Adolescent Development Specialist at the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund (UNICEF)

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.

We are recruiting to fill the position below:

Job TItle: Adolescent Development Specialist

Job Number: 519062
Location: Nigeria
Work Type: Fixed Term Staff

Job Descriptions
How can you make a difference?

• The Adolescent Development Manager reports to the Chief of Section for general guidance and direction. The Manager supports country office programming processes by providing expert technical advice and operational support to country office colleagues and internal and external partners and stakeholders to ensure that adolescent development and participation established under the Convention on the Rights of the Child, international treaties/framework and UN intergovernmental bodies, are integrated in UNICEFs advocacy, policies, programmes and humanitarian work.
• The Manager contributes to the achievement of sustainable and scalable results on adolescent related programmes/projects according to plans, allocation, results based-management approaches and methodology (RBM) and UNICEFs Strategic Plans, standards of performance and accountability framework.

Job Responsibilities
Country Programme development and planning:

• Design and update the situation analysis and conduct assessments to establish age and sex disaggregated evidence-based data for UNICEF advocacy and development of policies, frameworks and programmes to promote adolescent development and participation in the country.
• Assess national/regional/international development priorities to identify opportunities and strategies and courses of action to enhance the delivery of services and achievement of objectives on adolescent development and participation. Work in coordination with Child protection, C4D, Gender, Communication, Education, HIV/AIDS, Health, Nutrition, Social policy, WASH, Planning, Emergency and Monitoring & Evaluation to support development of a strategic framework for adolescents, across all sectors.
• Participate in CO programme formulation, planning and preparation to provide input, advice and operational support on the integration of cross sectoral policies and frameworks that promote adolescent development and participation. This includes the processes of SMR and CPD formulation. Ensure alignment of adolescent policies, frameworks and interventions with the UNICEFs Strategic Plans and coherence/integration with the UN Development Assistance Framework (UNDAF), regional strategies and national priorities, plans and competencies.
• Establish specific goals, objectives, strategies and implementation plans for adolescent development and participation programmes/projects across all sectors using results-based planning terminology and methodology (RBM). Prepare relevant documentation for programme review and approval.
• Work closely and collaboratively with colleagues and partners and stakeholders to discuss strategies and methodologies that enhance the realization of adolescent rights across all sectors and to promote partnerships and alliances on adolescent development and participation including partnerships with adolescents.
• Ensure that the voices of adolescents and children are systematically taken into consideration in the planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of the programme cycle.

Programme management, monitoring and delivery of results:

• Plan and/or collaborate with monitoring and evaluation initiatives to establish age disaggregated benchmarks, performance indicators and other UNICEF/UN system indicators, to assess and strengthen performance accountability, coherence and delivery of sustainable results on adolescent development and participation programmes and projects.
• Participate in major monitoring and evaluation exercises, programme reviews and annual reviews with government and other counterparts to assess progress and to engage stakeholders to take required action/interventions to achieve results for adolescents.
• Prepare/assess monitoring and evaluation reports to identify gaps, strengths and weaknesses in programme and management, identify lessons learned and use knowledge gained for development planning and timely intervention to achieve goals.
• Plan, monitor and oversee the use of programme resources (financial, human, administrative and other assets) certifying/verifying compliance with organizational rules, regulations and procedures, donor commitments and standards of accountability and integrity.
• Ensure timely reporting and liquidation of resources.
• Provide technical leadership to generate knowledge on the situation of adolescents, support sector specific analysis of data on adolescents and improve utilization of sex and age disaggregated data within UNICEF monitoring and evaluation tools and among partners.
• Submit/prepare proposals, programme/project reports to donors and other partners to raise resources for adolescent interventions and keep donors informed on programme progress and critical issues.

Advisory services and technical support:

• Participate in strategic discussions, meetings and other international/national meetings and workshops to provide evidence based papers and inputs on adolescent development and participation to influence policy and agenda setting.
• Provide technical advice and guidance to key government officials, NGO, UN system and other country office partners on policies, strategies, best practices and approaches on adolescent development and participation to support programme development, conceptualizing, planning, implementation and delivery of results.
• Prepare policy papers, briefs and other strategic programme materials for management use, information and consideration in development discussion and planning relating to adolescents.
• Provide technical advice to internal sectoral staff and external partners on approaches to enhance adolescents participation into the policy, programming and humanitarian interventions.

Advocacy, networking and partnership building:

• Lead advocacy drive for adolescent rights and programming within the country office, with other UN and government and non-government partners based on improved evidence and data.
• Build and strengthen strategic partnerships through networking and advocacy with local/national governments, UN system agency partners, donors, internationally recognized institutions, NGOs, research institutes, youth led organizations and private sector to reinforce cooperation and/or pursue opportunities to promote goals and achieve sustainable and broad results on UNICEFs adolescent development and participation initiatives.
• Contribute to the preparation of advocacy and communication strategies and implementation plans and activities for maximum communication impact and outreach to promote awareness, establish partnership/alliances and to ensure that adolescent development and participation programmes and initiatives are adequately resourced and supported.
• Participate and/or represent UNICEF in inter-agency (UNCT) discussions and planning on adolescent development and participation to ensure organizational position, interests and priorities are fully considered and integrated in the UNDAF development planning and agenda setting process. Collaborate with inter-agency partners/colleagues the UNDAF planning and preparation of programmes/projects including emergency preparedness.

Innovation, knowledge management and capacity building:

• Promote, document and disseminate critical thinking, innovative approaches and good practices on adolescent development and participation initiatives through advocacy and technical advisory services.
• Keep abreast, research, benchmark, introduce and implement best and cutting edge practices on adolescent development related issues. Institutionalize and disseminate best practices and knowledge learned to support development, planning, implementation and scale up.
• Contribute to the development of policies and procedures and introduce innovation and best practices that promote the rights of adolescents and enhances their development and participation as active members of society and their community.
• Organize/plan/implement capacity building initiatives to enhance the competencies of a wide range of internal and external partners/stakeholders to achieve sustainable results on adolescent development and participation programmes and initiatives.

Education
To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have:

• An advanced university degree in one of the following fields is required: Anthropology, Psychology, Sociology, Education or another relevant technical field.

Experience

• A minimum of eight years of professional experience in social development planning and management in adolescent development related areas is required.
• Experience working in a developing country is considered as an asset.
• Relevant experience in a UN system agency or organization is considered as an asset.

Language Requirements:

• Fluency in English is required.  Knowledge of another official UN language or local language of the duty station is considered as an asset.

For every Child, you demonstrate:

• UNICEF’s core values of Commitment, Diversity and Integrity and core competencies in Communication, Working with People and Drive for Results.
• View our competency framework at: http://www.unicef.org/about/employ/files/UNICEF_Competencies.pdf

Application Closing Date
Thursday 24th January, 2019 by 23:55:00 GMT+0100 (West Africa Standard Time)

How to Apply
Interested and qualified candidates should:
Click here to apply online

Note

• 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, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks, and will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles.
• Mobility is a condition of international professional employment with UNICEF and an underlying premise of the international civil service.
• Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process.