Antecedentes

UN Women’s programme on Second Chance Education (SCE) and Vocational Training aims to reach out to and enable 40,000 underprivileged young women and women in India through education, training, employment and entrepreneurship skills. The programme is trying to address the structural barriers young women and women face in realizing their full economic potential by trying out innovative pilots in all these verticals across project states viz Bihar, Maharashtra, Odisha and Rajasthan. To support young women and women in getting skilled and gainfully employed, the project adopts an empowerment approach to livelihoods as against the instrumental approach where the focus is merely on skills/income generation. The activities to strengthen women’s learning and earning pathways, therefore, will be coupled by the capacity building initiatives on making women aware about their rights and entitlements, raise voice against violations and demand accountability from duty bearers. The Programme will adopt evidence-based policy advocacy, leveraging UN Women’s and implementing partners’ institutional relationships with key relevant Ministries such as Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship, Ministry of Rural Development/National Rural Livelihoods Mission and Ministry of Human Resource Development. The programme intends to create a supportive ecosystem to enhance; women’s participation in the workforce and opportunities of self-employment, at the state as well as national level.

Objectives of the Assignment:

As part of UN Women’s SCE programme, UN Women is providing Technical Support to Odisha Skill Development Authority (ODSA), Bhubaneswar. Technical support is focused on developing the expertise of ODSA, on gender equality and mainstreaming through knowledge transfer and capacity development.

  • Capacity building of the State Government officials to strengthen mechanisms for gender equality and women’s empowerment, specifically in the thematic areas of education and skill, employment and entrepreneurship.
  • Strengthening the gender-responsive implementation and monitoring of state policies and programmes, specifically in the thematic areas of education and skill, employment and entrepreneurship.
  • Provide technical support to increase the outreach of women in the low performing districts by addressing the socio-cultural barriers faced by them so that they can access skill development training opportunities.

In this context, UN Women seeks to hire a Consultant at Bargarh district to provide technical and facilitative support to enhance the participation of women in technical, vocational education and training. Under the guidance and supervision of the Director of OSDA and Country Programme Manager, SCE/Deputy Representative, UN WOMEN, India the Consultant will work in close consultation with the Principals of the I.T.Is/Polytechnics in the concerned district to undertake the following key tasks and other responsibilities as may be assigned.

Deberes y responsabilidades

  • Review the skill ecosystem of the district to understand the gaps and challenges to be addressed to increase the enrolment of girls in technical, vocational education and training.
  • Facilitate convergent planning to improve skill development outcomes in consultation with the district administration which includes but is not limited to the District Skill Committee, Department of Skill Development & Technical Education, School & Mass Education, Women & Child Development and civil society partners.
  • Prepare a Consolidated Work Plan in consultation with the key stakeholders in the district for creating awareness, mobilization and counselling strategy to enable girls and disadvantaged groups to access the skill development programmes.
  • Community Sensitisation for creating a socially enabling environment for increasing the participation of women in skill training.
  • Enhance awareness among girls/women on the opportunities available and advantages of technical vocational education and training.
  • Mobilisation to raise awareness among the Parents of the female beneficiaries, School Principals, Teachers, Community Leaders and other influence groups on skill training opportunities, employment and career progression.
  • Ensure mobilisation and counselling services reach out to women through career counselling campaigns.
  • Facilitate identification, interaction and felicitation of women role models in the district.
  • Motivate girls to opt for non-traditional, unconventional and courses that are male dominant.
  • Facilitate the Gender Sensitisation of Counsellors, Mobilisers and key stakeholders.
  • Support in developing IEC/BCC materials for publicity such as leaflets, banners etc.
  • District level campaign to mobilise girls to overcome barriers and make the right career choices highlighting government efforts such as Sudakhya Scheme to increase the enrolment of girls in I.T.I’s etc.
  • Undertake field visits at regular intervals for monitoring and supportive supervision.
  • Documentation of best practices.
  • Monthly Reporting of progress.
  • Any other tasks assigned by the Supervisors from time to time.

