Policy Coordinator, Crisis & Resilience

Background

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion are core principles at UNDP: we value diversity as an expression of the multiplicity of nations and cultures where we operate, we foster inclusion as a way of ensuring all personnel are empowered to contribute to our mission, and we ensure equity and fairness in all our actions. Taking a ‘leave no one behind’ approach to our diversity efforts means increasing representation of underserved populations. People who identify as belonging to marginalized or excluded populations are strongly encouraged to apply. Learn more about working at UNDP including our values and inspiring stories.

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.

Within the context of SDG Financing, UNDP has launched the Sustainable Finance Sector Hub, which is a finance and innovation platform that draws on a critical mass of UNDP expertise, initiatives, and partnerships to support the mobilization and leveraging of resources for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and lead the implementation of the new UNDP private sector strategy. As part of UNDP’s Sustainable Finance Sector Hub, development finance has a central role to play in delivering support to the UN member-countries, in leveraging new sources of capital, offsetting high debt burdens, and in innovating for long term solutions to challenges around climate change, disaster resilience, and fragile ecosystems.

Role

The Istanbul International Center for Private Sector in Development (ICPSD) is the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Global Policy Center mandated to leverage the role of the private sector in development. The ICPSD was established in Istanbul, Türkiye on the basis of the Partnership Framework Agreement signed between the Government of the Republic of Türkiye and the United Nations Development Program in March 2011. The Center is one of the five global thematic centers of UNDP, advocating and facilitating the contribution of the private sector to human development and inclusive growth through the following thematic priority areas:

• Private Sector Engagement through South-South Cooperation for the SDGs
• Private Sector Engagement in Digital Transformation and Skills Development
• SDG Financing and Private Sector Development
• Resilience and Crisis Response

Under its Crisis and Resilience portfolio, ICPSD supports sustainable and durable solutions for conflict and fragile affected contexts. The Center, together with its partners and relevant stakeholders, is working on identifying and promoting private sector led good practices in developing countries to be replicated and scaled up to address the major development challenges such as humanitarian crises, disaster risk reduction, climate change, conflict affected economies. As part of the work under the thematic area the Center designs and implements activities to support the Country Offices, partners and stakeholders from both public and private sector through awareness raising and capacity building programs, knowledge products and technical assistance services.

Under the guidance and direct supervision of the Center’s Deputy Director, the Policy Coordinator will lead and be responsible for the ongoing and planned activities through Crisis and Resilience including overall management and coordination of thematic areas’ workplan and activities. The Policy Coordinator will also be leading the design and implementation of knowledge management activities of ICPSD under Crisis and Resilience, such as research, toolkit and training development for initiatives of the Center, cooperation, donor mobilization and technical advisory/ assistance offered to other UNDP units, including Country Offices and Regional Bureaus. The Policy Coordinator will promote organization’s capacity as a reliable partner with national as well as international counterparts, ensure coordination of sectoral activities with broader country/regional/global programmes and advocate on behalf of organization’s goals.

Duties And Responsibilities

Under the guidance of and reporting directly to the UNDP ICPSD Deputy Director, the Policy Coordinator will be responsible for performing, but not limited to, the following key functions:

Technical Support To UNDP Country Offices

• Provide technical support to develop capacity-building strategies for programs addressed at strengthening resilience in vulnerable communities.
• Coordinate preparation of high-quality policy and programme guidance materials for thematic areas such as value chains, trade facilitation, solar energy, financial sector and private sector development.
• Facilitate designing programme strategy and policies to develop scalable models for crisis response and resilience, across sectors to align with national and UNDP objectives.

Managing Research Activities On Fragile And Conflict-affected Contexts

• Provide oversight for high-quality publishable research reports from the project design, analysis, report writing and graphic design.
• Design research activities with methodological outlines, work plans, objectives, in addition to identifying research gaps and formulating research questions and engaging with academic and research institutions.
• Provide training to team of researchers in quantitative and qualitative analysis with a focus on building capacity in data collection and analysis for fragile and conflict-affected contexts.

Coordination Of ICPSD Crisis And Resilience Portfolio Projects

• Oversee the day-to-day management of crisis and resilience portfolio projects, ensuring timely and effective implementation in line with UNDP standards and donor requirements.
• Coordinate with project teams, partners, and stakeholders to facilitate operations and achieve project milestones.
• Establish and maintain relationships with key stakeholders, including government bodies, local and international NGOs, private sector partners, and community organizations.
• Foster an environment of innovation within the portfolio, encouraging the exploration of new approaches and technologies to enhance crisis response and resilience.

