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.

Achieving gender equality and women’s empowerment is an essential element of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development – the roadmap to a more equal, just, peaceful, and sustainable world. The Women’s Economic Empowerment Portfolio in India focusses on strengthening women’s economic rights and agency while creating an enabling environment for decent and safe employment and entrepreneurship opportunities for women in all their diversity. UN Women is implementing European Union (EU) funded WeEmpower India programme to advance women’s economic empowerment in India.  By promoting decent and safe economic opportunities, policy advocacy, and collaborative efforts including towards addressing discriminatory social norms, the project aims to create positive change for women and girls in all their diversity. The project envisions following result areas:

  1. Increased access to safe and decent economic opportunities for women and girls in all their diversity.
  2. Enhanced gender transformative policies and decision- making processes to improve women’s access to safe and decent employment and entrepreneurship.
  3. Positive gender norms that enable and increase women’s participation in economic and social life promoted.

The project adopts a three-pronged approach to deliver on results:

  1. Promoting Economic Opportunities:
    • Enable adoption and implementation of Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs) by private companies to strengthen women’s effective participation and leadership in formal work /sector.
    • Link women and girls to safe and decent jobs in high-potential sectors like clean energy and STEM fields.
    • Strengthen women’s entrepreneurship through providing mentorship and networking opportunities, entrepreneurial and digital skills, access to /matchmaking with investors, as well as addressing barriers hindering access to markets and finance through gender lens investing approaches.
    • Creating safe working spaces for women in Textile Supply Chain by addressing gender-based violence and harassment in predominate textile cluster.
  2. Gender-Responsive Policies and Decision-Making:
    • Foster dialogues with institutional stakeholders at central and local levels.
    • Strengthen statistical capacity to fill data gaps related to SDG 5 (gender equality).
    • Utilize data for informed policy and program decisions.
  3. Collective Agenda-Setting and Norm Shifting:
    • Engage partners (government, CSOs, private sector, EU Financing Institutions, EU Member States).
    • Facilitate information sharing, synergies, and alliances for gender action.
    • Challenge gender norms in areas relevant to the broader EU-India partnership agenda.

Reporting to Programme Manager, WEE, the Programme Officer contributes to the effective management of WeEmpower India by providing substantive inputs to programme design, formulation, implementation and evaluation.  The Programme Officer guides and facilitates the delivery of UN Women programmes by monitoring results achieved during implementation and ensuring appropriate application of systems and procedures and develops enhancements if necessary.  The Programme Officer works in close collaboration with the programme and operations team, UN Women HQ personnel, Government officials, multi and bi-lateral donors and civil society ensuring successful UN Women programme implementation under portfolio. The Programme Officer leads a team of 4 personnel (1 SC, 3 consultants).

Duties and Responsibilities

Contribute technically to the development of programme strategies in Women’s Economic Empowerment focused on Private Sector and Employment:

  • Lead and contribute technically to the development of project strategies in the areas of private sector engagement through  Women’s Empowerment Principles (WEPs) and women’s employment;
  • Provide substantive inputs to the design and formulation of programme/ project proposals and initiatives;
  • Identify areas for support and intervention related to the programme.

Provide substantive technical support to the implementation and management of the WeEmpower India programme with a focus on Private Sector and Employment:

  • Lead the implementation of programme activities;
  • Provide substantive technical support to the implementation and management of WEPs engagement with private sector companies as well as enabling women’s access to decent and safe employment;
  • Manage implementing agencies including CSOs recruited to deliver on project activities;
  • Provide technical inputs to the annual workplan and budget;
  • Lead the coordination of the call/request for proposals, including the organization of technical review committees, and capacity assessment of partners;
  • Maintain relationships with stakeholders to support implementation and expansion of the private sector engagement and employment component.

Provide technical assistance and capacity development to project/programme partners:

  • Lead in development and delivery of technical trainings to facilitate WEPs implementation;
  • Work closely with technical experts on gender data and statistics as well as coordinate and provide technical knowledge on relevant data parameters pertaining to women’s participation and leadership in formal employment/ corporate sector as well as other relevant SDG indicators;
  • Coordinate and provide technical support in the implementation of programme activities; Develop technical knowledge products;
  • Maintain relationships with national partners to support implementation and expansion of the WeEmpower India programme;
  • Identify opportunities for capacity building of partners and facilitate technical/ programming support and trainings to partners, as needed.

