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Portfolio Officer

Geneva

  • Organization: UNOPS - United Nations Office for Project Services
  • Location: Geneva
  • Grade: Junior level - IICA-1, International Individual Contractors Agreement
  • Occupational Groups:
    • Project and Programme Management
  • Closing Date: Closed

Background Information - UNOPS

UNOPS is an operational arm of the United Nations, supporting the successful implementation of its partners’ peacebuilding, humanitarian and development projects around the world. Our mission is to help people build better lives and countries achieve sustainable development.

UNOPS areas of expertise cover infrastructure, procurement, project management, financial management and human resources.

Working with us

UNOPS offers short- and long-term work opportunities in diverse and challenging environments across the globe. We are looking for creative, results-focused professionals with skills in a range of disciplines.

Diversity

With over 4,000 UNOPS personnel and approximately 7,000 personnel recruited on behalf of UNOPS partners spread across 80 countries, our workforce represents a wide range of nationalities and cultures. We promote a balanced, diverse workforce — a strength that helps us better understand and address our partners’ needs, and continually strive to improve our gender balance through initiatives and policies that encourage recruitment of qualified female candidates.

Work life harmonization

UNOPS values its people and recognizes the importance of balancing professional and personal demands.


Background Information - Job-specific

Based in Geneva, Switzerland, the Europe and Central Asia Regional Office (ECR) supports UNOPS offices in the region, providing management and financial/programmatic oversight of Global and Country specific Portfolios, Clusters and Operations Centers including hosting services, fund management, management advisory services, implementing projects, procuring goods and services and managing human resources. ECR ensures that projects are executed to the highest standards, providing a shared knowledge base and ensuring that best practices and lessons learned are disseminated between business units and projects across the entire region.

The Position is based in the UN Portfolio, which is a new and growing Portfolio within the UNOPS Geneva Office in ECR. The Portfolio hosts a series of programmatically independent initiatives (such as Roll Back Malaria, Scale up Nutrition and The Platform on Disaster Displacement) and implements projects on behalf of other UN Agencies (UNOG, UN Environment, and UNIDIR amongst others).

The Portfolio Officer is responsible for day-to-day implementation and operational support to various UNOPS Geneva based partners.   He/she works in close collaboration with the operations, programme and project teams in Geneva Office and ECR, UNOPS HQ and partner UN agencies’ and Government officials for successful service delivery.


Functional Responsibilities

Functional Responsibilities

The Portfolio Officer will perform the following functions:

Project Management

  • Assist in design and formulation of the work-plan for portfolio management, setting goals, targets and performance standards for the portfolio under his/her responsibility.
  • Initiation of a project into OneUNOPS, support in finalization of funding agreement; determination of required revisions; coordination of the mandatory and budget re-phasing exercises, closure of projects through review;
  • Assist in aggregating reports regularly prepared on activities, outputs and outcomes. Assist in the preparation of donor reports.
  • Assist the PM in preparing for, and follow up on, Board Meetings and quarterly assurance processes.
  • Support in drafting of contract documents and letters of agreement with institutions and UN agencies; administration of contracts and agreements and processing amendments, if required, for approval within the Team.
  • Monitoring missions to evaluate progress identify problems and take appropriate and timely decisions to meet client needs.

Support to Travel and Workshops

  • Support to the planning and implementation of the portfolio travel plans,
  • In coordination with the Travel Assistant, provide information to staff, consultants and meeting participants on the most direct and economical route, and plan routes and itineraries ensuring implementation of cost saving measures through direct negotiation under delegated authority with airlines (applying UN negotiated prices) and other travel related service providers and websites,
  • In coordination with the Travel Assistant, calculate airfare and other travel entitlements such as  Daily Subsistence Allowances (DSA), terminal expenses etc. for staff, consultants, meeting participants, and other official travelers,
  • Process travel authorization in line with travel entitlements for staff, consultants, and meeting participants ensuring that travel arrangement follow the UNOPS rules of most direct and economical route
  • Travel to workshops locations (globally) to provide hands-on administrative and logistical support

Procurement:

  • Assist in drafting of TORs for subcontractors and consultants; proposals of suitable firms or institutions and individual consultants; evaluation of proposals received; recommendations for contract awards; negotiations with successful bidder, for Portfolio Manager’s approval.
  • Monitor compliance of procurement activities with UNOPS rules, regulations, policies and strategies; implementation of the effective internal control, analysis of parameters in support of proper design and functioning of a client-oriented procurement management system.
  • Monitoring and evaluation of performance of service providers, suitable firms or institutions.
  • Follow-up on certification and approval of service payments, purchase orders and other disbursements for the projects under his/her management (to be certified by Portfolio Manager and Finance)Comprehensive up-to-date documentation of project under his / her responsibility
  • The incumbent will participate in regular team meetings to report on progress relevant to the team, share objectives for the following week, highlight milestones and identify areas of concern and collaboration;
  • Contributions to knowledge networks and communities of practice

HR services

  • Working with HR professionals, support in the drafting of recruitment plans for selected projects
  • Assist in the organization of assessments (written tests and interviews).
  • Assist in providing pro-active advice on staffing tables and recruitment plans to team leader.

