents available on the link below
- Call for Expression of Interest (EOI)
Documents to be included when submitting the proposals:
Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications:
a. Personal CV or P11, indicating all past experience from similar projects, as well as the contact details (email and telephone number) of the candidate and three professional references.
b. Two samples of previous work relevant to the technical field. This can include reports, presentations, articles, briefing/academic papers, strategy or planning documents, etc
?Instructions for on-line submissions:
Step 1: Please prepare all required documents electronically;
Step 2: Combine all documents in ONE SINGLE FILE (preferably in PDF however Word format can be also accepted) and upload to the UNDP Jobs using the links above;
Step 3: After that you will receive an auto reply from the UNDP jobs if your offer is received successfully.
Incomplete proposals or proposals received after the deadline will be rejected.
Note: Any request for clarification must be sent in writing before the submission deadline to the following emails: