UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security.

The UN Women Strategic Partnerships Division (SPD) is responsible for proactively driving the strategic positioning of UN Women and ensure that the size, sources and predictability of its resources help the organization achieve its strategic goals. The division is organized into three functional sections and a directorate: Communications & Advocacy (Comms), Multi-Stakeholder Partnerships and Advisory Services (MPAS), Public Partnerships Section (PPS) including four Liaison Offices (Nordic, Brussels, Japan and GCC in Abu Dhabi), and SPD Directorate.

Under the direct supervision of the SPD Operations Analyst, the Programme Associate supports the coordination and completion of operational and programmatic activities of the division. S/he is a member of the SPD Business Center team under the SPD Directorate from where most of his/her supporting, operational, programmatic functions are coordinated. S/he supports decisions to ensure delivery of organizational goals and operational results, including the compilation of information and analysis on a monthly and quarterly basis, handling daily operations, and playing a guidance role to all sections. S/he will be responsible to support the achievement of operational excellence and the analysis of results achieved in different programmatic and operational areas during the implementation of SPD’s workplans towards UN Women’s Strategic Plan.

The Programme Associate contributes to donor reporting, financial management, and programme implementation including necessary operational, administrative and programmatic support. The Programme Associate works in close collaboration with other UN Women HQ Divisions, like DMA, SPRED, EDO, PPID, CSD as required to support projects management and to resolve finance-related issues exchanging relevant information and planning coordinated actions. Likewise, as art of the support to SPD’s initiatives, the Programme Associate needs to coordinate actions with some Country Offices and Regional Offices. S/he serves as the procurement focal point for some SPD Units and performs other operational roles as well.

Duties and Responsibilities

Provide advanced administrative support to the financial management of the division  

• Verify on a monthly basis regular resources (RR) allocations received by sections and teams and available cash in non-core funds.
• Issue budget revisions to project management in line with section workplan, and as per adjustments based on budgetary guidelines for each type of funds and UN Women FRR.
• Provide inputs on budgetary planning, performance and monitoring at aggregate and detailed level focusing on managerial efficiency and financial sustainability.
• Elaborate and analyze resource requirements for project budget submissions. Advise programme managers of potential over expenditures and recommend budget revisions.
• Support SPD teams with the management of implementing partners, including issuance of agreements, liquidation of expenses, processing liquidation of advances forms and ensuring that necessary documentation are submitted (narrative and financial reports).
• Issue monthly and yearly monitoring reports on delivery rates (implementation and utilization rates) in accordance with instructions from Financial Management Section’s (FMS) and Programme Support & Management Unit’s (PSMU). This includes preparation of presentations for Division staff meetings and as required for sections and teams.
• Review and coordinate the issuance of financial reports as required by projects with FMS.
• Process PO and non-PO payments.
• Process financial adjustments and reconciliations a.k.a. General Ledger Journal Entries (GLJEs) as needed.
• Support SPD Units with the End-of-Month financial checklist certification.

Provide advanced administrative support to the human resources management of the division 

• Support project managers (PMs) with staff member posts management including coordinating and submitting requests for post establishment, post reclassification, post extension, post abolishment and contract extensions.
• Provide administrative and programmatic support with the preparation and submission of SSAs and internships requests to HR Division (including contract extensions).
• Maintain SSAs and internships contract monitoring tool and inform programme / project managers in a timely manner about expiration date and working months / days left in the contract in order to plan further actions if needed.
• Coordinate onboarding process for new staff members (fixed and temporary appointments), and other personnel like consultants and interns.
• Perform the role of personnel validator for some SPD sections.
• Coordinate procurement end to end processes as necessary.
• Perform role of approver 1 in travel module certifying travel requests and travel claims as per duty travel policy.
• Review the quality and timeliness of services provided by reference to corporate standards and by reference to standards/indicators established within the office.

Provide programmatic support with donor agreements linked to other resources (non-core)

• Provide technical guidance and support to PMs on the different processes related to donor agreements, funding modalities, budget structure, linkages to workplans and reporting commitments. 
• Support PMs with the management of donor agreements in the Donor Agreements Management System (DAMS), making sure that entries are accurate and updated and in accordance with PPID guidance for different donor agreement types, procedures, and corporate reporting requirements.
• Prepare project budgets and revisions to include support cost and activities as per agreement and approved section’s workplans in RMS. 
• Liaise with FMS Revenue Team on the application of funds to respective projects, including transfer of fund between HQ/CO/RO/LO projects.
• Perform the DAMS level one approver role for the division for non-core funds agreements for projects managed by SPD teams. This includes the coordination with FMS for final approvals in DAMS.
• Manage and track all SPD agreements with donors including implementing partners in order to monitor donor reporting commitments and advise PMs in advance of due dates.
• Provide support in cases where advances are transferred to implementing partners as per agreements. This includes liquidations of expenses and entries in PGAMS (Partner Grant Agreement Management System).
• Prepare information for the audit of projects and support implementation of audit recommendations.
• Coordinate with PMs and FMS to operationally and financially close projects.

Provide support in work planning activities to SPD sections

• Provide budgetary and programmatic support in the preparation of workplans, budget documents, and proposals.
• Support entries of workplans in Results Management System (RMS), including semi-annual monitoring and evaluation (M&E) requirements in RMS.
• Provide inputs to biannual workplans.
• Assure that mapping of RMS and ERP activities is accurate based on Biannual Workplan Plan’s guidance.

Facilitation of knowledge building and knowledge sharing 

• Support synthesis of lessons learnt, and best practices related to programme management and finance. 
• Coordinate the organization of training for the office staff and partners on programme and operations related issues.
• Review and give feedback on SOPs and business processes.

Other operational roles

• Act as the ERP focal point (generation of ERP users), making sure that delegation of authority corresponds to the ERP user role as per UN Women’s internal control framework (ICF).
• Provide ad-hoc support with the management and coordination of the SPD Director’s calendar and approvals via Global Service Tracker system (GST).
• Support SPD sections with the implementation of the new ERP system (Quantum).

Key Performance Indicators

• Programmatic and operational support to the recently created SPD Business Center.
• Timely feedback and inputs to improve processes and SOPs.
• Development of statistics of services provided by SPD Business Center.
• Establishment of a donor reporting monitoring tool.
• Improvement of SSAs and Internships contract monitoring tool.
• Monthly divisional delivery rate report to be shared in SPD staff meetings.
• Monthly project budget status reports including commitments to be shared with PMs.
• Timely and accurate support to budget formulation.
• Coordination of solicitation processes.

Required Skills and Experience

Education and certification:

• Completion of secondary education required.
• Bachelor’s degree in Business, Public Administration or any related field is an asset.
• CIPS Procurement Certification Level 2 is required.
• Candidates who do not have a University Degree will be required to complete the Global General Service Test (GGST) or UN Administrative Support Assessment Test (ASAT) - formerly known as the UN Clerical Test.

Experience:

• At least 7 years of progressively responsible experience in administration, finance, budget, or programme / project management support.
• Experience with donor agreements and preparation and coordination of donor reports (financial and programmatic).
• Experience in the use of computers applications and software packages (MS Word, Excel, etc.) with an advance knowledge of spreadsheet as well as web-based management systems.
• Experience with shared emails and service centers or customer services.
• Experience in the use of ERP platforms is an asset.
• Experience in supporting a team

Language Requirements:

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

Source: https://jobs.undp.org/cj_view_job.cfm?cur_job_id=109156