UNDP Jobs - 91923- Individual Consultant for Pro PALOP-TL SAI eLearni

Individual Consultant for Pro PALOP-TL SAI eLearning development & innovation mainstreaming – Pro PALOP-TL SAI eLearning & innovation Specialist

Location :

Praia, CAPE VERDE

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

06-Jul-2020

Application Deadline :

12-Jun-20 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

International Consultant

Duration of Initial Contract :

23 months (320 days, with two travel mission to Duty Station)

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

23 months (320 days, with two travel mission to Duty Station)

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence. UNDP does not tolerate sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, and discrimination. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks.

Background

N.B.

Applications through UNDP jobs will not be accepted, only to the procurement.cv@cv.jo.un.org email address.

Interested candidates are required to read the Procurement Notice for Individual Consultants and its related documents, which are available in the following websites:
•UN Cape Verde website,www.un.cv, https://caboverde.un.org/pt/jobs;
•UNGM website at www.ungm.org;
•Procurement Notice UNDP https://procurement-notices.undp.org/view_notice.cfm?notice_id=66310

Background

The European Union (EU) is one of the major partners and funders of UNDP’s work. Currently, the EU and UNDP are partnering in 140 countries to deepen democratic governance, prevent or recover from conflict and natural disasters, build resilience and adapt to climate change. The EU and its Member States are jointly the world’s largest donor of the development aid, with their Official Development Assistance (ODA) having reached €75.5 billion in 2016.

Communications and visibility are key for the EU to mobilize its citizens and governments to remain engaged in development aid and cooperation as well as for the EU - UNDP strategic partnership, including resource mobilization.

In the past decade, the Portuguese-speaking countries of Angola, Cabo Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, Sao Tome and Principe, and Timor-Leste have experienced significant progress in economic governance. Recent public finance management reforms are the main reason for this success.

However, weaknesses, including inadequate institutional capacity, skills and human resources, continue to hamper their public administration systems. This situation has undermined effective public finance management, budgetary oversight and control of public resources, which has significant adverse impacts on other governance and development sectors.

In order to support the above referred countries addressing such challenges, the European Union, UNDP and the National Authorizing Officers for the European Development Fund (NAO EDF) in the PALOP and Timor-Leste partner to deliver the Project for Strengthening technical and functional skills of Supreme Audit Institutions, National Parliaments and Civil Society for the control of public finances in the PALOP and Timor-Leste (Pro PALOP-TL SAI) .

The Pro PALOP-TL SAI project was fully funded by the European Union to promote economic governance in ACP Portuguese Speaking Countries (5 PALOP countries and Timor-Leste) and strengthened the technical and functional competencies of the Supreme Audit Institutions, Parliaments, and Civil Society in the field of public financial management.

The project enabled the capacity-building of beneficiary institutions, the development of skills, know-how and knowledge of oversight stakeholders. Therefore, the project had a real impact on people’s lives, and the overall framework of public finance management and budget oversight in PALOP and Timor-Leste. The project’s implementation started in January 2014 and came to an end in December 2017. The 2017 Edition of the Global Parliamentary Report , produced by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and UNDP has selected the Pro PALOP-TL SAI approach and actions to showcase at global level how to best promote “cooperation between parliament and supreme audit institutions”, so that legislatures can engage with SAIs to enhance control and oversight of public expenditure, and accelerate the delivery of SDG 5 and SDG 16 .

Building from the previous success story of the Pro PALOP-TL SAI, the Programme for Consolidating Economic Governance and Public Finance Management Systems (PFMS) in the PALOP-TL (Pro PALOP-TL SAI (Phase II)) covers the second priority area of the 11th EDF PALOP-TL Multi-Annual Indicative Plan (MIP) “Governance capacity Development”. The programme intends to improve economic governance in the PALOP-TL, with the specific objective to improve the performance of PALOP-TL countries on Public Finance accountability, effectiveness and transparency.

