UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works 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.

In 2015, on 25 September, the United Nations General Assembly adopted unanimously the Resolution 70/1 Transforming our World: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Gender equality and women’s empowerment is at the heart of the agenda, as numerous goals and targets address structural barriers to achieve equal rights and opportunities between women and men, girls and boys.

One of the key areas of concern is the economic empowerment of women. It is expressed in targets and indicators of SDG 5 (Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls) and SDG 8 (Promote inclusive and sustainable development, decent work and employment for all). Progress toward it depends not only on the adoption of a set of public policies by governments, but also on the existence of an enabling environment. This is also relevant to the achievement of SDG 1 (Poverty Reduction), SDG 10 (Reduced inequalities) and SDG 17 (Revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development).

In India, women’s participation in the economy has been dismal, with trends indicating a decline in the last decade. The female labour force participation rate in India is 23.3 for rural and urban areas. A disproportionate percentage of women workers are in the informal economy, implying contract-less labour and a lack of social benefits. For women in business, women entrepreneurs also face societal barriers in setting up businesses and issues with managing collateral for loans in a country where land titling is still governed by patriarchal notions of land ownership.

UN Women provides technical support to the Government of India in enabling gender responsive design and delivery of schemes, policies and programmes for women’s economic empowerment. In this context, the assignment entails technical assistance to the Department of Women and Child Development, Government of NCT of Delhi , on strengthening its women’s economic empowerment initiatives.

UN Women seeks the services of a Technical Consultant to support the Department of Women and Child Development, Government of NCT of Delhi in gender responsive design, execution, and monitoring of its initiatives on women’s economic empowerment (WEE). 

Under the direct supervision of the Director DWCD, the Technical Consultant will be responsible for:

• Support in formulation and implementation of women’s economic empowerment (WEE) initiatives in the areas of, but not limited to, skill building, employment, and entrepreneurship.
• Provide technical inputs on gender in the policies, programmes, schemes, initiatives on WEE
• Support in creation of strategic partnerships
• Support in developing a results-based monitoring and management system to track the progress of initiatives
• Ensure continuous assessment of performance in terms of the relevance of results, sustainability, responsibility and accountability, appropriateness, and resource allocation.
• Facilitate knowledge building and knowledge sharing as required by DWCD around the following:
  • Identification and synthesis of best practices and lessons learned;
  • Contributions to knowledge networks and communities of practice;
  • Drafts, develops and tailors materials, publications, brochures, targeted at specific audiences, to support the programme;
  • Drafts speeches & presentations for senior management to be delivered to a range of audiences.
• Ensure smooth coordination between relevant key stakeholders

Key Deliverables:

• Technical support to DWCD in formulation, implementation, and monitoring of WEE programmes, policies, schemes, initiatives.
• Strategic partnerships created.
• Results based monitoring system in place.
• Knowledge building and knowledge sharing facilitated.
• Coordination between key stakeholders ensured.

Corporate Competencies:

• Demonstrates commitment to UN Women’s mission, vision and values;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.

Functional Competencies:

Knowledge Management and Learning:

• Shares knowledge and experience;
• Actively works towards continuing personal learning, acts on learning plan and applies newly acquired skills.

Development and Operational Effectiveness:

• Ability to perform a variety of specialized tasks related to design, planning and implementation of programme, managing data, reporting;
• Ability to provide input to and use new IT based systems.

Leadership and Self-Management:

• Focuses on result for the client and responds positively to feedback;
• Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive attitude;
• Remains calm, in control even under pressure;
• Demonstrates openness to change and ability to manage complexities;
• Good understanding of gender and development in South Asia;
• Demonstrable ability to work in a team;
• Ability to work under pressure;
• Good writing and communication skills;
• Excellent computer literacy and skills.

Education:

• Masters’ degree in Gender and Development Studies, or any Social Sciences.

Experience:

• Minimum of 5 years’ experience of working on development projects; particularly in the context of women’s economic empowerment
• Knowledge of and experienced in project cycle management and well versed in logical frameworks.
• Previous experience with M&E, Reporting and Documentation for International Agencies including the UN System is desirable.
• Good writing skills and the ability to explain technical terms in a non-technical language;

Desired skills and experience:

• Excellent understanding of issues pertaining to women’s economic empowerment
• Concept clarity on project planning and monitoring, including logical frameworks and indicators;
• Excellent analytical skills and prior experience of both quantitative and qualitative data analyses;
• Working knowledge of gender and sex disaggregated statistics would be an asset;
• Experience in using statistical package such as SPSS/STATA;
• Previous exposure to gender related projects, qualitative and quantitative data analysis and M&E assignments.

Language:

• Strong written skills in English and good command over Hindi as medium of communication.

Application:

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

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 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);
• Expertise and Experience relevant to the assignment (10 points);
• Demonstrable experience on policy advocacy with the government and other stakeholders (5 points).

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

• Written Test (20 points)
• Interview (80 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.