Programme Policy Officer- Gender NOA, Colombo, Sri Lanka

ABOUT WFP

The United Nations World Food Programme is the world's largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide.  The mission of WFP is to help the world achieve Zero Hunger in our lifetimes.  Every day, WFP works worldwide to ensure that no child goes to bed hungry and that the poorest and most vulnerable, particularly women and children, can access the nutritious food they need.

ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT

The World Food Programme (WFP) is the world’s largest humanitarian agency, working worldwide on saving lives, changing lives. Within WFP, gender equity is identified as one of the priority, cross cutting issues to be integrated in all stages of development and humanitarian action in the interest of helping to ensure quality and accountability of humanitarian and development assistance, and for the achievement of SDG2 amongst other SDGs. At the country level, the WFP Country Office (CO) team is responsible for gender-sensitive programming and the promotion of gender equality through all its programmatic initiatives.

The objective of this position is to strengthen gender aspects of the implementation of WFP’s Sri Lanka Country Strategic Plan[1] in order to ensure effective and resource efficient gender-responsive programming, with the ultimate goal of contributing to better development results, especially for women, men, girls and boys in the country.

The Program Policy Officer will be primarily responsible for managing a joint WFP-UNFPA project, which aims at achieving gender equality and empowerment of women and girls through improved access to Sexual and Reproductive Health. The incumbent will work directly and be supervised on day to day basis by Nutrition Officer to ensure alignment with WFP’s objective to promote nutrition and food security in post conflict Sri Lanka. In addition, the incumbent will be responsible for providing strategic and technical support for the mainstreaming of gender equality and women’s empowerment across WFP programming and projects.

STANDARD MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS

Education:

• Master degree in social science, health, nutrition, agriculture or relevant field. Specialization in Gender or a related discipline is desirable.

Language: Fluency (level C) in English language and the duty station’s language, if different

JOB PURPOSE

The objective of this position is to strengthen gender aspects of the implementation of WFP’s Sri Lanka Country Strategic Plan[1] in order to ensure effective and resource efficient gender-responsive programming, with the ultimate goal of contributing to better development results, especially for women, men, girls and boys in the country.

4Ps CORE ORGANISATIONAL CAPABILITIES

Purpose

• Understand and communicate the Strategic Objectives: Understands WFP’s Strategic Objectives and the link to own work objectives.
• Be a force for positive change: Flexibly adapts individual contributions to accommodate changes in direction from supervisors and internal/external changes (such as evolving needs of beneficiaries, new requirements of partners).
•  Make the mission inspiring to our team: Recognizes and shares with team members the ways in which individual contributions relate to WFP’s mission.
•  Make our mission visible in everyday actions: Sets own goals in alignment with WFP’s overall operations, and is able to communicate this link to others.

People

• Look for ways to strengthen people's skills: Assesses own strengths and weaknesses to increase self-awareness, and includes these in conversations on own developmental needs.
•  Create an inclusive culture: Participates in open dialogue, and values the diverse opinion of others, regardless of background, culture, experience, or country assignment.
•  Be a coach & provide constructive feedback: Proactively seeks feedback and coaching to build confidence, and develop and improve individual skills.
•  Create an “I will”/”We will” spirit: Participates in accomplishing team activities and goals in the face of challenging circumstances.

Performance

• Encourage innovation & creative solutions: Shows willingness to explore and experiment with new ideas and approaches in own work.
•  Focus on getting results: Consistently delivers results within individual scope of work on time, on budget and without errors.
•  Make commitments and make good on commitments: Commits to upholding individual accountabilities and responsibilities in the face of ever-changing country or functional priorities.
•  Be Decisive: Makes rational decisions about individual activities when faced with uncertain circumstances, including in times of ambiguity regarding information or manager direction.

Partnership

• Connect and share across WFP units: Seeks to understand and adapt to internal or cross-unit teams’ priorities and preferred working styles.
•  Build strong external partnerships: Demonstrates ability to understand and appropriately respond to and/or escalate needs of external partners.
•  Be politically agile & adaptable: Portrays an informed and professional demeanor toward internal and external partners and stakeholders.
•  Be clear about the value WFP brings to partnerships: Provides operational support on analyses and assessments that quantifies and demonstrates WFP’s unique value as a partner.

