UNICEF Pacific is hiring a Digital Impact Officer (ICT Infrastructure & Cybersecurity) to be based in Suva, Fiji. S/he serves as a key technical and operational leader for the PHIT (Pacific Islands Healthy Transformation) Project. Under the general supervision of the Digital Impact (ICT) Specialist and programmatic guidance from the Chief of Health, the Officer is responsible for coordinating the design, deployment, security, and ongoing maintenance of regional ICT infrastructure—including backend and frontend systems, servers, networking, and cloud platforms—across participating Pacific Island countries. This role ensures the consistent application of security guardrails, interoperability, and regulatory compliance in line with UNICEF policies and donor requirements.

UNICEF works in over 190 countries and territories to save children’s lives, defend their rights, and help them fulfill their potential, from early childhood through adolescence.

At UNICEF, we are committed, passionate, and proud of what we do for as long as we are needed. Promoting the rights of every child is not just a job – it is a calling.

UNICEF is a place where careers are built: we offer our staff diverse opportunities for professional and personal development that will help them reinforce a sense of purpose while serving children and communities across the world. We welcome everyone who wants to belong and grow in a diverse and passionate culture, coupled with an attractive compensation and benefits package.

Visit our website to learn more about what we do at UNICEF.

For every child, the right to a future 

In the Pacific we work in Cook Islands, Fiji, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru, Niue, Palau, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tokelau, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu: These 14 Pacific island countries are home to 2.3 million people, including 1.2 million children and youth, living on more than 660 islands and atolls stretching across 17.2 million square kilometers of the Pacific Ocean, an area comparable to the combined size of the United States of America and Canada. Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Solomon Islands, and Tuvalu are classified as Fragile States according to World Bank/OECD criteria.

All 14 Pacific Island countries and territories have ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, but only a third are on track with reporting obligations. Explore the different areas of our work here: UNICEF Pacific Islands.

UNICEF Pacific’s health and nutrition programme strengthens climate-resilient primary health care (PHC) systems, improves immunization and essential health services, and advances multisectoral efforts to prevent malnutrition and promote healthy diets for children, adolescents, and women across Pacific Island countries. As part of its work to enhance health-system resilience, UNICEF also serves as the Regional Implementation Support Partner for the Pacific Healthy Islands Transformation (PHIT) Project.

The PHIT Project is a regional, multi-country initiative supporting Fiji, Kiribati, Tonga, and Tuvalu to strengthen their health systems through enhanced health-workforce capacity, expanded access to digital health innovations, and improved service delivery enabled by regional collaboration. The project is financed by multiple development partners, including the World Bank. Participating Pacific Island countries face common structural challenges, including geographic dispersion, limited access to specialist services, health-workforce shortages and supervision gaps, fragmented referral pathways, and uneven digital infrastructure, governance, and policy readiness. These constraints are further compounded by the growing burden of noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) and increasing climate-related and disaster risks.

Within the PHIT Project, UNICEF is responsible for facilitating the development and delivery of regional public goods that strengthen PHC, digital health systems, and workforce capacity across participating countries. This includes support for the development of regional Continuous Professional Development (CPD) and accreditation frameworks; deployment of digital learning platforms; establishment of regional health-workforce registries; development of a Regional Telehealth Network (RTN); rollout of AI-enabled diagnostic and treatment tools with appropriate risk-mitigation and governance frameworks; standardization of overseas medical referral (OMR) guidelines; and support to Centres of Excellence focused on PHC innovation.

How can you make a difference? 

In close consultation with Ministries of Health, country teams, and approved vendors, the Officer leads the specification and procurement of infrastructure for e-learning hubs, telehealth networks, and AI-based diagnostic and treatment applications, facilitating delivery, installation, testing, and operationalization of these systems. The position also oversees contract and vendor management, ensuring quality assurance, timely execution, and value for money, while supporting country ownership and capacity building. By enabling resilient, secure, and scalable ICT solutions, the Digital Impact (Infrastructure & Cybersecurity) Officer helps drive the successful implementation of PHIT regional and national activities, contributing to strengthened health system performance, digital innovation, and improved health outcomes for children, adolescents, and women throughout the Pacific region.

