Job Identification : 13935

Locations : Maputo, Mozambique

Posting Date : 10/02/2023, 04:24 PM

Apply Before : 10/17/2023, 03:59 AM

Job Schedule : Full time

Agency : UNDP

Grade : NOB

Vacancy Type : Fixed Term

Practice Area : Innovation

Bureau : Regional Bureau for Africa

Contract Duration : 1 Year with Possibility for extension

Education & Work Experience : Master’s Degree – 2 year(s) experience OR Bachelor’s Degree – 4 year(s) experience

Required Languages : English

Vacancy Timeline

2 Weeks

Mobility required/no mobility

no mobility required

Job Description

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.

The UNDP Strategic Plan embraces the complexity of development and commits the organization to helping countries find faster, more durable solutions to achieve Agenda 2030. Important development trends like urbanization, climate change, and rising inequalities pose significant challenges on our path to achieve the 2030 agenda of achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

UNDP has begun incubating several strategic initiatives aimed at ensuring UNDP is ‘fit for purpose’ to deliver a new generation of solutions in line with the challenges the world faces. One such key strategic initiatives is the UNDP Accelerator Lab Network which operates as part of UNDP’s sustainable development offering.

US:

We are building the largest and fastest learning global network on development challenges. We have already set up 60 labs in 78 countries) embedded within UNDP’s global architecture and country platforms. We are now recruiting for a second cohort of 30 labs to be based in UNDP around the world. We use the power of the crowd, machine learning and distributed decision making to support partners to understand problems, develop new solutions, promote more inclusive decision making, and provide better oversight of what is done. We identify grassroots solutions and stretch their potential to accelerate development. We apply experimentation closely with government partners to grow this as a mode of operating to reduce costs of large-scale public sector reforms. Experimentation helps us learn whether assumptions are accurate before deploying solutions at scale, especially in the rapidly evolving contexts that often dominate development progress.

You:

You are capable and excited about starting, designing and managing activities, direct engagement with local communities and collaboration across global networks. You are driven by learning new things, figuring out how they work and translating them across sectors. You tell stories of emergent solutions and you gravitate to solving global development challenges.

You have a natural inclination to interdisciplinarity, cross cultural mindset and cross sectoral experience with the cosmopolitan attraction for diversity. You are driven by a strong sense of purpose and commitment to make change happen and a keen eye to identify emerging opportunities and ‘at the edge’ trends. You are open to discovery and exploration, capable of articulating insights and ideas through visual thinking, open to serendipity and discovery yet are pragmatic and constructive working with public sector authorities. You are comfortable with ambiguity, capable of zooming out for context and zooming in for content and execution- sharp in pursuit of objectives, fast at adapting and changing course when needed. You have superb competencies in program and portfolio management, are at ease with decision-making processes and dynamics of different models of governance.

You are curious, a natural strategic thinker and a talented doer. You understand systems, the good, the bad and the ugly, and are capable of working within bureaucracies to make change, leverage technology to extend, enhance and multiply exploration, discovery and execution. You are digitally savvy, you hack tools, and you are keen to be a part of a large global organization exhibiting United Nations values.

Position Purpose

Under the guidance of the Resident Representative and his direct supervision the Head of Experimentation, is responsible for the provision of solutions for accelerate projects.

* The Accelerator Labs will be comprised of a core team with niche capabilities that focus on exploration, experimentation, and grassroots innovation. Within the first 6-8 months of the Lab fully functioning, each member of the Core team will take the lead on one of the following functions: 1) Coordination

2) Training

3) Communications

The Core team of the Accelerator lab will have capabilities in:

•  Experimentation (instituting rapid learning about emerging challenges through design and running of a portfolio of experiments that is coherent with the type of challenges that are part of UNDP’s strategic plan, and
•  Mapping Solutions: ethnographic methods and immersion in community dynamics, identification of and work with lead users, and implications of bottom-up solutions for the policy design
•  Exploration: The exploration function focuses on discovery and sense making of emerging trends, implications for systemic impacts and risks, and their potential for accelerating progress toward SDGs. Its work feeds into the portfolio of experiments ensuring its coherence with the emerging risks and opportunities and connects local dynamics and solutions into the broader national and international ecosystem of potential funders, partners, and allies thereby increasing the chances for acceleration. While critical for the functioning of the Accelerator Lab, the exploration function will also service the Country Office as determined and agreed with the UNDP senior management.

