Background

The United Nations Millennium Declaration was adopted in 2000 by world leaders, committing their countries to a new global partnership to reduce extreme poverty and setting out time-bound goals on meeting the needs of the world’s poorest. These goals, to be achieved by 2015, formed the basis for what are now known as the eight Millennium Development Goals, which have been broken down into 21 quantified targets that are measured by 60 indicators. As was outlined in the report of the Secretary to the General Assembly in September 2011, the UN system’s process of developing a new framework post-2015 is likely to have the best development impact if it emerges from an inclusive, open and transparent process with multi-stakeholder participation.

For the past 9 years, the UN Millennium Campaign has led UN efforts to build partnerships with civil society, private sector and citizens to contribute to the achievement of the MDGs. This has been done through the use innovative communications campaigns, advocacy, social mobilization and policy dialogue. The focus has been to seek to influencing policy, the generation, allocation and effective use of resources, ways of working and the democratic governance environment to accelerate the progress toward MDG achievement. In this regard, the UN Millennium Campaign is taking the lead in designing and implementing a strategy for outreach to stakeholders; both within and outside the UN including key leaders across civil society. Our post-2015 outreach is an attempt to bring the voice of citizens, civil society and the myriad of other stakeholders directly into the debates and conversations that will shape the development agenda. MY World, a global options survey, has been designed and developed to ask citizens what would make the most difference to their lives and that of their families. It will be disseminated through different channels to ensure both scale (to create political and media traction) and representativeness (for credibility of the results). It is envisaged that MY World will continue to 2015 and help to develop an engaged constituency to strengthen accountability for the next development agenda. One year after its official launch by the UN Secretary General, Ban-Ki Moon, MY World survey has gathered more than 3.1 million citizens’ voices from 194 countries.

The data that the survey continues to gather generates important information, not only in terms of global priorities, and how these differ by country, gender, age, level of education and location but also serves as useful inputs to the body of evidence available to member states in their discussions to shape the agenda. The success of MY World survey has been made possible by a strong stakeholder buy-in, especially among civil society, corporate sector and UN system-wide coordination, with some seed funding. During the first year of implementation, a number of core assets have been generated including a network of partners in almost every country in the world, development of key infrastructure for online, offline and mobile surveys were built with strong teams to lead each stream such as technical, policy, communications and partnerships. The World We Want 2015 is an innovative online platform created by the United Nations and civil society to amplify people's voices in the process of building a global agenda for sustainable development. Curating global conversations and feeding into the post-2015 discussions, the “World We Want 2015” platform (WWW2015) steers discussions on the post-2015 agenda and enhances civil society’s participation to ensure that people’s voices are taken into consideration when drafting the new development agenda. It is a unique online space that applies innovative techniques to data mining and visualization, thereby displaying data in a people friendly format.

The WWW2015 platform hosts official UN and civil society open consultations for post-2015 and consolidate civil society input to policy-making. Led by the Policy and Strategy Group for WWW2015, formed by various civil society organizations and UN institutions, the platform is facilitated by UN Development Group (UNDG) and managed by the UN Millennium Campaign (UNMC). The Global Strategic Advisor will ensure partnership management and maximising impact for both the initiatives under the direct supervision of the UN Millennium Campaign’s Director.

Duties and Responsibilities

• Secure strategic high level partnerships for My World and World We Want projects;
• Review and implement strategy for strengthening children and youth participation in development and implementation of the post -2015 development agenda;
• Main a close relationship with the UN-inter-agency network on youth development on post-2015 agenda;
• Manage UNMC’s responsibilities as a co-chair of the World We Want 2015 Policy Strategy Group.

• Support and maintain close partnerships with youth-led and civil society organisations for My World 2015.

• Act as a representative of UNMC as the co-chair of the World We Want 2015 Policy Strategy Group and manage the project team;
• Support and maintain close partnerships with civil society organisation for WWW2015;
• Lead on the design and analytics input from WWW2015 to feed into appropriate space of the UNGA September 2014 and SG’s Synthesis Report in November 2014, including other mobilisation moments throughout the year.

• Advice and assist in resource mobilisations for youth participation in development of a post -2015 development agenda;
• Lead on outreach to strategic donors to secure adequate resources required for WorldWeWant Platform for year 2015. 

• Represent UNMC at various panels and workshops as deemed;
• Lead and coordinate the management of existing partnerships and relationships in support of the UN Millennium Campaign’s initiatives, including strategic planning, coordinating development of synergies and participating in partner meetings, events, etc.

