UN WOMEN Jobs - 77039- Consultancy - Evaluation Specialist

Consultancy - Evaluation Specialist

Advertised on behalf of

UN WOMEN

Location :

New York, UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Type of Contract :

Individual Contract

Starting Date :

01-Mar-2018

Application Deadline :

16-Feb-18 (Midnight New York, USA)

Post Level :

International Consultant

Duration of Initial Contract :

6 months with possibility of extension

Languages Required :

English

Expected Duration of Assignment :

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

The 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. Placing women’s rights at the center of all its efforts, the 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.

The mandate and functions of UN Women call for the promotion of organizational and UN system accountability on gender equality through evaluation, strengthening evaluation capacities and learning from evaluation, and developing systems to measure the results and impact of UN Women with its enhanced role at country, regional and global levels. The purpose and role of evaluation in UN Women is to enhance accountability, inform decision-making and contribute to learning on the best ways to achieve women’s empowerment and gender equality through operational and normative work.

The Independent Evaluation Service (IES) of UN Women serves as the custodian of the evaluation function in line with United Nations Evaluation Group (UNEG) Norms and Standards. It deploys quantitative and qualitative approaches to evaluate transformative changes in gender equality and human rights and UN Women’s contribution therein. It undertakes corporate evaluations and promotes their use at decision making levels; supports decentralized evaluations for improved programming and evidence generation on what works for gender equality; supports evaluation capacity development within the organization and of regional and country partners, and promotes coordination with the UN system on joint evaluation of gender equality and the inclusion of gender in system wide evaluation.

Duties and Responsibilities

Summary of key functions

1. Conduct and/or manage corporate evaluations that are impartial, independent, credible and meet UNEG professional standards.

Carry out corporate evaluations, promoting stakeholder’s ownership and learning, alignment with country evaluation systems and partners participation;
Supervise effectively evaluations conducted by consultants;
Apply high professional standards in line with UN Women Evaluation Policy and UN Evaluation Norms & Standards;
Apply evaluation quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis tools, techniques and approaches;
Keep abreast of developments in the area of evaluation, exploring innovative approaches in the area of gender equality and women’s empowerment.

2. Promote the use of evaluations and that the findings and recommendations of evaluations are followed up.

Prepare reports to senior management on a periodic basis on findings and recommendations of evaluations;
Organize meetings, workshops and other discussion fora to establish a dialogue on evaluation results and the evaluative knowledge management;
Ensure that evaluation results are taken into account for the continued implementation of projects/ programmes and for the design and appraisal of new projects/ programmes;
Ensure that project/programme managers respond to recommendations and monitor the follow up on evaluations.

3. Promote evaluation capacity development in UN Women and in partner countries.

Provide training and coaching on evaluation, self-evaluation, monitoring and results based management within the Independent Evaluation Service (IES) and in other organizational units;
Provide advice/information/guidance to management and project/ programme managers on evaluations;
Substantially contribute to the development of methodologies for corporate evaluations, and to the review of guidelines, systems, procedures and tools related to evaluation.

4. Promote UN coordination on evaluation that is gender responsive.

Collaboration with other UN evaluation units on joint evaluation initiatives;
Representation of UN Women in United Nations Evaluation Group taskforces and substantial contribution to the inclusion of gender equality dimensions in system-wide evaluation;
Collaboration with professional evaluation bodies in the area of gender responsive evaluation.

5. Facilitate knowledge management and promote evaluation capacity development.

Provide technical inputs in the development and implementation of evaluation knowledge management products of Independent Evaluation Service (IES);
Provide technical support to Evaluation Officers in the production of knowledge and information products related to evaluations as well as dissemination strategies for the evaluation;
Prepare synthesis reports of corporate and decentralized evaluations, around areas of focus to distil common lessons learned and good practices;
Develop evaluation guidelines in line with UN Women evaluation policy and United Nations Evaluation group norms and standards;
Provide and/or assist in the provision of training on evaluation, self-evaluation, monitoring and results.

6. The consultant will perform other related duties and assignments as and when required.

Competencies

Core Values:

Respect for Diversity;
Integrity;
Professionalism.

Core Competencies:

Awareness and Sensitivity Regarding Gender Issues;
Accountability;
Creative Problem Solving;
Effective Communication;
Inclusive Collaboration;
Stakeholder Engagement;
Leading by Example.

Please visit this link for more information on UN Women’s Core Values and Competencies: http://www.unwomen.org/-/media/headquarters/attachments/sections/about%20us/employment/un-women-employment-values-and-competencies-definitions-en.pdf.

Functional Competencies:

Knowledge of gender equality analytical work and programming;
Strong understanding of various methodologies in evaluation, both qualitative and quantitative, such as surveys, record reviews, focus groups and case studies;
Ability to contribute to the development of the most efficient and effective methodology for the design, with
minimal guidance;
Strong understanding of gender responsive evaluation approach;
Strong understanding of various sampling techniques and their applications and ability to develop the most
accurate sampling technique for the methodology;
Good strong of how to address gender equality on evaluation design;
Strong understanding of questionnaire design and ability to develop questionnaires and other review instruments that will address issues identified in the design, independently;
Strong interviewing skills and ability conduct interviews independently;
Ability to collect reliable, valid and accurate information in an objective way;
Good knowledge of gender equality and women’s human rights;
Good training and coaching skills;
Ability to develop partnerships to promote gender responsive evaluation in the UN system and with national partners.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Master’s degree or equivalent in in social science international relations or related field, or combination of first level degree with relevant experience.

Experience:

A minimum of 5 years professional experience in evaluation of programmes preferably in the development context;
Experience working on gender equality and human rights;
Proven field work experience;
Experience related UN Women’s mandate and activities an asset.

Languages:

Fluency in English is required;
Knowledge of the other UN official working language is an asset.

Application:

All applications must include (as an attachment) the completed UN Women Personal History form (P-11) which can be downloaded from http://www.unwomen.org/about-us/employment Kindly note that the system will only allow one attachment. Applications without the completed UN Women P-11 form will be treated as incomplete and will not be considered for further assessment.

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.