KEY ACCOUNTABILITIES (not all-inclusive)

Within delegated authority, the Programme & Policy Officer in the field office will be responsible for executing the following tasks:

Core Responsibilities:

• As the CO Policy, Programme Gender Officer, advise, support and catalyse the implementation of the WFP Gender Policy and country gender workplan to mainstream gender into WFP strategic outcomes and activities as per the WFP Sri Lanka Country Strategic Plan (2018-2022), taking a clear leadership role in this regard and representing WFP in relevant fora;
• Manage the effective application and reporting on the Gender Marker (GM) as planned for all activities of the CSP 2018-2022.

• In particular, ensure robust mainstreaming of gender elements into the WFP-UNFPA joint project for women’s empowerment, improved nutrition and enhanced access to sexual and reproductive health, contributing to scalable models supported by robust M&E;
• Liaise closely with WFP’s partners especially UNFPA and government counterparts, to ensure proper monitoring and evaluation, reporting, and policy advice on specific gender issues of the WFP-UNFPA joint project.

Specific Tasks (50% of workload):

• Manage and supervise the implementation of the WFP-UNFPA joint project, including management of resources and development of appropriate linkages with other actors involved in supporting good practices across the full spectrum of activities;
• Preparation of project implementation activities and manage the day to day administrative matters for the project under the direction of the Deputy Country Director, with support of Nutrition Officer and other relevant CO staff (eg M&E).
• Coordinate with UNFPA to ensure appropriate collaboration of the Project.
• Develop and follow up on monitoring and reporting plan in close collaboration with M&E team.
• Closely work with the Communications Associate to develop and disseminate regular updates and/or briefing materials on gender activities to WFP partners and relevant stakeholders.

DESIRED EXPERIENCES FOR ENTRY INTO THE ROLE

• More than five years of professional work experience, as technical expert and advisor in gender equality in development programs and projects; in addition, experience in nutrition and health issues preferable, including at community level
• Demonstrated skills in training management and experience in capacity building relating to Gender Equality and Social Inclusion.
• In-depth knowledge in gender and social inclusion, and demonstrated experience and proficiency in managing programmes that mainstream gender.
• Proficiency in Windows, MS Office (Word, Excel, Power point, Outlook)
• Competencies: Cognitive Capacity, Teamwork, Action Management, Innovation, Partnering, Client Orientation.
• Proficiency in Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint;
• Fluency in English and proficiency in one of the local languages (Sinhalese or Tamil)

FUNCTIONAL CAPABILITIES

OTHER SPECIFIC JOB REQUIREMENTS

• Support the planning and coordination of the CO Gender Results Network (GRN) team and act as the CO Gender focal point, coordinating with the RBB gender focal point for support.
• In coordination with the GRN, develop and implement trainings on gender mainstreaming and analysis, gender marker, women’s empowerment, Gender Based Violence (GBV), and other related subjects for WFP staff and partners.
• Take the lead role in context/gender analysis to enable the CO team to identify strategic and concrete response to address gender inequalities in WFP-supported interventions.
• Work with the CO team in setting up or adapting the existing monitoring system to measure progress in gender mainstreaming results, ensuring integration of gender indicators into the result framework.
• Participate and represent WFP in relevant fora, gender working groups, conferences and trainings aimed at enhancing public awareness and advocacy on the importance of gender in food security and nutrition.  
• Manage the effective application and reporting on the Gender Marker (GM) as planned for all activities of the CSP 2018-2022.
• Strengthen strategic partnerships on gender and support the mobilization of resources (donor relations, funding proposals) required to effectively implement the CSP in line with the WFP global gender policy;
• Advise and support HR related matters to ensure gender balance within the workplace

TERMS AND CONDITIONS

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS

08 October 2018

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Qualified female applicants are especially encouraged to apply

WFP has zero tolerance for discrimination and does not discriminate on the basis of HIV/AIDS status.

No appointment under any kind of contract will be offered to members of the UN Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions (ACABQ), International Civil Service Commission (ICSC), FAO Finance Committee, WFP External Auditor, WFP Audit Committee, Joint Inspection Unit (JIU) and other similar bodies within the United Nations system with oversight responsibilities over WFP, both during their service and within three years of ceasing that service.