Background

1. Background

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.

Women’s leadership and political participation is one of UN Women’s primary areas of work as mandated in its inception, recognizing the integral role of women in strong and stable democratic processes. UN Women works to implement its Strategic Plan 2018-2021, Outcome 2, which focuses: Women lead, participate in and benefit equally from governance systems. Specifically, UN Women focuses on increasing the number of women of all ages who are fully participating, leading and engaging in political institutions and processes; it also focuses on increasing the political participation and leadership of young women, indigenous women and women with disabilities. These efforts are designed to guide countries towards reaching Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Target 5.5: “ensure women’s full and effective participation and equal opportunities for leadership at all levels of decision-making in political, economic and public life.”

In much of Central Asia women are increasingly taking on leadership positions, particularly in the legislative branch of the government. Since the year 2000, women’s participation in Parliament in the region has more than doubled, from just 9% in 2000 to 25% in 2020. Young women, those who are 40 years old and younger make up only a small fraction of elected MPs. The Central Asia Women Leaders’ Caucus (CAWLC) was created in 2020 with the aim of supporting women in the region to attain a more prominent political, economic and social role and enable them to increasingly influence the decision-making process on issues related to sustainable development, security, and other policy areas in the region. The Caucus was formally launched on 23 December 2020 at the Dialogue of Women Leaders from Central Asian states. The Caucus represents the five countries of the Central Asia region, namely Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

UN Women is supporting the implementation of the CAWLC’s first Annual Work Plan, including through capacity building on women’s political leadership, specifically by supporting the CAWLC to connect with other regional caucuses, provision of leadership training, and technical expertise on gender equality and women’s political leadership. To continue to support the development of the CAWLC as a regional network for women’s leadership UN Women will develop a report on strategic opportunities for the CAWLC.

In this context, UN Women will contract a consultant to research and draft the report, a concept note, and a presentation. Working directly with UN Women ECARO and under the direct supervision of UN Women’s ECARO Political Participation and Governance Policy Specialist, the Consultant will conduct desk review, conduct online audio consultations as needed, work with the Policy Specialist to adopt the methodology, draft all content for the stated deliverables, and provide a final set of deliverables after receiving and incorporating feedback. 

Duties and Responsibilities

2. Duties and Responsibilities

The Consultant will be responsible for the following tasks:

Task 1: Research and prepare a Report of no more than 20 pages on strategic opportunities for the CAWLC to further develop its capacity as a regional network for women leaders over the next three years.

• Conduct desk review on experiences and best practices on other region-based women’s caucuses, women’s political leadership in Central Asia,
• Review available resources on CAWLC and conduct a mini-institutional review.
• Conduct targeted stakeholder conversations in conjunction with desk research to identify capacity needs, opportunities, thematic priorities, and partnership opportunities in the Central Asian region and beyond.
• Draft report of no more than 20 pages, which synthesizes the desk review and stakeholder conversations, including recommendations on strategic opportunities and partnerships, best practices, options for institutional sustainability, and other findings.
• Using agreed methodology and in close collaboration with UN Women ECARO WPP Policy Specialist, provide a draft report and revise the final draft based on feedback.

Task 2: Develop a Concept Note to support Women Leaders Networks in Central Asia

• No more than 5 pages.

Task 3: Prepare a Presentation based on the final Strategic Opportunities Report

• Preparation of a Power Point presentation and talking points to present the key elements of the Strategic Opportunities report.

The main areas of work include:

1. Inception

• Desk review of existing material relevant to the research focus;
• Detailed research outline and following feedback finalize an agreed outline;
• Agreed methodology and work plan to meet deliverables on the expected schedule;

2. Data Gathering

• Desk review of additional relevant materials

• Agreed plan of online audio consultations;
• Key information needs matrix;
• Conduct consultations;
• File consultation notes and provide update briefings as necessary to UN Women ECARO on progress;
• Undertake supplementary data gathering as necessary;

3. Drafting and Finalization

• Based on the agreed outline, first draft of the research paper incorporating results of desktop review and data gathered through consultations;
• Facilitate review in consultation with UN Women ECARO, and following that, draft the final report;

• Draft a Concept Note and PowerPoint presentation with talking points;
• Provide briefing for UN WOMEN ECARO on the final report.

3. Deliverables

Competencies

4. Competencies

Core Values and Guiding Principles

• Demonstrates integrity by modeling UN Women values and ethical standards.
• Demonstrates a commitment to UN Women’s mission and vision.
• Able to work effectively within a team.
• Displays cultural and gender sensitivity and adaptability.
• Able to multi-task and juggle competing demands.
• Can assess and prioritize work needs quickly.
• Able to relate to external partners, including other international organizations and agencies, NGOs, grassroots community groups, etc.

Functional Competencies

• Sound expertise in gender equality and women’s empowerment, including on women’s political participation.
• Advanced expertise in training curriculum design and development.
• Training facilitation experience in different countries.
• Broad knowledge of training techniques and tools.
• Good communication skills.
• Fluent in Microsoft word, excel, e-mail, web-based applications and databases.
• Demonstrated leadership and personal examples of promoting knowledge management and a professional learning environment.
• Outstanding networking, team-building, organizational and communication skills.
• Capacity to work with diverse partners including governments, donors and civil society.
• Ability to work effectively and harmoniously with people from varied cultures and professional backgrounds.
• Ability to produce well-written documents demonstrating excellent interpersonal communication skills.

Required Skills and Experience

5. Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Advanced university degree (Master's degree or equivalent) in Gender Studies, Political Science, Sociology, International Relations, or relevant field
• A Bachelor’s degree with +2 years experience will be accepted in the place of a Master’s.

Experience:

• A minimum of 10 years of relevant work experience in the field of gender equality and women’s empowerment with a focus on women’s political participation and governance, as well as in writing strategic documents and reports.
• Experience in women’s political participation, women’s caucuses, regional cooperation, and women’s leadership generally.
• Experience working and communicating in a multicultural environment and in different governance systems.
• Experience in drafting and producing well-written, clear reports, presentations, and concept notes for effective understanding, adaptation and delivery.
• Experience with UN organizations and programmes or intergovernmental processes, including those related to women’s empowerment, gender mainstreaming and gender equality is an asset.
• Experience working with multi-stakeholder organizations is essential: governments, CSOs, and the UN/multilateral/bilateral institutions. 
• Experience working in Central Asia is an asset.

Language:

• Fluency in oral and written English is required.
• Working knowledge of Russian is an asset.

6. Application procedure

The following documents should be submitted as part of the application:

• UN Women P11 with past experience in similar assignments; can be downloaded at http://www.unwomen.org/about-us/employment. A signed copy should be submitted.
• Financial Proposal Specify a total lump sum amount for the tasks specified in this Terms of Reference. The financial proposal shall include a breakdown of this lump sum amount (daily rate and number of anticipated working days, and any other possible costs).

7. Evaluation of applicants

Consultants will be evaluated using a cumulative analysis method taking into consideration the combination of qualifications and financial proposal. Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 49 points in the technical evaluation would be considered for financial evaluation.

Financial Evaluation (30%) – max. 30 points:

The maximum number of points assigned to the financial proposal is allocated to the lowest price proposal. All other price proposals receive points in inverse proportion. A suggested formula is as follows:

p = 30 (µ/z)

Using the following values:

p = points for the financial proposal being evaluated

µ = price of the lowest priced proposal

z = price of the proposal being evaluated