Background

The Social and Environmental Compliance Unit (SECU) reports to the Administrator via the Director, OAI, and is responsible for reviews of UNDP compliance with its social and environmental standards.  SECU provides independent, objective review of compliance with UNDP-adopted Social and Environmental Standards (SES) and other applicable social and environmental policies in response to allegations from project-affected people, the Administrator, or others authorized to bring compliance issues to the attention of SECU.

SECU conducts investigations in accordance with the Uniform Principles and Guidelines for Investigations, and the SECU Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs).

SECU seeks to compile a Roster with suitably skilled and experienced Compliance Experts with a focus in the sectors (social and environmental compliance)  covered by the SES and in those regions where complaints are most likely to emerge.

Duties and Responsibilities

Consultants will support the SECU investigation process as experienced policy compliance reviewers. The consultants should be able to lead and/or contribute to teams on a variety of social/environmental issues and to exercise judgment about the course of an investigation.

The duties may include desk reviews and/or field visits, depending on what is appropriate in a particular complaint, with intensive interactions with local communities, civil society, project implementers, UNDP staff, and host governments.  The consultants will oversee research and analysis for reporting to various internal and external stakeholders and partners on compliance related issues.  Research and analysis projects may be specialized and require innovative research techniques to identify elusive data sources, internally and externally.

Deliverables:

Under the supervision of the SECU Lead Compliance Officer, the Consultant may, depending on needs in the context of a given complaint, deliver the follow outputs:

  • Drafts of reports of a high standard, providing an objective and factual summary of the data with soundly based conclusions;
  • Reports and statistics created under the supervision of the Lead Compliance Officer, as requested;
  • Presentations of conclusions about compliance with the SES/other applicable social and environmental standards to SECU and OAI.

Duration and selection of a consultant for specific investigations case:

The Consultant will be engaged on an ‘as needed’ basis.  In other words, as and when SECU requires the services of the Consultant, a selection will be made among those qualified in the Roster.

The selection is based on, inter alias, the availability of the consultant at the needed time, their language capacity, their expertise in the investigation case and value for money (fee rate).

Competencies

Communication:

  • Writes clearly and convincingly;
  • Has good presentation skills.

Task Management Skills:

  • Ability to meet sharp and frequent deadlines;
  • Ability to handle multiple tasks;
  • Capable of handling a large volume of data;
  • Ability to pay attention to details;
  • Exercises sound judgment/analysis;
  • Ability to handle confidential and politically sensitive issues.

Teamwork:

  • Embraces extra responsibilities;
  • Build team morale and consensus;
  • Able to accept constructive feedback.

Technical Skills:

  • Demonstrate ability to use the following tools:
  • Microsoft Office suite:

Building and Sharing Knowledge:

  • Actively builds deep knowledge in technical areas;
  • Makes valuable practice contributions;
  • Provides advice and support to others.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

  • Bachelor’s degree is required, advanced degree in environmental or international development related field preferred.

Experience:

  • Minimum of 10 years of relevant practical experience related to social and environmental policy compliance required;
  • Working experience in multi-sector and complex projects in various regions, particularly sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America/Caribbean, South and Southeast Asia and the Middle East/North Africa is highly desirable;
  • Experience working with indigenous peoples and local communities is highly desirable;
  • Ability and willingness to travel to developing countries, including areas with hardship or hazardous working conditions;
  • Strong understanding of information security and confidentiality issues relevant to investigations, highly desirable;
  • Knowledge of the operations of UNDP or similar institutions;
  • Knowledge of UNDP’s Social and Environmental Standards and Social and Environmental Screening Procedures.

Language Requirements:

  • Fluency in written and spoken English required;
  • Knowledge of Spanish, French,  and/or Arabic advantageous.

Recommended Presentation of Proposal:

Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents/information in his/her application:

  • Cover Letter - Explaining why you are applying for the position and highlighting any factors that are particularly relevant to your application;
  • Completed P11 - form including past relevant experience and contact details of 3 referees. A blank P11 form can be download from the attached document; and
  • Financial proposal - indicating the proposed daily fee rate in US$.

How to apply:

This assignment  is also advertised in UNDP Procurement Notice  through the link:

http://procurement-notices.undp.org/view_notice.cfm?notice_id=20194&view=admin

The application must contain duly completed and signed Personal History Form (P11), which can be downloaded from www.sas.undp.org/Documents/P11_Personal_history_form.doc.

P11 should be uploaded to your online application in lieu of CV. All applications must be submitted through the UNDP Jobs Admin site. Only if you experience technical issues with uploading your P11 to the UNDP Jobs Admin site, please send it to oai.bids@undp.org indicating:  your name and “SECU Compliance Reviewer” in the e-mail subject field.

Please note that:

  • Applications without P11 form will not be considered;
  • Application should be submitted in the English language;
  • Please group all your documents into one (1) single PDF document as the system only allows to upload maximum one document.