Background

With a view to achieve Bangladesh’s development agenda of being a middle -income country by 2021, reducing poverty, attaining a sustainable and inclusive economic growth Government of Bangladesh (GOB) needs to tap all the actual and potential resources and advance the capacity to take ownership and guide the development process.  With this end, GOB needs to scale up its policy capacity to articulate, protect and promote its strategic economic and other national interests at the regional and global policy making arenas.  Leveraging appropriate knowledge management tools is critical to improve policy making capacity (by making policies evidence based), planning, implementation and oversight of development projects, public service delivery and to facilitate the desired development transition.

With this understanding, Knowledge for Development Management (K4DM) project emerged as a joint initiative of the Government of Bangladesh (GOB) and UNDP in September 2014 and will continue until December 2020. The project is being implemented and coordinated by the Economic Relations Division (ERD) (anchored at the UN Wing of ERD) of the Ministry of Finance and supported by the UNDP. The project aims to promote and facilitate a knowledge-based

decision-making process. Moreover, given the current context of declining trend of the traditional Official Development Assistance (ODA), the project attempted to contribute to the process of exploring the innovative alternatives for resource mobilization and its effective utilization through collaboration between all stakeholders and capacity enhancement of ERD.

After 05 years’ of implementation the project has achieved significantly tangible and also non-tangible results within a short span of time. The achievements include:  institutionalizing the issues of leveraging Non-Resident Bangladeshis (NRBs), South-South Cooperation (SSC) for national development, establishing cell at ERD on SSC and NRBS, and the creation of an information repository at the ERD called the ERDPEDIA. A portal is also created through this Project for the NRB’s to invest towards the national development of Bangladesh which is www.nrb.gov.bd. The Project has achieved a commendable success in developing the policy making, economic diplomacy, planning and negotiation skills of the ERD officials as well as other ministries through arranging a series of skill development trainings and workshops. Apart from these tangible achievements, the Project initiated many nationally important activities.

Project has also initiated National Human Development Report (NHDR) for which an advisory committee consisting of 22 members has been formed to provide guidance towards NHDR publication including theme selection, content development, finalization and other relevant issues.

Description of Assignment:

Consultancy to assist UNDP/ERD of Ministry of Finance of the GoB in the formulation of a Lessons Learned report for the first phase of the K4DM project.

The national consultant will:

• Provide a comprehensive report on the lessons learned through the implementation of the K4DM Project for the period of January 2015 – December 2020, which is the implementation timeframe of the project;
• Outline a pathway for incorporating the lessons from the first phase into the second phase of the K4DM Project, which will possibly start in January 2021 and continue for 3 years

Duties and Responsibilities

Scope of Work:

The National Consultant (IC) is expected to provide a comprehensive report on the lessons learned through the implementation of the K4DM Project. The scope of the report will include the period of January 2015 – December 2020, which is the implementation timeframe of the project. The incumbent will work under the guidance of the Project Manager, in close consultation with the National Project Director.

The output will be a report which outlines findings and recommendations with regard to the review objectives listed below:

Lessons Learned from the Project in General: Which lessons could be learned through the best practices of the project? Which practices were not successful, and why not? This chapter will cover the project in general and will outline broad lessons learned through the implementation of the entire project.

Lessons Learned about Management: This chapter will focus on the managerial structure of the project, and the lessons to be learned from the management framework. It will assess the style of leadership and organizational structure, as well as the lessons learned from the implementation of various project activities.

Lessons Learned about Collaboration and Partnership: This chapter will capture the lessons learned through the collaboration and partnership between K4DM and ERD, as well as ERD and its other partners, such as A2i project. What worked about the partnerships? What did not work? How were the lessons learned?

Lessons Learned about Budgeting and Procurement: This chapter should focus on the lessons learned due to the budgeting and procurement processes of the project. It should cover what was effective about the budgeting and procurement practices, as well as what the shortcomings were.

Lessons Learned from COVID-19: COVID-19 presented an unprecedented scenario for the project. Therefore, lessons learned during this period are going to be crucial to document, as they have not been previously explored. The report should contain a separate chapter on which lessons can be derived from the project’s activities and role during the pandemic.