Competencies

Corporate Competencies:

• Demonstrates integrity and fairness, by modeling the UN/UNDP’s values, normative framework and ethical standards;
• Promotes the vision, mission and strategic goals of UNDP;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.

• Capacity to interact with senior officials and credibly influence decision makers in UNDP programme countries and other international development organizations;   
• Strong analytical, dialogue, consultation and communication skills, including ability to produce high quality practical advisory reports and knowledge products.

• Managerial experience and decision-making skills;
• Ability to conceptualize and convey strategic vision from the spectrum of development experience;
• Knowledge and expertise in UNDP’s programming processes;
• Proven ability to lead a service area and drive for results with substantial knowledge of results-based management and budgeting.

• Demonstrated developed people management and organizational skills;
• Proven ability to manage teams; creating an enabling environment, mentoring and developing staff;
• Excellent negotiating and networking skills.

• Substantive knowledge and understanding of development cooperation with the ability to support the service area and inter-disciplinary topics of relevance;
• Ability to integrate knowledge with broader strategic, policy and operational objectives;
• A sound global network of institutional and individual contacts.

• Ability to strongly promote knowledge sharing and knowledge products and services;
• Demonstrated ability to understand clients' needs and concerns; respond promptly and effectively to client needs and customize services and products as appropriate;
• Demonstrated ability to collaborate with others in own unit and across boundaries; acknowledge others' contributions; promote collaboration and facilitate teamwork across organizational boundaries;
• Open to new ideas; shares own knowledge; applies knowledge in daily work; builds partnerships for learning and knowledge sharing;
• Promotes knowledge management in UNDP and a learning environment in the office through leadership and personal example;
• Seeks and applies knowledge, information and best practices from within and outside of UNDP.

• Mature judgment and initiative;
• Proven ability to provide strategic direction in service area;
• Independent judgment and discretion in advising on handling policy issues, challenges and sensitive issues at HQ level, regional and country level.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Advanced university degree (Master’s degree or above) in sociology, economics, law, gender and development, urban planning, management and other social science or related field.

Experience:

• A minimum of Fifteen years of progressively responsible experience in working with children and youth development and participation issues;
• Capacity building, Advocacy, Partnerships and training in youth development and participation is desirable.

Languages:

• English and French are the working languages of the United Nations Secretariat;
• For the post advertised, fluency in spoken and written English is required;
• Working knowledge of another UN official language will be an advantage.

Other Skill:

• The candidate will should have proven experience on high level policy advocacy experience in children and youth issues.

Evaluation of applicants
 
Individual consultants will be evaluated based on a cumulative analysis taking into consideration the combination of the applicants’ qualifications and financial proposal. Only the highest ranked candidates who would be found qualified for the job will be considered for the Financial Evaluation.
 
The award of the contract should be made to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:

Responsive/compliant/acceptable; and
Having received the highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the solicitation.

Technical criteria (short-listed) – 70 per cent of total evaluation – maximum of 35 points:

• Strong project management and analytical skills with solid knowledge of international development (5 points);
• Experience in partnership building and proven record of resource mobilisation (10 points);
• Experience in coordinating complex processes with multi-stakeholder and high-level participations (10 points);
• Experience and solid knowledge in MDGs and Post-2015 advocacy and outreach (10 Points).

Financial criteria (short-listing) – 30 per cent of evaluation – maximum 15 points
 
A cover letter explaining why you are the most suitable candidate for the advertised position.

Please paste the letter into the "Resume and Motivation" section of the electronic application.
Filled UNDP Personal History form (P11) including past experience in similar projects and contact details of referees.
(blank form can be downloaded from http://sas.undp.org/Documents/P11_Personal_history_form.doc); please upload the P11 instead of your CV; ); please upload the P11 instead of your CV.
Financial Proposal - specifying a daily rate for the tasks specified in this announcement. Please note that the financial proposal is all-inclusive and shall take into account various expenses incurred by the consultant/contractor during the contract period (e.g. fee, health insurance, vaccination and any other relevant expenses related to the performance of services).

Incomplete applications will not be considered. Please make sure you have provided all requested materials. Payments will be made only upon confirmation of UNDP on delivering on the contract obligations in a satisfactory manner.
 
Individual Consultants are responsible for ensuring they have vaccinations/inoculations when travelling to certain countries, as designated by the UN Medical Director. Consultants are also required to comply with the UN security directives set forth under dss.un.org.
 
Qualified women and members of minorities are encouraged to apply.
 
Due to large number of applications we receive, we are able to inform only the successful candidates about the outcome or status of the selection process.