Background

UN Women Regional Office for Arab States (ROAS) is implementing a regional programme which aims to respond to new challenges and opportunities raised by the Arab uprisings regarding Gender Equality and Women Empowerment (GEWE). It seeks to understand the root causes of gender inequalities and to address them through an innovative bottom-up approach.

With the overall goal to enhance gender equality in the region, the programme intends more specifically to contribute to the following:

• Understand the root causes of gender inequality in order to develop tools and conduct evidence-based advocacy for policy change;
• Strengthen the capacities and networks of GEWE civil society organizations, with a particular focus on the sustainability of new and emerging movements including youth groups;
• Develop community-based solutions to promote gender equality based on innovative approaches and South-South exchanges.

The programme is being implemented by the UN Women in Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco and Palestine. It is funded by the Swedish International Development Cooperation (Sida). 

A key focus of the programme is to enhance cross learning and networking among partner organisations and other stakeholders and a regional learning document will therefore be developed during the last year of the programme (2018). The learning document will be informed by a regional learning meeting with key partner organisations working on male engagement in gender equality.

Objective of the Assignment:

To develop a regional learning document and an online summary document. It will build on the Midterm review undertaken in mid-2017, two south to south learning exchange visits, narrative program reports and workshop evaluations. The products should also be informed by interviews with key stakeholders.

The learning document will include the following main components including both engaging men and boys for gender equality and women’s rights in Islam – which are the two main components of the programme.

Scope of the Assignment:

The scope is to develop a learning document with an accompanying communication product. In addition, a short guidance note on how to use the tools and products developed under the programme should be developed.

Activities:

• Undertake a literature review of existing materials;
• Undertake key interviews with key stakeholders;
• Develop a draft learning report and present it at a learning meeting;
• Finalise the learning report, including key recommendations based on the outcomes of the meeting;
• Develop the communication product based on the learning document;
• Develop a guidance note on how to use the products developed under the programme.

The consultant will work under the overall supervision of the Regional Programme Manager.

Duties and Responsibilities

Monitoring and Reporting Requirements:

The progress of the work will be delineated and supervised by the Programme Manager.  The consultant will submit a monthly report on the progress of work. Payment will take place upon two instalments, one after the learning meeting and another with the submission of the guidance note.

Competencies

Core Values:

• Respect for Diversity
• Integrity
• Professionalism

Core Competencies:

• Awareness and Sensitivity Regarding Gender Issues
• Accountability
• Creative Problem Solving
• Effective Communication
• Inclusive Collaboration
• Stakeholder Engagement
• Leading by Example

Please visit this link for more information on UN Women’s Core Values and Competencies:

 http://www.unwomen.org/-/media/headquarters/attachments/sections/about%20us/employment/un-women-employment-values-and-competencies-definitions-en.pdf

Functional Competencies:

• Excellent writing and communication skills. Communicates sensitively, effectively and creatively across different consistencies;
• Demonstrate very good understanding of knowledge management;
• Proven networking skills, and ability to generate interest in UN Women’s mandate;
• Strong initiative-taker;
• Very effective at multi-tasking;
• Builds strong relations and focus on impact and results;
• Ability to handle a large volume of work under time constraints.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

A master degree in International Development, Gender and Development, Human Rights, Public Administration or other related Social Sciences. 

Experience:

• A minimum of eight years of experience in the communication and knowledge management field;
• Traceable record of work on similar projects;
• Communication literacy, electronic networks and software used for communication purposes;
• Familiar with gender issues, and preferable on engaging youth/ boys and men for gender equality; 
• Familiar with UN Women and UN system is an asset;
• Familiar with the Middle East and North Africa is asset.

Language Requirements:

Fluency in English is required.

Evaluation Criteria:

Individual consultants will be evaluated based on the following methodology:

Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 49 out of the 70 points in the technical evaluation would be considered for the Financial Evaluation.

Technical Criteria Weight: 70%

• Criteria 1: Experience in knowledge management and in producing knowledge products (35 points);
• Criteria 2: Experience and understanding relating to gender equality, including on the engagement of men and boys in gender equality (25 points);
• Criteria 3: Experience in developing persuasive communication products (10 points).

Financial: Lowest financial proposal: 30%.

Contract will be awarded to the technically qualified consultant who obtains the highest combines score (financial and technical). The points for the Financial Proposal will be allocated as per the following formula:

(Lowest Bid Offered*)/(Bid of the Consultant) x 30*"Lowest Bid Offered" refers to the lowest price offered by Offerors scoring at least 49 points in technical evaluation.

Applications:

Interested Individual Consultants must submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications:

• Proposal: The following documents should be included as part of the proposal;
• A cover letter with a brief presentation of your consultancy explaining your suitability for the work;
• A proposed outline of the learning document (maximum two pages) including your approach to this consultancy (maximum one page);
• All applications must include (as an attachment) the completed UN Women Personal History form (P-11) which can be downloaded from http://www.unwomen.org/about-us/employment
• Financial proposal; Proposed lumpsum amount for undertaking this consultancy (in US dollars) including participation in a three days learning meeting in Jordan (travel and DSA);
• Any relevant learning documents/knowledge management products the consultant has developed should be attached.
• Kindly note that the system will only allow one attachment. Applications without the completed UN Women P-11 form will be treated as incomplete and will not be considered for further assessment.

Note:

In July 2010, the United Nations General Assembly created UN Women, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. The creation of UN Women came about as part of the UN reform agenda, bringing together resources and mandates for greater impact. It merges and builds on the important work of four previously distinct parts of the UN system (DAW, OSAGI, INSTRAW and UNIFEM), which focused exclusively on gender equality and women's empowerment.

UN Women is applying fair and transparent selection process that would take into account both the technical qualification of Consultants as well as their price proposals. The contract will be awarded to the candidate obtaining the highest combined technical and financial scores.