Communications, Innovation and Multimedia Specialist

Update

Working under the day-to-day supervision of the Resident Representative, and/or the Deputy Resident Representative, the incumbent will support the country office, through utilization of innovative communications approaches that enhance impactful development storytelling. This includes curating engaging multimedia content for online and office audiences and management of engagement platforms and advocacy campaigns. The UNV will also contribute to strengthening the UNDP brand, ensuring editorial consistency, managing digital assets, and identifying innovative ways to proactively engage and sustain audience-centric communication to support the articulation of UNDP offer in Botswana and impact of its partnerships-enabled output. The CO therefore requires the services of the Communications, Innovation and Multimedia Associate in order to achieve its goals and objectives of effective, anticipatory, and results oriented communications. It will require skills in fields like photography-videography, journalistic drafting, photo editing, leveraging AI-supported platforms and software in a creative and ethical way, and the management of social media platforms.

UNDP adopts a portfolio approach to accommodate changing business needs and leverage linkages across interventions to achieve its strategic goals. Therefore, UNDP personnel are expected to work across units, functions, teams, and projects in multidisciplinary teams in order to enhance and enable horizontal collaboration.

Under the direct supervision of the Resident Representative (RR) and/or the Deputy Resident Representative (DRR), the UN Volunteer will undertake the following tasks:

1. Lead the design and implementation of the communication strategies aligned with the Country Office and corporate priorities.

• Lead the formulation, implementation, and tracking of the Country Office communication strategy aligned with the Programme and Country Annual Plan (PCAP ) and corporate documents.
• Provide timely support in the curation and implementation of the Country Office and project public engagement and outreach strategies and assets.
• Support the design and implementation of digital and multimedia campaigns and advocacy strategies for the Country Office and projects.
• Facilitate timely and enriching communication on and around UN Development Programme (UNDP ) contribution and impact, including that of its partners, to Botswana's development agenda through an evidence-based and human-centred storytelling approach.
• Support the inclusion and integration of the Country Office's communication and advocacy strategies into all aspects of UNDP's work implementation in Botswana.
• Lead contextualization, localization, and adaptation of global and regional communications and campaigns.
• Facilitate outreach and engagement with innovators, creatives, community mobilisers, and influencers to achieve articulation of programmatic achievements.

2. Manage digital platforms, including website, social media, intranet, and other web-based communication platforms, and adapt emerging technologies/tools for communications;

• Lead designing and preparation of content for the Country Office website, including social media platforms, fostering timely, innovative, and consistent engagement with all target audiences.
• Facilitate the development and publication of blogs, articles, success stories, and multimedia campaign materials/assets that enhance the visibility of programme implementation, partnerships, and impact.
• Monitor and optimize trends in digital and emerging technologies for communications to elevate visibility and stakeholder engagement.
• Ensure that Country Office reporting adheres to the laid-out UNDP corporate communications requirements and best practices.
• Ensure regular updates are made in the dynamic sections of the Country Office website (events, results, etc.).
• Ensure timely and regular social media engagements through people impact stories.
• Reach out to implementing partners and beneficiaries to create timeless content to help raise the Country Office profile.
• Support the design of the communications database and image banks based on corporate requirements in collaboration with the UNDP global digital team and regional team.
• Lead social media and creative writing workshops for implementing partners to improve how partners communicate UNDP interventions.
• Provide digital solutions to enable smooth and inclusive dialogues such as livestreaming, virtual meetings, and other available avenues.

3. Promote close cooperation between and among UN/DP units to proactively identify and mitigate bottlenecks to the delivery of results.

• Ensure regular communication and information flow between the programme and operations teams to ensure programmatic and operational coherence, and identify and resolve bottlenecks to programme/project implementation.
• Support identification and coordinated actions to promote more efficient programme implementation and proactive mitigation of bottlenecks/risks to programme delivery (e.g., set-up of programmatic rosters ).
• As delegated by the RR/DRR, represent UNDP in specific partner coordination mechanisms/platforms to advance UNDP’s interagency commitments (e.g., Harmonized Approach to Cash Transfers (HACT ) working group ).
• Support development of the Country Office pipeline, if/as assigned, through cross-sectoral coordination with other UN agencies or partners.

4. Support the facilitation of knowledge building and management.

• Curate digital content on thematic topics aligned to the Country Office programmatic offer to position UNDP in emerging development trends, targeting internal and external audiences.
• Provide social media and creative writing workshops to implementing partners to improve how they communicate development issues and impacts (in collaboration with Communications Associate and Regional Bureau for Africa (RBA ) Communications colleagues) .
• Contextualize and localize promotion and advocacy of corporate knowledge products such as the Human Development Report.
• Create, maintain, and keep track of a digital calendar of events to support timely and consistent preparation and dissemination of media advisories and press releases.
• Gather and consolidate content for the generation of a monthly digital calendar of events for the Country Office.
• Disseminate content of the Country Office digital calendar of events.
• Publicize, within the internal communication platforms, implemented events and interventions as per the Country Office calendar of events.
• Periodically generate and administer internal surveys to improve Country Office feedback processes in a transparent and secure manner.

Identification and roll-out of digital and artificial intelligence (AI ) solutions for Country Office projects and their implementing partners:
5. Identify and roll out approved digital solutions for programming in alignment with UNDP digital and AI strategy.

• Work with project teams to reorganize digital filing on Microsoft Teams and other corporate platforms to enable seamless file sharing and improve collaboration.
• Facilitate adoption of project data and mapping tools, including AI tools, to consolidate Country Office project presence in the country.
• Ensure compliance with corporate information management and technology standards, guidelines, and procedures for the Country Office technology environment.
• Support implementation of database management systems (DMS) for Country Office projects as needed.
• Support staff and partners in ensuring that procurements for digital works (videos, websites, databases, eBooks/catalogues, podcasts) that have branding components are fully compliant.
• Design creative materials such as infographics, social media cards, publications, banners, and visuals that align with UNDP’s branding guidelines, using tools and AI-supported platforms such as Canva, Adobe Creative Suite, or any other relevant tools.
• Prepare a weekly digital news bulletin highlighting key developments and recent events in the development landscape for the Office of the Resident Representative.
• Manage and analyze media monitoring data with AI tools to (i) systematically collect, categorize, interpret, and repackage information from diverse media sources; (ii) provide actionable insights on public sentiment, emerging trends, and stakeholder perceptions to inform and optimize UNDP’s communication strategies and messaging.