Consultancy, Senior Blockchain Developer,11.5 months, Remote

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.

The Office of Innovation specifically looks to form partnerships around frontier technologies (like drones and UAVs, blockchain, 21st century skills, urban technologies, new banking tools, wearables and sensors, or 3D-Printing) that exist at the intersection of $100 billion business markets and 1 billion person needs – and to identify how they can grow and scale profitably and inclusively.

UNICEF Venture explores frontier technologies, and how they could be used to solve humanity’s greatest challenges. The team sees blockchain technology as having benefits in three main ways: new ways of mobilizing resources, creating better transparency in processes, and applications in UNICEF’s programme work in education, identity, healthcare and more.

To understand the technical, social, ethical, and legal challenges of utilizing blockchain technologies in our complex and interconnected world, the team is undertaking a set of explorations and learnings.  The team is particularly focused on experiments with cryptocurrencies, smart contracts, digital collectibles, off-chain and low bandwidth, accessible and alternative users, and various types of tokens.

To support these efforts, the UNICEF Venture team is looking for a senior full-stack blockchain developer. Candidates should have work experience in distributed systems, cryptography, token economics, consensus mechanisms and/or smart contracts, and are comfortable with various programming languages (Solidity, Python, JavaScript, etc.). The candidate must have technical knowledge of various blockchains (ex. Bitcoin, Ethereum, Quorum), and common tools used in building such solutions (Truffle, Remix, ethers.js, web3.js, MetaMask, etc.). In addition to having technical knowledge of working with blockchain specific tools, the candidate is expected to have experience with full-stack development and some developer operations (e.g. React JS, Node JS, Docker, Kubernetes).

How can you make a difference?

You’ll be part of a blockchain team that builds prototypes and supports startups and UNICEF country offices in their own exploration of the technology. 

You will work with a cross-functional team to build applications to help solve large challenges. You should have some blockchain experience, but more importantly, you should be familiar with building intuitive user interfaces for diverse user groups. You should understand the particular considerations of building web3 applications (managing private keys, network latency, transaction costs, etc.).

Your main responsibilities will be:

• Lead the development and deployment of various blockchain related prototypes, including determining the operational feasibility, contributing to prototypes developed in conjunction with partners (within the UN and externally) and managing and configuring the technical environments.
• Provide specialised technical guidance to the blockchain startups and country office pilots, specifically supporting s and developing software engineers and improving operations by conducting system analysis and recommending changes in procedures and policies.
• Lead various technical engagements, including internally with the Innovation Fund team, collaboration with external partners on prototypes and demonstrating solutions by developing documentation, flowcharts, diagrams, etc. for other developers (internal and external).

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

• An advanced university degree (Master’s or higher) in computer science, engineering or other relevant field.
  *A first University Degree in a relevant field combined with 2 additional years of professional experience may be accepted in lieu of an Advanced University Degree.
• A minimum of 8 years of relevant professional experience in developing applications, preference given to open-source and blockchain projects
• Strong development capabilities with programming languages and frameworks such as React JS, Node JS, ES6, TypeScript to build full-stack mobile and web applications
• Familiarity with Git
• Experience setting up DevOps environments with Docker, Kubernetes, NGINX, etc.
• Extensive experience with system integration, interface design, API development
• Strong understanding and experience with various blockchain platforms; can quickly learn new tooling systems and platforms such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Truffle, Solidity, Infura, GoLang, web3.js, ethers.js, bitcoinjs-lib, etc.
• Experience working with large sets of data and databases (e.g. SQL, noSQL, blockchains, etc.)
• Strong grasp on architectural best practices; specifically, knowledge in parallelization, and distributed systems design is desired
• Familiarity and practical experience with implementing security requirements (e.g. OWASP, Consensys smart contract best practices)
• Experience working with Solidity smart contracts from Open Zeppelin, Compound, Gnosis, and other open source blockchain projects
• Knowledge of the environment in which UNICEF operates, and understanding the constraints of working in a developing-world environment. This should include experience developing low-bandwidth applications in challenging work environments.
• Ability to align technical goals with UNICEF strategic goals — that always will mean UNICEF’s mission over any particular technology
• Willingness to travel (sometimes on short notice) and develop software in the field, directly with end-users
• Developing country work experience and/or familiarity with emergency is considered an asset.
• Fluency in English is required. Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish) or a local language is 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 UNICEF competencies required for this post are…

• Applying Technical Expertise – Level 3
• Creating and Innovating – Level 3
• Deciding and Initiating Action – Level 2

To view our competency framework, please visit here.

Click here to learn more about UNICEF’s values and competencies.

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

• Monthly payment, based on monthly tasks and progress reports, approved upon monthly review with supervisor.
• 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.