Background

Duties and Responsibilities

1. Advisory and specialized technical support;
2. Programme management, monitoring and oversight;
3. Advocacy and support to UN coordination, joint programming and reform;
4. Knowledge management and capacity building;
5. Management of operations.

• Advise, support, guide and provide input to assure quality control in the formulation of relevant, high quality, results-based and rights-based country programmes and projects;
• Provide strategic and specialized technical advice to the Country Director on the development of systems, processes and mechanisms to support effective programme planning, implementation, monitoring and timely progress reporting;
• Review and evaluate proposals submitted to the Country Office and oversee the preparation of donor proposals and reports to ensure quality, compliance with requirements as per established rules, regulations, including the commitments under relevant UNDAFs and the UN Women global Strategic Plans Take timely action to take any corrective action to meet standards for submissions;
• Prepare policy document, briefs and other strategic papers/materials for the Country Director for use in the development and presentation of a coherent regional perspective to help define regional strategic and plans of action for implementation;
• Assess the country level annual work plans and present the Country Director with recommendations and conclusions to assist in development planning.

• Recommend and/or set monitoring standards, criteria and other indicators for measuring and assessing progress/results;
• Monitor the progress on, mutually agreed results frameworks and performance indicators and timely take action/decision and/or provide timely support;
• Lead the annual process of gathering information and prepare reports for HQ on progress of programme implementation, assessing results and identifying areas for Country Director action and/or decision to ensure achievement of results as planned and in accordance with UNW goals and objectives and accountability framework;
• Identify areas that may require improvement and capture best practices/lessons learned, using corporate monitoring tools, as such as the Balance Score Card, Atlas Snapshot and Dashboard, Staff Surveys, Audits and other corporate reports. Take action to improve areas of weakness;
• Manage the timely allocation of funds to programmes. Monitor and ensure the appropriate utilization of resources approved and allocated to programmes and projects that are managed by the country office;
• Ensure substantive and good quality proposals following the established rules, and regulations, and adhering to the Strategic Plan and Annual Work plans;
• Ensure sustainable and solid relations developed with  counterparts, resulting in the enhanced reputation and credibility of UN Women;
• Under the oversight of the Country Director, backstop the Operations Manager in preparing and providing guidance to the Country Office on the whole process of audit exercises, oversee the collection and verification of accurate and complete documentation for audit review, advice on the preparation of responses to audit and monitor the timely and full implementation of audit recommendations and required actions.

• Support the Country Director in establishing and maintaining effective consultations with governments, partners, stakeholders and donors to achieve active collaboration, cooperation and alliances on programme development and implementation, resource mobilization and sustained partnerships;
• Upon the request of the Country Director, represent UN Women in UNCTs as appropriate/delegated to consult, collaborate and/or interact on common issues and activities and participate in the CCA/UNDAF process to ensure the active participation of UNW in these processes to advance gender equity and women’s human rights, actively seeks out participation of UN Women in UN system thematic and other working groups to establish effective network and to keep abreast of on going debate and thinking on aids development, facilitate joint programming and promote UN Women competencies and interests to advance gender and women’s human rights.

• Identify lessons learned and areas of emphasis to guide program improvements and future strategic development plan;
• Manage the process of collecting and sharing lessons learned on gender equality and women’s empowerment to build knowledge and capacity of partners and stakeholders;
• Design and implement capacity building training activities to enhance skills and knowledge in Results Based Management, Results based budgeting and systematic quality assurance;
• Contribute to the development and maintenance of global and regional programme knowledge networks and practices, and development of knowledge products.

• Under the overall responsibility of the Country Director, provide day-to-day supervision of the Operational services, i.e. human, financial, procurement and IT services of UN Women Country Office and country programmes and projects, ensuring compliance of all services according to rules, regulations, processes and procedures and UN Women’s accountability framework.

Competencies

• Integrity: Demonstrating consistency in upholding and promoting the values of UN Women in actions and decisions, in line with the UN Code of Conduct;
• Cultural Sensitivity/Valuing diversity: Demonstrating an appreciation of the multicultural nature of the organization and the diversity of its staff. Demonstrating an international outlook, appreciating differences in values and learning from cultural diversity.

• Ethics and Values: Promoting Ethics and Integrity / Creating Organizational Precedents.
• Organizational Awareness: Building support and political acumen.
• Developing and Empowering People / coaching and mentoring: Building staff competence, creating an environment of creativity and innovation.
• Working in Teams: Building and promoting effective teams.
• Communicating Information and Ideas: Creating and promoting enabling environment for open communication.
• Self-management and Emotional intelligence: Creating an emotionally intelligent organization.
• Conflict Management / Negotiating and Resolving Disagreements: Leveraging conflict in the interests of the organization & setting standards.
• Knowledge Sharing / Continuous Learning: Sharing knowledge across the organization and building a culture of knowledge sharing and learning.
• Appropriate and Transparent Decision Making: Fair and transparent decision-making; calculated risk-taking.

• Demonstrated theoretical, intellectual and technical skills in aid development/programming particularly those that are pertinent to UNW strategic priorities on gender issues and women’s rights;
• Demonstrated political acumen and technical capacity in representing the organization effectively in national and international fora to advocate and to promote organizational priorities, initiatives and a better understanding of the organizational strategic agenda;
• Proven ability to lead a practice area and to drive results;
• Ability to establish and maintain broad strategic networks and partnerships with UN agencies and other international partners to promote partnership and build alliances to advance organizational interests and competencies;
• Ability to go beyond established procedures and practices, introduce new approaches and strategic innovations;
• Good knowledge of Results Based Management principles and approaches.

Required Skills and Experience

• Advanced university degree in development related disciplines, economics or public policy or other social science fields. 

• Minimum 10 years of extensive development experience that combines intellectual, strategic and managerial leadership in development programs some of which should be in the area of gender equality and women’s rights at the international level, preferably in developing countries within the UN system, Agencies, Funds or Programs or renowned institutions/academia.

• Written and oral proficiency in English is required. Knowledge of the other UN working knowledge is desirable.