UNDP Jobs - 100407- Consultant for Monitoring of the Systemic Alignmen

Consultant for Monitoring of the Systemic Alignment of the EU Acquis in the National Legal Framework

Location :

Home-based, MONTENEGRO

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

26-Jul-2021

Application Deadline :

28-Jul-21 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

National Consultant

Duration of Initial Contract :

1 August 2021 - 30 September 2021

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

25 consultancy days

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence. UNDP does not tolerate sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, and discrimination. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks.

Background

In May 2020 Montenegro accepted, as a political initiative, the enhanced methodology providing a credible EU perspective to the Western Balkans. Montenegro welcomed the Commission’s initiative, presented in the form of a non paper in March 2021, towards creating mechanisms for the application of the revised methodology, as a tool for accelerating our EU accession process. This initiative resulted in the Council conclusions under Portuguese presidency on the application of the revised enlargement methodology to the accession negotiations with Montenegro and Serbia.

Montenegro, as the only candidate country with all 33 screened chapters of the Acquis open, three of which have been provisionally closed, deems clusters approach inapplicable. However, a strong political impulse to the process is reflected in the fact that the revised methodology advocates major political steer and accelerated integration. This political dimension should allow Montenegro to further promote its reforms, as well as continuous 100% alignment with the EU’s Common Foreign and Security Policy.

Clusters approach in the case of Montenegro can only have an added value as a mechanism of an increased dynamism that unlocks the potential of early integration and introduction of positive measures, as Montenegro is keen to “phase-in” to many sectoral EU policies. Similar to the participation in e.g. the Council’s ERAC (European Research Area and Committee), Montenegro stands ready to be associated soon enough to as many EU programmes and EU policies as possible and take part as an observer well before the accession date.

Against this backdrop, European Integration Office –EIO has already analysed potential impact on the revised methodology on the state of play in negotiations in terms of progress of chapters, as well as organisational stream of the process and possible adaptations to the functioning of the negotiating structure. One of the findings was the necessity to engage academia in a more substantial and systemic way so that the whole system could benefit more from evidence, research and knowledge that can be unlocked as a support to the public administration and to the benefit of the EU negotiating process.

The project “Strengthening capacities for the acceleration of EU accession of Montenegro” is funded by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and implemented by UNDP in partnership with the European Integration Office and General Secretariat of the Government. The general objective of this action is to assist, advise and support EU accession negotiations through strengthening the capacities of the Government in responding to the demands of the new phases of accession.

Duties and Responsibilities

Objectives of the assignment: The objective of the assignment is to develop a coordination mechanism that would allow for better monitoring of the systemic alignment of the EU Acquis in the national legal framework, through systemic and sustainable engagement of academia in the Montenegro negotiating structure.

Job content:
Under the supervision of the UNDP Programme Manager, the consultant will perform the following tasks:

Analyse the documents under the revised methodology, as well as the EIO analyses and papers on the functioning of the negotiating structure and identify gaps;
Propose models for enhanced participation of academia, bearing in mind that clustering can possibly create major interlinkages and cross-fertilisation among chapters;
Define, either under one pilot cluster, for example the Internal market, or horizontally, the scope of work and modalities of functioning of academia – providing research papers, collection of data, case studies.
Devise a coordination mechanism that would allow for better monitoring the systemic alignment of the EU Acquis in the national legal framework;
Propose tools that would allow for building foresight capacities for the alignment of the national legal system with the EU Acquis, e.g. ex-ante legal system impact assessment;
Preparing the Final report on undertaken activities to the UNDP Programme Manager. It should contain sufficient details and information that would allow for the appraisal of the effectiveness to date of the assignment’s activities.

The expected results: Under the supervision of the UNDP Programme Manager, the consultant is expected to deliver the above mentioned tasks.

Timing and reporting: The local consultant will be engaged under individual contract, for total of 25 consultancy days, during the period 1 August – 30 September 2021. The local consultant will be responsible to prepare and the final report to the UNDP Programme Manager, and it should contain sufficient detail and information that would allow for the appraisal of the effectiveness to date of the assignment’s activities.

Time duration and travel: The local consultant will be engaged under individual contract for total of 25 consultancy days, during the period 1 August – 30 September 2021. No travel is envisaged.

Competencies

Demonstrates integrity by modelling the UN’s values and ethical standards;
Promotes the vision, mission and strategic goals of UN/UNDP;
Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability;
Ability to lead strategic planning, results-based management and reporting;
Builds strong relationships with clients, focuses on impact and result for the client and responds positively to feedback;
Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive attitude;
Excellent communication skills, facility in working with teams and capacity to compose clear and readable narrative reports;
Demonstrates ability to manage complexities and work under pressure, as well as conflict resolution skills;
Excellent organizational and time management skills;
Knowledge Management and Learning;
Shares knowledge and experience;
Actively works towards continuing personal learning, acts on learning plan and applies newly acquired skills.
Ability to perform a variety of standard tasks related to Results Management, including collecting of documentation, data entering, preparation of revisions, filling, provision of information;
Ability to provide input to business processes re-engineering, implementation of new systems;
Ability to work independently and in a team.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Advanced degree in Law.

Experience:

Minimum ten years of working experience in a university or a research centre;
Proven experience at the senior position related to the EU Accession process will be an advantage;
Detailed technical knowledge of EU Accession process.

Languages:

Fluency in Montenegrin and English language.

Criteria for selection:

Combined Scoring method will be used. When using this weighted scoring method, the award of the contract should be made to the individual consultant whose offer has been evaluated and determined as: (i) responsive, compliant, acceptable, and (ii) having received the highest score out of a pre-determined set of weighted technical and financial criteria specific to the solicitation.

Technical criteria weight - 70% (Background and education 10%; Relevant previous experience 20%; Substantial knowledge/Required competencies 30%; Required language 10%);
Financial criteria weight - 30%.

Only offerors obtaining a minimum 490 points for technical criteria will be considered for the financial evaluation. For more information on procurement methodology for Individual Contractors, please refer to Procurement Notice.

Application procedure:

Interested applicants are requested to submit their applications by July 28, 2021 by using the Apply now button. The application should contain CV or P11 that can be downloaded at https://www.me.undp.org/content/montenegro/en/home/jobs.html. Please note that UNDP jobsite system allows only one uploading of application document, so please make sure that you merge all your documents into a single file.

Only the short-listed applicants will be contacted and requested to submit a letter of interest including a price quotation indicating the lump sum (in EUR) requested for the work envisaged in the section "Description of Responsibilities".