Summary Of Key Functions/Accountabilities

1. Coordination & Governance

• Assist in co-leading a Regional (multi-country) Technical Working Group (RTWG), a collaborative forum composed of technical stakeholders and representatives from multiple countries to coordinate and guide the PHIT implementation ensuring consistency, knowledge sharing and alignment with overarching objectives of the project, 
• Help manage daily operations of the (RTWG) and organize cross-country technical forums as needed to guide implementation according to the delivery schedule including facilitating progress meetings on a regular basis and keeping detailed decision records.
• Work closely with government ICT teams, the World Bank, and Infrastructure & Solution Vendors to support countries in assessing current policies and regulations, while creating infrastructure architectures, hosting plans, security measures, and service level agreement frameworks.
• Keep an updated infrastructure deployment roadmap and risk register; provide regular updates on progress, risks, and mitigation strategies to the programme steering committee.

1. Procurement and Evaluation of Health ICT Infrastructure

• Deliver expert technical support to country offices in designing and implementing health ICT infrastructure, encompassing architecture, integration, interoperability, security, compliance, and scalability, while ensuring alignment with global, national, and governmental partner standards as well as best practices for healthcare environments.
• Identify and highlight gaps, opportunities, and strategies for scale-up in the procurement, deployment, and management of health ICT infrastructure, medical-grade digital equipment, digital learning systems, and robust power solutions.
• Assess and support each countries Public Key Infrastructure required for sharing and validating cross border health data.
• Lead the procurement activities, including the preparation and review of terms of reference, proposals, quotations, vendor selection, vendor management and contract administration for ICT and digital medical equipment, ensuring conformity with project requirements and alignment to country standards.

1. Infrastructure Deployment & Operations

• Plan, manage and coordinate vendor activities for deployment and setup of e-learning hubs, health facility infrastructure and connectivity upgrade, backup power solutions installations
• Oversee and guide the deployment of the PHIT Project’s backend infrastructure ensuring compliance with each country ‘s requirement and with international cybersecurity standards. Ensure that technology investments are secure, sustainable, and support the project’s long-term goals.
• Help establish and maintain strict quality assurance protocols, thorough technical documentation, and effective support structures for healthcare settings.
• Co-design and co-facilitate change management workshops with infrastructure vendors and countries, co-develop capacity building and training sessions, finalize training curricula and enablement toolkits, and coordinate country training schedules and champions networks. 
• Organize capacity planning and support countries in managing service performance including uptime, latency, and throughput as well as handling vendor escalations when necessary.
• Ensure successful delivery of post implementation support and maintenance of all infrastructures systems
• Execute handover of all ICT Infrastructure and clinical/end-user equipment to governments

1. Cybersecurity & Compliance

• Co-ordinate and lead security assessments, penetration tests, and remediation plans; track findings to closure in close collaboration with countries.
• Work with countries in defining and/or enforcing or aligning to data protection controls, access provisioning, and security incident management.
• Ensure data residency, backup, retention is aligned with sovereign/national requirements.
• Maintain regulatory compliance documentation

1. Documentation, Knowledge Management & Reporting

• Oversee regional project management activities and milestones (infrastructure & cybersecurity) across multiple countries, ensuring the repository of artefacts and documentation is maintained on a secure, up-to-date platform.
• Maintain a centralized repository and comprehensive lessons learned logs to facilitate cross-country knowledge sharing and reuse.
• Contribute to the preparation and sharing of monthly project status reports to all key stakeholders.
• Conduct enablement sessions for country ICT teams; manage coordination of knowledge transfer and handover processes.
• Maintain and update the register of purchase requisition stages, equipment delivery/installation/handover status, payment certification and status.
• Maintain comprehensive budget tracker for all procurement activities pertaining to PHIT Project.

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

Minimum requirements:

Education:

• An undergraduate degree (Bachelor’s degree or equivalent) is required in Computer Science, Cybersecurity, Networking, Digital Infrastructure, International Development or another relevant technical field.