Provide technical inputs to the monitoring and reporting of the programme/ project:

  • Monitor progress of implementation of activities and finances using results based management tools;
  • Draft reports on monitoring missions, programme results s, outputs and outcomes;
  • Provide substantive inputs to the preparation of donor and UN Women reports;
  • Train partners on Results Based Management and monitor implementation;
  • Review, coordinate and monitor the submission of implementing partner financial and narrative reports.

Provide substantive technical inputs to the management of people and finances of the programme:

  • Monitor budget implementation and make budget re-alignments/ revisions, as necessary;
  • Provide substantive inputs to financial reports;
  • Supervise Programme Associates and Assistant.

Provide substantive inputs to building partnerships and resource mobilization strategies:

  • Provide substantive inputs to resource mobilization strategies; analyze and maintain information and databases;
  • Prepare relevant documentation such as project summaries, conference papers, briefing notes, speeches, and donor profiles;
  • Participate in donor meetings and public information events, as delegated.

Provide technical support to inter-agency coordination on Women’s Economic Empowerment to achieve coherence and alignment of UN Women programmes with other partners in the country:

  • Provide technical support to inter-agency coordination on private sector engagement through WEPs and employment to achieve coherence and alignment of UN Women programmes with other UN agencies as well as stakeholders;
  • Provide substantive technical support to the Programme Manager, Representative and Deputy Representative on inter-agency coordination related activities by drafting background reports and briefs.

Provide substantive inputs to advocacy, knowledge building and communication efforts:

  • Provide substantive inputs to advocacy, knowledge building and communication efforts including organizing events, trainings;
  • Coordinate the development of knowledge products on private sector engagement through WEPs towards larger goal of gender equality and women’s economic empowerment;
  • Support knowledge management and communications related activities;
  • Develop background documents, briefs and presentations related to WEE;
  • Coordinate and organize advocacy campaigns, events, trainings, workshops and knowledge products;
  • Coordinate the development of knowledge management methodologies, and products on WEE.

The incumbent performs other duties within their functional profile as deemed necessary for the efficient functioning of the Office and the Organisation.

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

  • Good programme formulation, implementation, monitoring and evaluation skills
  • Good knowledge of Results Based Management
  • Ability to gather and interpret data, reach logical conclusions and present findings and recommendations
  • Good analytical skills
  • Good knowledge in the area of Women’s Economic Empowerment
  • Ability to identify and analyze trends, opportunities and threats to fundraising

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

  • Master’s degree or equivalent in social sciences, human rights, gender/women's studies, international development, or a related field is required.
  • A first-level university degree in combination with two additional years of qualifying experience may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.
  • A project/programme management certification would be an added advantage.

Experience:

  • At least 2 years of progressively responsible work experience in development programme/project implementation, coordination, monitoring and evaluation, donor reporting and capacity building is required espeically in the area of women’s economic empowerment.
  • Experience in the area of Women’s Economic Empowerment is required.
  • Demonstrated experience of work with private sector on strengthening women’s economic empowerment.
  • Demonstrated experience in promoting women’s decent and safe employment opportunities especially in formal employment.
  • Experience coordinating and liaising with government agencies and/or donors is desirable.
  • Experience in the usage of computers and office software packages (MS Word, Excel, etc.) and spreadsheet and database packages, experience in handling of web-based management systems is required.
  • Experience in the use of a modern web-based ERP System, preferably Oracle Cloud, is desirable.

Language Requirements:

  • Fluency in English is required.
  • Knowledge of another official UN language is desirable (French, Arabic, Chinese, Russian or Spanish).
  • Working knowledge of Hindi and/or other India language is desirable.

Interested applicants should apply to this vacancy announcement through UNDP jobs site: jobs.undp.org

Application Information:

  • All applications must include (as an attachment) the completed UN Women Personal History form (P-11) which can be downloaded from http://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/about-us/jobs
  • Kindly note that the system will only allow one attachment. Applications without the completed UN Women P-11 form will be treated as incomplete and will not be considered for further assessment;
  • UN Women will only be able to respond to those applications in which there is further interest.

Inclusion Statement:

  • At UN Women, we are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment of mutual respect. UN Women recruits employ, 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.)

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.