Facilitation of knowledge building and management focusing on achievement of the following results:

• Identify and synthetize lessons learnt and best practices in the area of work.
• Actively promote a knowledge sharing and learning culture.

The incumbent performs other duties within their functional profile as deemed necessary for the efficient functioning of the Office and the Organization.

Institutional Arrangement

The Policy Coordinator will work under the direct supervision of the ICPSD Deputy Director and in close collaboration with ICPSD units and UNDP Afghanistan team members. The Policy Coordinator will directly supervise personnel working in ICPSD’s Crisis and Resilience Portfolio, and these personnel will report to the Policy Coordinator.

Competencies

Core Competencies

• Achieve Results: LEVEL 1: Plans and monitors own work, pays attention to details, delivers quality work by deadline
• Think Innovatively: LEVEL 1: Open to creative ideas/known risks, is pragmatic problem solver, makes improvements
• Learn Continuously: LEVEL 1: Open minded and curious, shares knowledge, learns from mistakes, asks for feedback
• Adapt with Agility: LEVEL 1: Adapts to change, constructively handles ambiguity/uncertainty, is flexible
• Act with Determination: LEVEL 1: Shows drive and motivation, able to deliver calmly in face of adversity, confident
• Engage and Partner: LEVEL 1: Demonstrates compassion/understanding towards others, forms positive relationships
• Enable Diversity and Inclusion: LEVEL 1: Appreciate/respect differences, aware of unconscious bias, confront discrimination

People Management Competencies

UNDP People Management Competencies can be found in the dedicated site

Cross-Functional & Technical Competencies

• System Thinking:
• Ability to use objective problem analysis and judgement to understand how interrelated elements coexist within an overall process or system, and to consider how altering one element can impact on other parts of the system
• Results-based Management:
• Ability to manage programmes and projects with a focus at improved performance and demonstrable results
• Project Management:
• Ability to plan, organize, prioritize and control resources, procedures and protocols to achieve specific goals
• Relationship management:
• Ability to engage with a wide range of public and private partners, build, sustain and/or strengthen working relations, trust and mutual understanding
• Multi-stakeholder engagement and funding:
• Knowledge and ability to forge multi-stakeholder partnerships, and remove any obstacles to resource mobilization and multi-stakeholder funding platforms

Education

Required Skills and Experience

• Master’s degree in international relations, public policy, finance, economics, or a related area is required.
• Bachelor’s degree in the above-mentioned field of study, in combination with an additional 2 years of qualifying experience will be given due consideration in lieu of the Master’s degree.

Experience

• Minimum 2 years (with Master’s degree) or 4 years (with Bachelor’s degree) of progressively responsible working experience in project/ programme coordination, analysis or closely related area is required.

Languages

• Fluency in English is required.
• Working knowledge of another UN language is an asset.

Required Skills

• Experience in managing multi-stakeholder research activities is an asset.
• Experience of programme design and support in fragile and conflict affected countries is an asset.
• Experience in economic research in fragile and conflict affected contexts is an asset.
• Experience in writing reports on financial sector, macroeconomic, and socioeconomics topics is an asset

Desired Skills

• Proven experience of coordinating multi-stakeholder partnerships with humanitarian and development organisations is an asset.
• Proven experience organising capacity building and events for conflict and fragile affected contexts is desirable.
• Proven experience working with value chain analyses in fragile and conflict-affected countries is an advantage.
• Proven experience in coordinating data collection and conducting extensive data analysis is an asset.
• Proven experience with projects within the Afghanistan context and economy is desirable

Disclaimer

Applicant Information About UNDP Rosters

Note: UNDP reserves the right to select one or more candidates from this vacancy announcement. We may also retain applications and consider candidates applying to this post for other similar positions with UNDP at the same grade level and with similar job description, experience and educational requirements.

Non-discrimination

UNDP has a zero-tolerance policy towards sexual exploitation and misconduct, sexual harassment, and abuse of authority. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks, and will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles.

UNDP is an equal opportunity and inclusive employer that does not discriminate based on race, sex, gender identity, religion, nationality, ethnic origin, sexual orientation, disability, pregnancy, age, language, social origin or other status.

Scam warning

The United Nations does not charge any application, processing, training, interviewing, testing or other fee in connection with the application or recruitment process. Should you receive a solicitation for the payment of a fee, please disregard it. Furthermore, please note that emblems, logos, names and addresses are easily copied and reproduced. Therefore, you are advised to apply particular care when submitting personal information on the web.