The Consultant is expected to deliver the following outputs:

  • Develop a Workplan in consultation with key stakeholders to mobilise girls for technical education and training.
  • Facilitate and participate in meetings/consultations with various stakeholders - State Government and district administration as well as other partners.
  • Capacity building and sensitisation of key stakeholders on Gender.
  • Support & develop communication materials for district level campaign.
  • Documentation of the best practices in the districts for learning.
  • Timely submission of Monthly Progress Report and Consultation/Meeting Reports.
  • Any other tasks assigned as per requirement.

Competencias

Core Values / Guiding Principles:

Integrity:

  • Demonstrate consistency in upholding and promoting the values of UN Women in actions and decisions, in line with the UN Code of Conduct.

Professionalism:

  • Demonstrate professional competence and expert knowledge of the pertinent substantive areas of work.

Cultural sensitivity and valuing diversity:

  • Demonstrate an appreciation of the multicultural nature of the organization and the diversity of its staff. Demonstrate an international outlook, appreciating difference in values and learning from cultural diversity.

Core Competencies:

Ethics and Values:

  • Demonstrate and safeguard ethics and integrity.

Organizational Awareness:

  • Demonstrate corporate knowledge and sound judgment.

Work in teams:

  • Demonstrate ability to work in a multicultural, multi-ethnic environment and to maintain effective working relations with people of different national and cultural backgrounds.

Communicating and Information Sharing:

  • Facilitate and encourage open communication and strive for effective communication.

Self-management and Emotional Intelligence:

  • Stay composed and positive even in difficult moments, handle tense situations with diplomacy and tact, and have a consistent behaviour towards others.

Conflict Management:

  • Surface conflicts and address them proactively acknowledging different feelings and views and directing energy towards a mutually acceptable solution.

Continuous Learning and Knowledge Sharing:

  • Encourage learning and sharing of knowledge.

Functional Competencies:

  • Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive attitude.
  • Demonstrates good oral and written communication skills.
  • Focuses on impact and result for the partners and responds positively to feedback.

Habilidades y experiencia requeridas

Education:

  • Master’s degree in social sciences, women’s rights, international studies, gender and development, law or any other related discipline.

Experience:

  • 3 years of professional experience, preferably with the government or civil society sector on gender, skilling and employment and entrepreneurship.
  • Experience of working in women related projects would be desirable;
  • Experience of Government functioning;
  • Demonstrated verbal and written communication skills;
  • Experience in the usage of computers and office software packages (MS Word, Excel, etc.) required and advance knowledge of spread sheet and database packages desirable.

Language Requirements:

  • Fluency in English and Odia. Understanding of the local dialect spoken in the district will be an added advantage.

Interested applicants should apply to this announcement through UNDP jobs site: jobs.undp.org.

Application:

Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications in one single PDF document:

  • All applications must include (as an attachment) the completed UN Women Personal History form (P-11) which can be downloaded from  http://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/about-us/jobs;
  • Kindly note that the system will only allow one attachment, please combine all your documents into one (1) single PDF document. Applications without the completed UN Women P-11 form will be treated as incomplete and will not be considered for further assessment;
  • Applications received after the close date will not be accepted;
  • Only short-listed candidates will be contacted.

Evaluation and Selection Criteria: 

Criteria for shortlisting of CVs will be based on the following assessment:

  • Required Degree and Qualification (5 points);
  • Minimum Experience relevant to the assignment (10 points);
  • Working knowledge and experience of working with National /State Government (5 points);

The evaluation process for selection of the candidate will be based on the following assessment:

  • Interview (70 Points)
  • Writing Samples (30 Points)

Please Note:

  • For an assignment requiring travel, consultants of 65 years or more require full medical examination and statement of fitness to work to engage in the consultancy.
  • Due to large number of potential applicants, only competitively selected candidates will be contacted for remaining steps of the service procurement process.

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.