How to Incorporate Lessons Learned in Phase II:  This chapter will contain recommendations on how to incorporate the Lessons Learned in the Phase II of the Project, based on the project document for the next phase.

Institutional Arrangement :

The National Project Manager (NPM) of K4DM will be the contract administrator for the assignment and will supervise the activities of the consultant, evaluate her/his performance and approve the deliverables.

During the contract period, the consultant is expected to meet the key officials in ERD, Planning Commission, IMED, and other relevant ministries of Bangladesh Government. K4DM will provide office space (no computer). The project team will assist to arrange various meetings, consultations, and interviews and ensure access to key officials as mentioned in proposed methodologies. Notably, K4DM will not provide vehicle support for pick and drop from residence to office and office to residence. It is the responsibility of the selected consultant.

Duration of the Contract and Duty Station :

The duration of the assignment will be 30 working days over a period of 02 months with the expected beginning on the date of 1st week of October, 2020.

This position is Dhaka, Bangladesh based.

Final Products/Services:

• Inception report containing conceptual framework, methodology, questions and tools for data collection, reporting outline and work plan.
• Preparation and submission of draft report including relevant chapters
• Submission and acceptance of final report with recommendations for the future

Competencies

• Demonstrates commitment to UNDP’s mission, vision and values.
• Ability to work in a challenging and complex environment;
• Independent and flexible;
• Creative and result-oriented; and
• Has demonstrate leadership capabilities

Required Skills and Experience

This is a high-profile consultancy assignment requiring senior and professional inputs based on substantive experience and qualifications of the consultant who will be invited to submit a detailed technical proposal alongside CV including previous similar experiences.

Minimum eligibility criteria of the consultant:

• Minimum Master’s Degree in social-science, development studies, public administration, law and/or areas relevant for the assignment;
• Demonstrated experience of writing evaluation reports or lessons learned reports for the UN system or other international organizations including evaluations and/or lessons learned reports;
• Minimum 07 years of professional experience of similar work with development organizations and special reference to government organizations;

Must demonstrate understanding of the UNDP project implementation process and demonstrate excellent oral and analytical skills

Note: The individual consultant who does not meet the above eligibility criteria shall not be considered for further evaluation. Necessary documentation must be submitted to substantiate the above eligibility criteria.

Cumulative analysis-

The award of the contract will be made to the individual consultant up on Cumulative Analysis/evaluation 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;

Only candidates obtaining a minimum 70% mark in technical evaluation will be considered eligible for financial evaluation.

Technical Evaluation Criteria (Total 70 marks)

• Educational Qualification-20 Marks
• Experience of conducting evaluation reports and/or lessons learned reports for international or UN organizations  -20 Marks
• Experience of writing publications in association with the government-10 Marks
• Experience of working with the Ministries of the Government of Bangladesh-20 Marks

Financial Evaluation (Total 30 marks)

All technical qualified proposals will be scored out 30 based on the formula provided below. The maximum points (30) will be assigned to the lowest financial proposal. All other proposals received points according to the following formula:

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.

The financial proposal shall specify a total lump sum amount, and payment terms around specific and measurable (qualitative and quantitative) deliverables (i.e. whether payments fall in installments or upon completion of the entire contract). Payments are based upon output, i.e. upon delivery of the services specified in the TOR. In order to assist the requesting unit in the comparison of financial proposals, the financial proposal will include a breakdown of this lump sum amount (including travel, per diems, and number of anticipated working days).

DOCUMENTS TO BE INCLUDED WHEN SUBMITTING THE PROPOSALS

Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications:

Proposal

• Technical Proposal including the timeline, methodology and plan of action;
• Duly accomplished Letter of Confirmation of Interest and Availability using the template provided by UNDP;
• Personal CV, indicating all past experience from similar projects, as well as the contact details (email and telephone number) of the Candidate and at least three (3) professional references;
• Financial Proposal: Financial Proposal has to be submitted through a standard interest and availability template which can be downloaded from the link below:

http://www.bd.undp.org/content/dam/bangladesh/docs/Jobs/Interest%20and%20Submission%20of%20Financial%20Proposal-Template%20for%20Confirmation.docx