Consultancy: M&E Specialist, Office of Innovation, remote, 25 days within 4 months

UNICEF works in some of the world’s toughest places, to reach the world’s most disadvantaged children. To save their lives. To defend their rights. To help them fulfill their potential.

Across 190 countries and territories, we work for every child, everywhere, every day, to build a better world for everyone.

And we never give up.

For every child, innovate…

UNICEF has a 70-year history of innovating for children. We believe that new approaches, partnerships and technologies that support realizing children’s rights are critical to improving their lives.

The Office of Innovation is a creative, interactive, and agile team in UNICEF. We sit at a unique intersection, where an organization that works on huge global issues meets the startup thinking, the technology, and the partners that turn this energy into scalable solutions.
 
UNICEF’s Office of Innovation creates opportunities for the world’s children by focusing on where new markets can meet their vital needs. We do this by:

• Connecting youth communities (or more broadly — anyone disconnected or under-served) to decision-makers, and to each other, to deliver informed, relevant and sustained programmes that build better, stronger futures for children.
• Provoking change for children through an entrepreneurial approach — in a traditionally risk-averse field — to harness rapidly moving innovations and apply them to serve the needs of all children.
• Creating new models of partnership that leverage core business values across the public, private and academic sectors in order to deliver fast, and lasting results for children.

UNDP Innovation

Innovation for development is about identifying more effective solutions that add value for the people affected by development challenges – people and their governments, our users and clients.

In 2014, UNDP established its Innovation Facility as a global mechanism to support innovation for development. The Facility’s portfolio is firmly rooted in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and UNDP’s Strategic Plan (2018-2021). The portfolio explores current and emerging service lines to: eradicate poverty, protect the planet, prevent violent conflict, manage climate change risk and advance gender equality, among other development challenges. The Facility has provided technical support and funding to colleagues in UNDP Country Offices across all regions to test frontier technologies and new approaches to deliver better results. To date, the Facility has invested in over 140 country-level experiments, across 87 countries and territories.

UNDP’s investment in innovation have focused on:

• Cultivating new skills in UNDP Country Offices and enhancing support to countries’ implementation of the 2030 Agenda
• Harnessing the unique expertise and contributions of new partners
• Facilitating new partnerships, from collaborations with small start ups and nodes in innovation systems to joint work with disruptors and thought leaders
• Unlocking new sourcing of financing for development
• Scaling new ways of working

UNICEF UNDP Innovating Together
As part of the UN Reform process, there is Framework for Action between UNICEF and UNDP, which was updated in 2020. The framework identifies five big-ticketed areas of collaboration.

1. Innovative Solutions
2. Youth engagement and empowerment
3. Climate change and environmental degradation
4. Financing
5. Civil society partnerships

Innovative solutions – Big Think Challenge

Following a Call to Action by the two Principals in mid-2019, UNDP and UNICEF embarked on a joint initiative to identify sustainable innovative solutions that demonstrate the ability of the two organizations to work together more efficiently in the delivery of results at scale.This collaboration builds on the extensive innovative work of the two agencies on the ground, particularly in the 60 countries around the world where UNDP accelerator labs are being established, and where UNICEF teams have amassed a solid base of experience.

The goal is to test new ways of working together to address sustainable development challenges, building on past experiments in innovation, scanning what is happening in-country, mapping local solutions, and working with national partners to test ideas and experiment rapidly for scale.  Results from the experiments can be reviewed for further scale-up through Governments, private-public sector partnership channels and supply and technology-related innovations.

Generation Unlimited
Generation Unlimited is a global, multi-sector partnership that enables young people to become productive and engaged members of society by connecting secondary-age education and training to employment and entrepreneurship. If the largest generation of young people in history is prepared for the transition to work, the potential for global progress is unlimited.

https://www.generationunlimited.org/

Generation Unlimited Youth Challenge
The global Youth Challenge is a  part of young people’s engagement in Gen U. . The challenge engages marginalized and vulnerable young people of ages 14 to 24 around the world in the design of solutions that have the potential to scale and create improvements in relation to Gen U strategic priorities. The focus areas of the Youth Challenge are centered around the strategic priorities of Generation Unlimited.
The Generation Unlimited Global Team, hosted by UNICEF, launched the first GenU Youth Challenge in September 2018 in 16 countries with a call for applications from young people from marginalized and disadvantaged backgrounds. The second Youth Challenge launched in September 2019 in 41 countries, as a partnership between UNICEF, UNDP, the World Organization of the Scout Movement, Plan International and other local partners. There have been delays and challenges due to COVID-19, but 72 youth teams from 36 countries are currently (October 2020) participating in the global judging process, aiming to select 8 global winners by December 2020.

