Background

UNDP’s Social and Environmental Standards (SES, www.undp.org/ses) underpin our commitment to mainstream social and environmental sustainability and accountability in our Programmes and Projects to support sustainable development.

The objectives of the Standards are to:

  • Strengthen the social and environmental outcomes of Programmes and Projects
  • Avoid adverse impacts to people and the environment
  • Minimize, mitigate, and manage adverse impacts where avoidance is not possible
  • Strengthen UNDP and partner capacities for managing social and environmental risks
  • Ensure full and effective stakeholder engagement, including through a mechanism to respond to complaints from project-affected people

The SES are comprised of an Overarching Policy and Principles, Project-Level Standards, and a Policy Delivery Process. The overarching policy and principles at the core of the SES are: (i) human rights-based approach to development programming; (ii) gender equality; and (iii) environmental sustainability.

A key mechanism to ensure these standards are applied is through UNDP’s project-level Social and Environmental Screening Procedure (SESP). The objectives of the SESP are to: (a) Integrate the SES Overarching Principles; (b) Identify potential social and environmental risks and their significance; (c) Determine the Project's risk category (Low, Moderate, High); and (d) Determine the level of social and environmental assessment and management measures required to address potential risks and impacts.

UNDP’s SES and SESP came into effect January 1, 2015. The challenge now is to ensure successful implementation and strengthened capacities of staff to apply the standards.

Duties and Responsibilities

The Knowledge Management Analyst, Social and Environmental Standards, will support the following areas of work and activities:

Manage SES Roster of Experts

  • Respond to requests coming in for the recruitment of consultants through the roster
  • On-going management of the roster, using the online WIDE portal
  • Annual reporting on use of the roster and lessons learned
  • Support updates to the roster and the addition of new consultant

Update SES Outreach and Communications

  • Development of content for the Toolkit, including case studies
  • Day-to-day management and updating of the Toolkit
  • Updates to public website as needed
  • Prepare communication materials including newsletters, presentations, flyers, Frequently Asked Questions

Support knowledge sharing for UN social and environmental sustainability consultative process

  • Support UN wide efforts to strengthen knowledge sharing on social and environmental standards

Support review and update of SES policies and guidance

  • Track comments on SES Guidance Notes
  • Support review and tracking lessons learned to inform SES/SESP update
  • Track comments on SES/SESP updates.

Competencies

Functional Competencies:

  • Technical: The consultant must demonstrate experience and interest in environmental and social safeguards and sustainability.
  • Communication: Demonstrated excellence in clear, concise and convincing writing and communication skills.
  • Professionalism: The consultant should be capable of working in a high pressure environment with sharp and frequent deadlines, managing many tasks simultaneously and producing quality results; responsive and pays attention to details.
  • Teamwork: The consultant should work well in a team; Projects a positive image and is ready to take on a wide range of tasks; Focuses on results for the client; and welcomes constructive feedback. Demonstrated ability to work effectively as part of a collaborative team and process.
  • Knowledge Management and Learning: The consultant should demonstrate a commitment to sharing knowledge and experience; actively develop substantive understanding and experience in Social and Environmental Standards.

Corporate Competencies:                                                                                                  

  • Demonstrates integrity by upholding the United Nations' values and ethical standards; treats all people fairly;
  • Appreciates differences in values and learning from cultural diversity;
  • Promotes UNDP vision, mission and strategic goals;
  • Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age-based sensitivity and adaptability;
  • Demonstrating consistency in upholding and promoting the values of UNDP in actions and decisions, in line with the UN Code of Conduct.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

  •  Master’s degree in field related to international development or social and environmental sustainability is required.

Work Experience:

  • Demonstration of at least one year of relevant coursework, job or internship experience related to social and environmental safeguards, impact assessment and/or sustainability in an international development context.
  • Familiarity with the UN System, in particular UNDP.
  • Familiarity with SharePoint is an asset.

Language Requirements:

  • Proficient in written and spoken English;
  • Working knowledge of another UN language is an asset.

Application Procedure

The application package containing the following (to be uploaded as one file):

  • Online application with brief description of why the Offer considers her/himself the most suitable for the assignment; and
  • Personal CV or P11, indicating all past experience from similar projects and specifying the relevant assignment period (from/to), as well as the email and telephone contacts of at least three (3) professional references.

Note: The above documents need to be scanned in one file and uploaded to the online application as one document.