The proposed programme aims to expand and consolidate Pro PALOP-TL SAI’s initiatives and successes of South-South and Triangular Cooperation by supporting capacity development, further develop regional dialogue and deliver technical assistance in the above referred domain. Within this scope, it is proposed to focus the intervention on three domains for consolidating PFMS, where cooperation among PALOP-TL/EU is already underway and showed positive impacts, as well a regional added value, to obtain the following expected results:

1. The executives' capacities to ensure fiscal and budget transparency in the PALOP-TL are improved.
2. The supreme audit institutions and other relevant external control institutions' capacities to ensure external audit/control over PFMS in the PALOP-TL are enhanced.
3. The capacities of Parliaments and CSO to ensure effective legislative oversight and social monitoring of PFMS in the PALOP-TL are strengthened.

The programme will develop a Facility to support and broker initiatives for capacity development, south-south and triangular cooperation, exchanges of experiences and "peer2peer" learning, with the expectation to foster institutional-based, process-based and human resources-based change and transformational dynamics.

The programme's beneficiaries were identified through the relevant 10th EDF programmes (PALOP-TL RIP and NIPs), as well as by means of a thorough mapping, analysis and diagnostic carried out along the implementation of the Pro PALOP-TL SAI between 2014 and 2017 , complemented by an ad-hoc mapping consultation process in the 6 countries in 2016-2017. Given its successful experience in implementing the Pro PALOP-TL SAI, as well as in developing/providing institutional capacity development tools and processes, the EU and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) have agreed to renew their partnership.

Duties and Responsibilities

UNDP hosted the AGORA secretariat from 2010 until 2018. The secretariat was composed of an AGORA manager, and full-time consultants (thematic areas), IT consultants and other consultants responsible for translation and specific content development. Interns and UN volunteers oversaw communication and social media. Resource mobilisation was a big part of the staff’s and consultants’ work – making sure there was funding to continue with AGORA. UNDP expressed its will to further engage in AGORA but agrees to handover the hosting of the secretariat to another organization.

From 2015 to 2018, the EU-funded Pro PALOP-TL SAI (Phase I) project, implemented by UNDP Cabo Verde, invested a total of 308,710 USD in order to ensure high-quality products that would stay available in a sustainable manner to the public in general, the project beneficiaries and supplier (EU). Due to this investment, Pro PALOP-TL SAI stakeholders would be able to access the project’s Website hosted in the AGORA Portal (including sub portals for extractive industries and library), LMS platform (eLearning courses) available in Portuguese language.

This investment was part of an exit strategy by the project’s first phase and is being continued in the second phase of the Pro PALOP-TL SAI, the Programme for the Consolidation of Economic Governance and Public Finance Management Systems in the PALOP-TL countries. During the AGORA meeting referred above, the Board members decided that continue the collaboration with the project hosting Pro PALOP-TL SAI project’s website and the PALOP-TL Portuguese Corner, as well as the LMS for eLearning courses, hosted in the AGORA platform.

The AGORA Portal for Parliamentary Development has played a central role in the project’s 1st phase distant learning, communications and visibility, as well as in its exit strategy. The project’s 2nd phase is also putting the portal at the core of these elements.

At the core of this exit and sustainability strategy was the Pro PALOP-TL SAI AGORA hosted eLearnings. Since the project’s first phase, the project executive used training actions as a tool to enhance skills and provide credible credentials to the beneficiaries, while establishing eLearning platforms in Portuguese (with English translation) that ensure durable access to best practices, database and information in Portuguese on PFM domains – such as fiscal openness, legislative budget oversight, external control of PFM, social monitoring of PFMS and budget transparency, among others.

Between 2015 and 2017, the Pro PALOP-TL SAI project developed a strong partnership with the AGORA Portal spanning multiple knowledge management, learning products and communications products. During this period, the project established and made available to the public an eLearning platform in Portuguese Language hosted on the AGORA Global Parliamentary Platform, thus ensure means of durable access to database and information in Portuguese Language produced by and with the support of the project and its beneficiary institutions. Transversal to all the Pro PALOP-TL SAI outputs aiming to foster joint-learning, peer2peer exchanges of experiences for capacity development, communities of practices to share best practices and foster development and strategic agendas in the domain of PMF, these online courses reached 3,450 persons from the PALOP-TL countries. Among them, SAI judges and auditors, MPs, parliamentary staff and members of the civil society.

