Historique

Millions of people continue experiencing untold misery and suffering, as the COVID-19 pandemic overwhelms health, education, and economic systems and takes human development gains back, for the first time since 1990. While the summer of 2020 brought some relief, and the international pharmaceutical scientific community has worked miracles by offering first COVID-19 vaccines in less than a year for (uneven) rollout worldwide, the pandemic is very far from over. As such, humanity is experiencing only the pandemic's initial impacts, since the consequences of the measures we are taking in response will be far-reaching for years to come. Economies and social ties will face aftershocks for decades, as the world only begins to return to "normalcy" in 2021. The trajectory of that return is obscure, shadowed by slower-than-anticipated vaccine rollout, new virus strains, economic troubles and political turmoil worldwide.

Against this backdrop, Ukraine has benefitted from a holistic UN assistance package from spring to fall of 2020. Yet, with the numbers growing drastically in the autumn-winter season of 2020 – 2021 , on some days registering over 16 000 new cases , absence of robust forecasting , the growing threat of new COVID-19 strains (variants), widespread societal fatigue over quarantine measures, uncertainty over vaccination rollout plans, continued macroeconomic challenges and lack of significant progress with resolving the conflict in the east of the country or regaining control over the occupied Autonomous Republic of Crimea, Ukraine is still far from being on the trajectory for surfacing from the country-wide epidemic or stabilizing the environment in which the country's governance machinery currently operates.

The RESURFACE Project is a mix of rapid response to the highly volatile situation and a longer-term resilience-driven transformation of Ukraine's crisis decision-making and adaptation to extraordinary circumstances. The project will be implemented during 12 months starting from 1 March 2021 and has incorporated lessons learned from its predecessor Crisis Coordination and Management in Ukraine (CCMU) Project. Apart from practical results achieved between April and October 2020 under the small-scale and agile CCMU intervention, UNDP has taken note of ideas and proposals mentioned throughout the high-level policy dialogue meeting between the UNDP Administrator, Achim Steiner, and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Dmytro Kuleba. As the CCMU initiative drew to a close, Ukrainian government counterparts reiterated to UNDP Ukraine their satisfaction with results of the smaller engagement and contributed to the design of the RESURFACE Project by proposing activities, areas for collaboration and making sure that the submission is fully aligned with national priorities and needs including Ukraine's Socio-Economic Impact of COVID-19 Assessment (SEIA) and the resulting national COVID-recovery plans.

Given the above, the proposed RESURFACE Project takes catalytic assistance to Ukraine's government authorities to a new level than CCMU by deploying a mechanism that aims at not only delivering on the urgent needs of today but programming for more resilient Ukraine's governance systems in two aspects (1) coordination and (2) institutional adaptability, as the country starts to emerge from the COVID-related crisis.

In this context, the United Nations Development Programme is recruiting a Communication Advisor with relevant experience and track record.

The Communication Advisor will be directly responsible for enhancing capacities of the Policy Advisory Unit under PMO/SCMU to better communicate the implementation of reforms leading to the SDGs achievement while also addressing EU and Euro-Atlantic integration as per the government’s priority.

The incumbent will promote UNDP’s mandate as a gender-responsive organization with zero tolerance to any kind of discriminatory and abusive behaviour, including sexual harassment, sexual exploitation and abuse.

Devoirs et responsabilités

II. Duties and Responsibilities:

The incumbent will provide advice to the Secretariat of the Cabinet of Ministers on intra-governmental communication and external coordination machinery for ongoing COVID-19 response with an eye towards being applied as other crises inevitably appear or intensify.

The incumbent will report primarily to the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) / SCMU, with a reporting line to the UNDP Ukraine and the Project Manager as a part of a Democratic Governance team. The Communication Advisor to the Policy Advisory Unit under PMO/SCMU will work closely with other members of the Policy Advisory Unit and the press-office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

S/he will provide support to the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) / SCMU and its respective staffs through the following functions:

• Develop protocols and guidelines of communication response to different types of crisis and regular situations that can be used by the state servants working at PMO/SCMU;
• Advise press-service of the SCMU on the best practices of social media management and copywriting;
• Develop and initiate social media and information campaigns;
• Support Health communication advisor in collecting, managing and providing verified data disaggregated by sex, age and other social identifiers to the State Commission on Technical-Environmental and Emergency Situations to support the national response and prepare information products for updates and committee decision making that respond to the needs of women and men and address gender inequalities;
• Provide support to managing crisis communications and develop crisis management and response strategies of the SCMU;
• Revise an existing communication strategy of the PMO/SCMU;
• Play a proactive role of information-sharing, linking different communications channels and serve both as a government policy think tank and convening internal communications platforms to achieve the desired outcome.

III. Payments schedule:

• Communication protocols, guidelines, content plans, campaigns, instructions developed in cooperation with the press-office of the PMO/SCMU – based on number of certified worked days;
• Advisory service on the above-mentioned issues provided — based on number of certified worked days;
• Progress reports are provided to UNDP – based on number of certified worked days.