Key Duties and Responsibilities

Experiment portfolio design:

•  Works with UNDP and partners in mapping the context and nature of development challenges, with a particular focus on understanding systemic issues beyond traditional silos and classifications and identifying drivers of change, and levers for intervention;
•  Mapping systems and assets, identifying levers and logic for intervention, building hypotheses of change that are a fit to the system level challenges identified;
•  Identify logic against which to asses fit and coherence of the individual portfolios with the frontier challenges on which they are meant to generate learning;
•  Together with UNDP and development partners, coordinate portfolios of experiments to target multiple domains of complex problems.

Management of tests and experiments for sustainable development challenges:

•  Collaborate with UNDP colleagues and stakeholders on the design of experiments across to validate the hypotheses and test the effectiveness of identified prototypes, including (but not limit to) defining variables, formulating hypotheses, and coordinating experimental protocols;
•  Develop a framework to capture the learning from the experiments in such a way that it favors critical reflection and rapid adaptation over static reporting;
•  Provide technical guidance for experiment design, roll-out and validation based on the experiment conditions, resources available, and requirements;
•  Proactively manage risks within experiments including those related to ethics and privacy;
•  Examine the results from the testing of prototypes and translate them into proposals informing programmatic decisions on next steps and implications for improvement, spin offs and scaling-up, where warranted.

Working out Loud:

•  Proactively use blog and social media to share findings from the experiments and portfolio implementation;
•  Help UNDP and partners disseminate insights from Accelerator lab experiments via social media platforms as a way to regularly reflect and engage with external audiences;
•  Liaise with UNDP’s global Accelerator Lab network and share learnings and insights from the country-specific experience;
•  Jointly with the CO, support lab partners to develop an emerging pipeline of new initiatives, support other activities related to the design and operation of the Lab;
•  Design and deliver engaging and meaningful methods for reflection on learning from experiments;
•  Proactively use blog posts and social media to share insights, attract partners and help position Accelerator Lab at the forefront of the exploration of new trends;
•  Lead other activities related to the design and operations of the Accelerator Lab.

Organizational learning and interface with the core business of UNDP:

•  Help embed a portfolio logic in clients’ work including the existing UNDP Country Programme (as determined and agreed with the senior management);
•  Working with clients to encourage reflection and capturing of insights from individual experiments, as they related to the overall portfolio logic;
•  Work together with your Accelerator Lab colleagues and experts to codify and advance the Accelerator Lab practice and portfolio design in particular;
•  Provide technical consultation and training for national partners and the CO through various phases including asset mapping, developing a strategic portfolio logic, experiment design, prototype testing, and evaluation;
•  Design and deliver engaging and meaningful methods for reflection on learning from experiments;
•  Lead other activities related to the design and operations of the Accelerator Lab.

Competencies:

Core competencies

•  Achieve Results: LEVEL 2: Scale up solutions and simplifies processes, balances speed and accuracy in doing work;
•  Think Innovatively: LEVEL 2: Offer new ideas/open to new approaches, demonstrate systemic/integrated thinking;
•  Learn Continuously: LEVEL 1: Open minded and curious, shares knowledge, learns from mistakes, asks for feedback;
•  Adapt with Agility: LEVEL 2: Go outside comfort zone, learn from others, and support their learning;
•  Act with Determination: LEVEL 2: Adapt processes/approaches to new situations, involve others in change process;
•  Engage and Partner: LEVEL 2: Is facilitator/integrator, bring people together, build/maintain coalitions/partnerships;
•  Enable Diversity and Inclusion: LEVEL 2: Facilitate conversations to bridge differences, considers in decision making.

