Grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, UN Women will work 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. Placing women’s rights at the center of all its efforts, UN Women will lead and coordinate United Nations System efforts to ensure that commitments on gender equality and gender mainstreaming translate into action throughout the world. It will provide strong and coherent leadership in support of Member States’ priorities and efforts, building effective partnerships with civil society and other relevant actors.

Despite some encouraging data and statistics on women's participation in politics, women still lack access to political leadership opportunities and resources at local, national and regional levels. The UN Women Global Initiative on Women’s Leadership and Political Participation includes in its key results areas, the access to knowledge on women’s political participation. Within this framework, UN Women supports the International Knowledge Network of Women in Politics (iKNOW Politics) jointly with UNDP, International IDEA, IPU and NDI. The five partners agreed, in 2007, to jointly establish IKNOW Politics as a platform designed to increase the participation and effectiveness of women in political life by utilizing a technology enabled forum to share best practices on women's political participation and leadership (www.iknowpolitics.org).

iKNOW Politics brings together women involved in politics around the world by utilizing an online platform to provide access to resources, expertise, dialogue, and knowledge creation on women's political participation. Network members have access to a cadre of experts and practitioners that can advise candidates and elected officials on how to develop and implement successful campaign and lobbying strategies with the goal of getting more women involved in politics. Additionally, the network provides an opportunity to the users to stay abreast of global events and news related to women's political participation globally and regionally. UN Women will host the iKNOW Politics Secretariat to ensure continuity and growth for the platform in 2015 and beyond.

Under the supervision of the iKNOW Politics Coordinator and/or the UN Women Policy Advisor on Political Participation, the Language Facilitator will be responsible to further expand and update the iKNOW Politics language platforms and strengthen the online communities in Arabic and/or French).

Functions /Key Results Expected:

• Strengthen and expand the iKNOW Politics Network Community;
• Website content management Spanish (and/or French) platforms;
• Apply innovative communication approaches via social media platforms.

Website content management of Arabic and/or French platforms:

• Maintain and populate the news section of the platform with daily updates;
• Expand the knowledge library with new resources on women’s political participation;
• Identify relevant events and trainings on women’s political participation and promote them to the iKNOW Politics Community;
• Conduct interviews and produce audio-visual materials to showcase good examples on women’s political participation;
• Translate website content (interviews, texts, articles) from English to relevant languages;
• Perform regular quality control on language versions of the website (bugs, incorrect links, quality of pictures, search functions, content organization).

Strengthen and expand the iKNOW Politics Network Community:

• Manage the membership of the Network, facilitate communication between members and encourage contributions from the experts and collaborators in relevant language platforms;
• Expand the membership of the Network by reaching out to politicians, international organizations, NGOs, academic institutions, women organizations, youth, indigenous peoples and minority communities;
• Design, disseminate and moderate online discussions and mobilize members to contribute;
• Manage the process of collecting and disseminating lessons learned on women’s political participation from the discussions generated in the iKNOW Politics portal;
• Filter and respond to messages, contributions and queries to determine the most relevant information and resources to be shared with the global Network;
• Respond to user requests through active solicitation of expert feedback.

Support the development of knowledge management products:

• Conduct research and contribute to consolidated replies;
• Support the production and dissemination of iKNOW Politics newsletters;
• Organize, manage and promote thematic webinars and google hangouts;
• Support the process of collecting and disseminating lessons learned on women’s political participation form the discussions generated in the iKNOW Politics portal;
• Support the identification of best practices for analysis and documentation of lessons learned.

Apply innovative communication approaches via social media platforms:

• Maintain and promote through content feeds the iKNOW Politics social media platforms (including, but not limited to Google+, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn);
• Identify relevant online campaigns and collaborate with partners to promote iKNOW Politics;
• Monitor and report on social key performance indicators such as reach, engagement and conversation.

Corporate Competencies:

• Demonstrates integrity by modeling the UN’s values and ethical standards;
• Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of UN Women;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability;
• Treats all people fairly without favoritism;
• Fulfills all obligations to gender sensitivity and zero tolerance for sexual harassment.

Functional Competencies:

• Excellent written communication (some experience in proofreading, strong editing skills, including for an online platform).
• Substantive knowledge of issues on gender equality and women’s empowerment;
• Strong IT skills (knowledge of content management systems such as Drupal is an asset);
• Understanding and experience in Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and social media strategies, and other media tools;
• Good understanding of communications and outreach at the international level;
• Results oriented, focused, highly creative, communicative and a team player;
• Outstanding networking, team-building, organizational and communication skills;
• Capacity to work with diverse partners including governments, donors and civil society.

Education:

• Advanced university degree (Master's degree or equivalent) in journalism, political science, international relations or related fields;
• A first level of university in combination with at least two years of qualifying experience may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.

Experience:

• At least 3 years of progressively responsible experience in public information, journalism, international relations or related area.
• Knowledge of the recent advocacy trends in the advancement of women in politics;
• Substantive experience in women’s leadership and participation is an advantage;
• Experience in working in a multicultural and web-based environment;
• Experience in designing knowledge management products (online discussions, consolidated replies, webinars, and newsletters);
• Experience with the development and production of audio-visual materials an advantage.

Languages:

• Fluency in English and Arabic and/or French.

Proposal requirements / Application Procedure

Interested candidates are invited to submit their online applications by 5 August 2015 with the following documents as a single document.

• Cover Letter including brief information about which of your previous experiences makes you the most suitable candidate for the advertised position and a brief description of chosen work methodology/approach to carry out the tasks described in the Terms of Reference;
• Financial Proposal, specifying the daily rate. Please note that payment to the selected candidate will include travel costs to the duty station of the most economic and direct route as per UN Women rules and regulations;
• Updated CV.

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.

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 – 70% of total evaluation – max 35 points:

• Criteria A (Academic background specified in the announcement) – max 5 points;
• Criteria B (Demonstrated experience in building and maintaining online communities) – max 10 points;
• Criteria C (Demonstrated experience in writing/editing and translating (online) content in Arabic and/or French) – max 10 points;
• Criteria D (Strong understanding of issues on gender equality and women’s empowerment) – max 10 points;
• Only the highest ranked candidates who would be found qualified for the job will be considered for the Financial Evaluation.

Financial Criteria - 30% of total evaluation – max. 15 points

Application:

• Interested candidates are requested to apply no later than COB (EST) 5 August 2015.