IV. Performance Indicators for evaluation of results:

• Number of communication protocols, guidelines, content plans, campaigns, instructions developed in cooperation with the press-office of the PMO/SCMU;
• Timely submission of the regular performance reports.

V.  Monitoring / reporting requirements:

Work-progress reporting/monitoring meetings will be held with the consultant on a weekly basis. UNDP will be the final authority to control the quality and evaluate the work. No reports or documents should be published or distributed to third parties without approval of UNDP.

The consultant will work under the daily supervision of the Project Manager as a part of Democratic Governance Team and will interact with UNDP to receive any clarifications and guidance that may be needed.

Monthly reports capturing the list of deliverables and progress made, timesheets and the plan for next month should be submitted at the end of each month in the format agreed with UNDP. The satisfactory completion of each of the deliverables shall be subject to endorsement of the Project Manager.

Final report covering the whole assignment, followed with recommendations and all relevant Annexes by the end of January 2022.

The Consultant will duly inform UNDP of any problems, issues or delays arising in the course of implementation of assignment and take necessary steps to address them.

All reports and results are to be submitted to the UNDP in electronic format (*.docx, *.xlsx, *.pptx, and *.pdf or other formats accepted by UNDP).

Compétences

• Demonstrates integrity by modelling the UN’s values and ethical standards;
• Promotes the vision, mission, and strategic goals of UNDP;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability;
• Treats all people fairly without favouritism;
• Fulfils all obligations to gender sensitivity and zero tolerance for sexual harassment.

Qualifications et expériences requises

VI. Experience and qualification requirements

Education

• Master’s degree in public administration, public relations, journalism, social sciences or related field;

Experience

• At least 7 years of specific professional experience at the national or international level in the media sphere, public relations, communications or advocacy;
• At least 5 years of professional experience in the usage of social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram, Google+, Linkedin or others.
• Proven reports and/or publications record related to communication (at least 3 relevant publications)
• Experience with a multilateral or international organization/foundation is an asset

Languages

• Fluency in English and Ukrainian languages

Skills to be evaluated during validation interview stage with technically compliant candidates:

• Strong managerial and leadership skills, notably planning, organizing, coordinating and controlling, problem solving and decision-making;
• Mature judgment combined with a proactive, energetic approach to problem solving; excellent interpersonal skills;
• Integrity by modelling the UN’s values and ethical standards;
• Strong organizational and time management skills;
• Ability to work under pressure and meet deadlines;
• Excellent analytical skills;
• Excellent writing, proficient communication and organization skills.

VII. Documents to be included when submitting the proposals

Applicants shall submit the following documents:

VIII. Financial proposal

 Contracts based on daily fee

The financial proposal will specify the daily fee and payments will be made to the Individual Consultant based on the number of days worked.

Travel costs

Should any travel be necessary in connection to this TOR, UNDP will reimburse the expenses based on the duly authorized travel details, including travel and per diems.  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.

In the case of unforeseeable travel, payment of travel costs including tickets, lodging and terminal expenses should be agreed upon, between the respective business unit and Individual Consultant, prior to travel and will be reimbursed.

IX. Evaluation criteria

Educational background – 7 points max:

• 7 pts – PhD in public administration, publicrelations, journalism, social sciences or related field.
• 5 pts – Master’s/ Degree.

Relevant professional experience in public relations, communications or advocacy – 21 points maximum:

• 21 pts – more than 10 years;
• 19 pts – 9-10 years;
• 17 pts –7-8  years;

Relevant professional experience in the usage of social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram, Google+, Linkedin or others – 15 points maximum:

• 15 pts – more than 5 years;
• 13 pts – 3-5 years;
• 11 pts – 1-2 years;

Proven reports and/or publications record related to communication (at least 5 relevant publications) - 12 pts maximum

• 12 pts – 5 publications and more
• 10 pts – 3-4 publications

Experience with a multilateral or international organization/foundation -  5 pts maximum

• 5 pts – proven experience;

Language skills - 10 points maximum:

• 10 pts – fluency in Ukrainian, English;
• 6 pts - fluency in Ukrainian, working knowledge of English.

Maximum available technical score - 70 points.

X. Evaluation method

 Cumulative analysis

Contract award shall be made to the incumbent whose offer has been evaluated and determined as:

a) responsive/compliant/acceptable, and

b) having received the cumulative highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the solicitation.

* Technical Criteria weight: 70%

* Financial Criteria weight: 30%

Only candidates obtaining a minimum 70% from the maximum available technical score (49 points) would be considered for the Financial Evaluation

The maximum number of points assigned to the financial proposal is allocated to the lowest price proposal and will equal to 30. All other price proposals will be evaluated and assigned points, as per below formula:

30 points [max points available for financial part] x [lowest of all evaluated offered prices among responsive offers] / [evaluated price].

The proposal obtaining the overall cumulatively highest score after adding the score of the technical proposal and the financial proposal will be considered as the most compliant offer and will be awarded a contract.