How can you make a difference?

UNICEF is seeking a consultant, with expertise in monitoring and programme reviews and ideally also experience in deploying innovative, participatory, youth-led and other non-traditional monitoring and evaluation methods in development contexts. The consultant will be synthesizing quantitative and qualitative data on the Big Think Challenge and the second Generation Unlimited Youth Challenge, providing a review of both activities and lessons learnt and recommendations around partnership working between the two agencies (and wider partner groups) at country level within the sphere of youth and innovation.

Your main responsibilities will be:

You will be required working closely with UNICEF Office of Innovation, UNICEF ADAP, UNDP Innovation, UNDP Youth and Generation Unlimited. This work will build on a separate contract (with accountability to UNDP) to review existing data and documentation on Big Think Challenge and the Youth Challenge, conduct interviews and surveys with country offices that participated in both challenges.

Using the data collected from M&E data, documentation review, interviews and surveys, the key responsibilities will be and synthesis and documentation of findings to include:

• High level process review for the GenU Youth Challenge and Big Think Challenge
• Partnership review: identifying the extent to which the Youth Challenge was successful in supporting multi-agency partnership, particularly between UNICEF and UNDP in the space of youth and innovation
• Capture best practices (including a documented case study) for effective joint working at country level between UNICEF and UNDP
• Collate lessons learned and recommendations for improvements

The work of this consultant will be  collaborative, working closely:

• With colleagues in UNICEF Office of Innovation, UNDP Innovation and Generation Unlimited;
• With other colleagues at Headquarters, particularly UNICEF’s Adolescent Development and Participation Section and UNDP’s Youth section
• With members of the Generation Unlimited Global Team
• Field engagement with Regional and Country level personnel engaged with the Youth Challenge and the Big Think Challenge; and
• With external partners, resource people and expertise

To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have…

• Advanced degree (Master’s or higher) in Social Sciences, Social Policy, Social Development, Development Planning, Statistics or other relevant field.
• A minimum of 5 years of experience in monitoring  design and implementation in development contexts, with direct experience in deploying innovative, participatory, youth-led and other non-traditional M&E methods required. A first University Degree in a relevant field combined with 7 years of professional experience will be accepted in lieu of an Advanced University Degree.
• Experience in working at the intersection of youth (particularly education and skill-building), private sector (mainly start up ecosystem, accelerators, incubators) and wider partnerships an asset.
• Experience in working with multiple countries and with multiple stakeholders an asset.
• Experience in working with organizations focused on engaging and empowering adolescents and youth, especially the most marginalized, preferred an asset.
• Excellent written English and verbal communication skills required.
• Experience with processing large amounts of information and synthesizing it
• Strong interpersonal and networking skills. Ability to work collaboratively in a team and in a diverse work environment.
• Knowledge of United Nations – particularly UNICEF – programming, processes and work streams an asset.
• Fluency in English is required, strong written and verbal competency is necessary.
• Working knowledge of another UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian, Spanish) an asset.

For every Child, you demonstrate…

UNICEF’s values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, and Accountability (CRITA) and core competencies in Communication, Working with People and Drive for Results.

The functional competencies required for this post are…

• Communication Level II
• Working with People Level II
• Drive for Results Level II
• Relating and Networking Level II
• Applying Technical Expertise Level III
• Analysing Level II
• Learning and Researching Level III
• Creating and Innovating Level II
• Entrepreneurial Thinking Level II
• Adapting and Responding to Change Level II
• Coping with Pressure and Setbacks Level II

View our competency framework at

http://www.unicef.org/about/employ/files/UNICEF_Competencies.pdf

UNICEF is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages all candidates, irrespective of gender, nationality, religious and ethnic backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities, to apply to become a part of the organization.

UNICEF has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UNICEF, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. UNICEF also adheres to strict child safeguarding principles. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles and will therefore undergo rigorous reference and background checks. Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check.

Payment details and further considerations

• Payment shall be effected upon satisfaction of each of the key deliverables.
• Consultant is responsible for his/her own health and travel insurance
• Consultant is eligible for standard DSA for all work-related travel

Remarks:

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process.

Individuals engaged under a consultancy or individual contract will not be considered “staff members” under the Staff Regulations and Rules of the United Nations and UNICEF’s policies and procedures, and will not be entitled to benefits provided therein (such as leave entitlements and medical insurance coverage). Their conditions of service will be governed by their contract and the General Conditions of Contracts for the Services of Consultants and Individual Contractors. Consultants and individual contractors are responsible for determining their tax liabilities and for the payment of any taxes and/or duties, in accordance with local or other applicable laws.