Shortlisted candidates (ONLY) will be requested to submit a Financial Proposal.

  • The financial proposal should specify an all-inclusive daily fee (based on a 7 hour working day - lunch time is not included - and estimated 21.75 days per month).
  • The financial proposal must be all-inclusive and take into account various expenses that will be incurred during the contract, including: the daily professional fee; cost of travel from the home base to the duty station and vice versa, where required; living allowances at the duty station; communications, utilities and consumables; life, health and any other insurance; risks and inconveniences related to work under hardship and hazardous conditions (e.g., personal security needs, etc.), when applicable; and any other relevant expenses related to the performance of services under the contract.
  • In the case of unforeseeable travel requested by UNDP, payment of travel costs including tickets, lodging and terminal expenses should be agreed upon, between UNDP and Individual Consultant, prior to travel and will be reimbursed. In general, UNDP should not accept travel costs exceeding those of an economy class ticket. Should the IC wish to travel on a higher class he/she should do so using their own resources.
  • If the Offeror is employed by an organization/company/institution, and he/she expects his/her employer to charge a management fee in the process of releasing him/her to UNDP under a Reimbursable Loan Agreement (RLA), the Offeror must indicate at this point, and ensure that all such costs are duly incorporated in the financial proposal submitted to UNDP.

The Financial Proposal is to be emailed as per the instruction in the separate email that will be sent to shortlisted candidates.

Evaluation process

Applicants are reviewed based on Required Skills and Experience stated above and based on the technical evaluation criteria outlined below.  Applicants will be evaluated based on cumulative scoring.  When using this weighted scoring method, the award of the contract will be made to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:

  • Being 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 where technical criteria weighs 70% and Financial criteria/ Proposal weighs 30%.

Technical evaluation - Total 70% (70 points):

Desk review:

  • Demonstrated understanding of social and environmental safeguards (20 points)

  • Knowledge management skills and expertise, including roster management, websites, newsletters, knowledge products, networks (25 points)

Interview. Maximum Weight = 25% (25 Points)

After review of the applications, the top 3-6 candidates will be invited for interview.  Candidates obtaining a minimum of 70% (49 points) of the maximum obtainable points for the technical criteria (70 points) shall be considered for the financial evaluation.

Financial evaluation - Total 30% (30 points)

The following formula will be used to evaluate financial proposal:

p = y (µ/z), where

p = points for the financial proposal being evaluated

y = maximum number of points for the financial proposal

µ = price of the lowest priced proposal

z = price of the proposal being evaluated

Contract Award

Candidate obtaining the highest combined scores in the combined score of Technical and Financial evaluation will be considered technically qualified and will be offered to enter into a framework Long Term Agreement with UNDP.

Institutional arrangement

The on-call consultant will report to, seek approval/acceptance of outputs from the UNDP Policy Specialist, Social and Environmental Standards.

Duration of the Contract

The duration of the framework contract will be initially for 1 year with a maximum of 80 working days, in the first year and with possibility of extension up to 3 years, subject to satisfactory performance.

Payment modality

  • Payment to the Individual Contractor will be made based on the actual number of days worked, deliverables accepted and upon certification of satisfactory completion by the manager. The consultant will be able to submit one invoice at the end of each month for payment.
  • The work week will be based on 35 hours, i.e. on a 7 hour working day, with core hours being between 9h00 and 18h00 daily.

LTA Framework Agreement

UNDP plans to enter into the Long-Term Agreement (LTA) with one TOP ranked successful Individual Contractor to assure resources availability at the required timeframe and/or increased demand for services requested.

Please note that the LTA does not form a financial obligation or commitment from UNDP at the time the LTA contract is signed, and that such an agreement is non-exclusive. When a specific need arises, the successful Individual Contractor will be approached and be provided with a specific TOR and deliverables (and time frame) but still within the scope of the responsibilities stated in the LTA. The successful Individual Contractor/s is expected to provide Confirmation of Interest on the specific services required. Financial commitments will only be established each time a Purchase Order for the specific services/TOR for Individual Contractor is committed and based on the agreed LTA Daily Rate Consultancy Fee.

This LTA has a cumulative ceiling amount that may accrue to the individual contractor during the life of the LTA, but said amount shall remain as an upper limit, and must not and cannot be interpreted nor understood as neither a financial commitment nor guarantee of business volume.

Annexes (click on the hyperlink to access the documents):