Cross-Functional & Technical competencies

Business Direction & Strategy

•  System Thinking
  •  Ability to develop effectiveness strategies and prioritized plans in line with UNDP’s objectives, based on the systemic analysis of challenges, potential risks, and opportunities, linking the vision to reality on the ground, and creating tangible solutions;
  •  Ability to leverage learning from a variety of sources to anticipate and respond to future trends; to demonstrate foresight to model what future developments and possible ways forward look like for UNDP;
  •  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.

Digital Innovation

•  Digital business analysis
  •  Ability to support digital business processes across a range of digital projects, programmes and activities.
•  Creative facilitation
  •  Ability to design workshops that considers and addresses multiple interests, agendas, worldviews; set out clear objectives and engaging activities; select appropriate tools, materials, resources that are needed to enable or support the activities;
  •  Ability to swiftly build rapport with participants and create a safe space (on- and offline) where they feel comfortable to share their views, concerns, experiences and reflections; supporting this with a range of tools to stimulate active participation;
  •  Ability to facilitate inclusive conversations, ability to work with a diverse set of people with different backgrounds, seniority and expert levels, using different approaches tailored to fit the people in the room, drawing out the perspectives and ideas of each individual and making decisions through deliberation and discussion across a group;
  •  Ability to pace a session, adjust to the abilities and energy levels of attendees and the nature or purpose of an exercise. Being flexible and able to improvise, adapting and changing approaches in response to the needs, while staying true to the intent and objectives of the session.
•  Visualization & mapping
  •  Ability to visualize and clarify ideas, processes or (complex) situations by making quick sketches, drawings or using diagrams, illustrations, photos, videos, animations, three dimensional mock-ups to support group dialogues, reflection, ideation, problem solving or decision making;
  •  Using abstraction, analogical and metaphorical thinking to create compelling visuals, maps, models or embodied thinking that provide new perspectives and help a group of disparate actors to find a common language and develop a shared mental model;
  •  Ability to quickly grasp the dynamics of a complex system, identify key elements, entities and their relations, create maps or models that help people inside the system, or outsiders, understand its dynamics; being able to swiftly make sense of an undifferentiated mass of information, extract its very essence, and turn that into key messages and visualizations.

Required Skills and Experience

Education

•  Master’s degree in Social Sciences, Data science, Statistics, Physics, Computer Science, Business Intelligence, or related field; OR
•  Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field with additional 2 years of qualifying experience will be given due consideration in lieu of a master’s degree.

Experience, Knowledge and Skills

•  Minimum of 2 years (with master’s degree) or 4 years (with bachelor’s degree) of professional experience in development programming or policy; social innovation; partnership building; engagement (public and private sector) and/or resource mobilization;
•  Professional experience in development programming or policy and social innovation;
•  Demonstrated capacity in horizon scanning;
•  Demonstrated capacity in data analysis and visualization.

Experience in following areas is desirable but not necessary:

•  Proven professional knowledge and experience in social innovation approaches such as Systems Thinking, Ethnography, Crowdsourcing, Collective Intelligence Design, Citizen Science, Positive Deviance, Social Network Analysis, Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning;
•  Professional experience in partnership building and engagement (public and private sector);
•  Demonstrated capacity to use open data, mobile data, geospatial data, drone & satellite data, citizen data for informing policy making, strategic planning, or programme design;
•  Proven professional knowledge and experience in at least one of the following: Future thinking and Foresight, Design Research, and Systems Mapping;
•  Key awareness of key global and regional trends;
•  Demonstrated access to networks of edge innovators.

Client Orientation:

•  Organize and prioritize work schedule to meet client needs and deadlines;
•  Anticipate client needs and addresses them promptly.

Language

•  Proficiency in written and spoken English.

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.

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