Work Experience: 

• A minimum of 2 years of professional experience in Digital Technology in a large corporate or regional organisation is required.
• Experience with Public Key Infrastructure is preferred.
• Hands on experience with On-Premises and/or Cloud(Azure/AWS/Digital Ocean/GCP) Infrastructure management
• Experience in designing, deploying and managing Virtualization platform (Proxmox/VMWare/Hyper-V), Server Operating Systems, Networking and Backup/Disaster Recovery
• Good knowledge, understanding in implementing security systems including IAM, SIEM, SOAR, ISO27001
• Experience in coordinating large infrastructure projects including multiple stakeholder management is an added advantage
• Experience or exposure in developing or supporting development of Cybersecurity guidelines/policies/procedures is desired
• Exposure to UNICEF, UN or other INGO programmatic areas, including in health sector will be an added advantage

Skills:

• Solid understanding of infrastructure planning, monitoring, evaluation, and technical reporting.
• Excellent project management, analytical, and problem-solving skills related to digital infrastructure and cybersecurity initiatives.
• Strong leadership, communication, and stakeholder engagement abilities, with a focus on building effective partnerships across technical and non-technical teams.

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 Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust and Accountability and Sustainability (CRITAS) underpin everything we do and how we do it. Get acquainted with Our Values Charter: UNICEF Values

The UNICEF competencies required for this post are…

(1) Builds and maintains partnerships

(2) Demonstrates self-awareness and ethical awareness

(3) Drive to achieve results for impact

(4) Innovates and embraces change

(5) Manages ambiguity and complexity

(6) Thinks and acts strategically

(7) Works collaboratively with others 

Familiarize yourself with our competency framework and its different levels.

UNICEF promotes and advocates for the protection of the rights of every child, everywhere, in everything it does and is mandated to support the realization of the rights of every child, including those most disadvantaged, and our global workforce must reflect the diversity of those children. The UNICEF family is committed to include everyone, irrespective of their race/ethnicity, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, nationality, socio-economic background, minority, or any other status.

UNICEF encourages applications from all qualified candidates, regardless of gender, nationality, religious or ethnic backgrounds, and from people with disabilities, including neurodivergence. We offer a wide range of benefits to our staff, including paid parental leave, breastfeeding breaks and reasonable accommodation for persons with disabilities. UNICEF provides reasonable accommodation throughout the recruitment process. If you require any accommodation, please submit your request through the accessibility email button on the UNICEF Careers webpage Accessibility | UNICEF. Should you be shortlisted, please get in touch with the recruiter directly to share further details, enabling us to make the necessary arrangements in advance.

UNICEF does not hire candidates who are married to children (persons under 18). 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 based on gender, nationality, age, race, sexual orientation, religious or ethnic background or disabilities. UNICEF is committed to promote the protection and safeguarding of all children. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks, and will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles. 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, and selected candidates with disabilities may be requested to submit supporting documentation in relation to their disability confidentially.

UNICEF appointments are subject to medical clearance.  Issuance of a visa by the host country of the duty station is required for IP positions and will be facilitated by UNICEF. Appointments may also be subject to inoculation (vaccination) requirements, including against SARS-CoV-2 (Covid). Should you be selected for a position with UNICEF, you either must be inoculated as required or receive a medical exemption from the relevant department of the UN. Otherwise, the selection will be canceled.

Remarks:

As per Article 101, paragraph 3, of the Charter of the United Nations, the paramount consideration in the employment of the staff is the necessity of securing the highest standards of efficiency, competence, and integrity.

UNICEF is committed to fostering an inclusive, representative, and welcoming workforce. For this position, eligible and suitable candidates are encouraged to apply.

Government employees who are considered for employment with UNICEF are normally required to resign from their government positions before taking up an assignment with UNICEF. UNICEF reserves the right to withdraw an offer of appointment, without compensation, if a visa or medical clearance is not obtained, or necessary inoculation requirements are not met, within a reasonable period for any reason. 

UNICEF does not charge a processing fee at any stage of its recruitment, selection, and hiring processes (i.e., application stage, interview stage, validation stage, or appointment and training). UNICEF will not ask for applicants’ bank account information.

Humanitarian action is a cross-cutting priority within UNICEF’s Strategic Plan. UNICEF is committed to stay and deliver in humanitarian contexts. Therefore, all staff, at all levels across all functional areas, can be called upon to be deployed to support humanitarian response, contributing to both strengthening resilience of communities and capacity of national authorities.

All UNICEF positions are advertised, and only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process. An internal candidate performing at the level of the post in the relevant functional area, or an internal/external candidate in the corresponding Talent Group, may be selected, if suitable for the post, without assessment of other candidates.

Additional information about working for UNICEF can be found here.