By the end of the project’s 1st phase, the AGORA e-Learning Portal featured five online courses based entirely on the content of the project’s training workshops and seminars on the ground. Free of charge, widely publicised and available in English and Portuguese, the e-learnings allow the global audience to get to know and benefit from Pro PALOP-TL SAI’s innovative approach to and expertise on various aspects of public financial management.

All courses developed by the Pro PALOP-TL SAI became especially relevant for members of parliaments and staff, supreme audit institutions and civil society but are also a valuable resource for development partners, practitioners and academics. Official accreditation was awarded to those who complete the course successfully. In 2015, upon the launching of the Pro PALOP-TL SAI eLearnings, AGORA LMS registered 700 registered course-takers; in 2016 there was an increase of 236% in the registered course-takers (1,650 in total) and, by the end of 2017, this number had increased to 3,209 registered course-takers (195% increase in relation to 2016). This increase was also reflected in the growth of Africa users of AGORA website: from 7% in 2015-16 (the last among the regions using the platform) to 36% in 2016 (the first among the regions).

In 2018, due to potential legal and financial implications related to entry into force of the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) , the AGORA Learning Management System (LMS) Platform, where the Pro PALOP-TL SAI eLearning courses are hosted, took transitory measures to ensure compliance with the regulation. These measures included, essentially, the temporary suspension of the "sign in" and "sign up" functions for the courses and potentially the elimination of the existing database of practitioners enrolled in the courses. Since August 2019, after alignment with the GDPR was ensured, 345 additional course-takers were registered in the LMS platform – out of which, 102 were registered in the PALOP and Timor-Leste (30% of the course-takers) and 238 were using the courses developed by the Pro PALOP-TL SAI (69% of the course-takers).

This potential is being capitalized in the project’s 2nd phase in order to update existing eLearnings with more innovative learning methodologies and to develop additional ones on the basis of learning events delivered by the project.

To this end, UNDP Cabo Verde is recruiting a consultant (Pro PALOP-TL SAI eLearning & innovation specialist) to design, develop the Pro PALOP-TL SAI eLearning courses; setup and ensure the technical maintenance of its Learning Management System (hosted in AGORA Platform); and to streamline innovation into the project’s interventions. The consultant will work from home – except for travel foreseen in Products 13 and 14 (See section F).

Competencies

Core competencies:

Demonstrates integrity by modelling the UN’s values and ethical standards;
Promotes the vision, mission and strategic goals of the UN system;
Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.

Functional competencies:

Strong knowledge of server-side scripting technologies like PHP (preferred), Ruby or Python;
Excellent knowledge of JavaScript, HTML, CSS and XML;
In-depth knowledge of object-oriented programming;
Good knowledge of software architecture patterns (MVC and ORM);
Good knowledge of design thinking processes;
Good communication and interpersonal skills, ability to foster networks and partnerships;
Attention to detail;
Ability to work in a team and to communicate in a clear fashion.

Required Skills and Experience

Academic background:

Minimum Bachelor's Degree (or related Diploma) in Information Technology/Computer Science, Multimedia, or related field.

Work experience:

Minimum 10 years of work experience in the fields of: software engineering, web applications design and implementation;
Minimum 7 years of work experience in educational technologies like eLearning design and development;
Experience with providing tech and innovation consultancy to international organizations (knowledge of design thinking process and previous experience with conducting hackathons for international organisations is a must);
Proven experience of design and implementation of web applications;
Experience with LMS and CMS;
Experience with database systems (MySQL and PostgreSQL)
Experience in Linux server environments;
Experience in video, sound and animation techniques as well as interactive techniques.
Experience in conducting hackathons involving multiple stakeholders (private sector, academia, etc.)
Proven experience of design and implementation of eLearning applications;
Experience in software testing is a plus;
Experience in graphical design, Photoshop, Illustrator and video production is a plus;
Preferably have a creative/multimedia background;
Preferably experience in developing/designing of the same and/or similar products;
Experience with innovative learning methodologies like game-based learningExperience/familiarity with the UN system is a must;
Experience/familiarity with governance matters is an asset;
Creative background is an asset.

Required languages:

Written and spoken communication skills in English.