Client Services

  • Contribution to organization and client capacity building of high performance delivery through coaching and mentoring of internal clients and partners.
  • Focus on clients’ services, keeping them informed of the status of project activities. Oral and written periodic reports.
  • Active interaction with clients to solicit feedback and gauge client satisfaction.
  • Interaction with internal clients and regional portfolio managers to integrate and harmonize approaches.
  • Demonstration of professional and personal ethics, transparency and openness to encourage respect and similar behavior from colleagues.

Other

  • Perform other related duties as instructed by supervisors.
  • Participation in the organization and conduct of training for the operations/ projects personnel.
  • The incumbent will define his/her own performance indicators responding to the priorities identified with his / her supervisor. These indicators will be assessed in accordance with performance management policy.


Education

Master’s Degree or equivalent in Business Administration, Public Administration, Economics, Environment, Political Sciences, International Relations, Social Sciences or related field.  A first-level university degree (bachelor’s) in combination with required qualifying experience may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.


Experience

With a Master's degree, some relevant work experience is desirable but not required.

With a Bachelor's degree, 2 years of relevant work experience (post-Bachelor’s) is required.

Relevant experience at the national or international level in providing project management and transactional services is desirable.

Hands-on experience in design, monitoring and evaluation of development projects is desirable.

Experience in the usage of computers and MS Office and G-Suite is desirable

Experience in the following areas is also desirable:

  • Working with multiple clients.
  • Supporting large conferences or workshops      
  • Managing projects from the initiation to closure stage using Prince 2 or similar project management methodology.
  • Leading procurement processes or providing guidance to project partners on procurement
  • Supporting HR processes working alongside HR professionals


Languages

  • Fluency in English is required
  • Fluency/working knowledge of French is an asset

Competencies

Treats all individuals with respect; responds sensitively to differences and encourages others to do the same. Upholds organizational and ethical norms. Maintains high standards of trustworthiness. Role model for diversity and inclusion.
Acts as a positive role model contributing to the team spirit. Collaborates and supports the development of others. For people managers only: Acts as positive leadership role model, motivates, directs and inspires others to succeed, utilizing appropriate leadership styles.
Demonstrates understanding of the impact of own role on all partners and always puts the end beneficiary first. Builds and maintains strong external relationships and is a competent partner for others (if relevant to the role).
Efficiently establishes an appropriate course of action for self and/or others to accomplish a goal. Actions lead to total task accomplishment through concern for quality in all areas. Sees opportunities and takes the initiative to act on them. Understands that responsible use of resources maximizes our impact on our beneficiaries.
Open to change and flexible in a fast paced environment. Effectively adapts own approach to suit changing circumstances or requirements. Reflects on experiences and modifies own behavior. Performance is consistent, even under pressure. Always pursues continuous improvements.
Evaluates data and courses of action to reach logical, pragmatic decisions. Takes an unbiased, rational approach with calculated risks. Applies innovation and creativity to problem-solving.
Expresses ideas or facts in a clear, concise and open manner. Communication indicates a consideration for the feelings and needs of others. Actively listens and proactively shares knowledge. Handles conflict effectively, by overcoming differences of opinion and finding common ground.

Additional Considerations

  • Please note that the closing date is midnight Copenhagen time
  • Applications received after the closing date will not be considered.
  • Only those candidates that are short-listed for interviews will be notified.
  • Qualified female candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.
  • UNOPS seeks to reasonably accommodate candidates with special needs, upon request.
  • Work life harmonization - UNOPS values its people and recognizes the importance of balancing professional and personal demands. We have a progressive policy on work-life harmonization and offer several flexible working options. This policy applies to UNOPS personnel on all contract types
  • UNOPS seeks to reasonably accommodate candidates with special needs, upon request.
  • The incumbent is responsible to abide by security policies, administrative instructions, plans and procedures of the UN Security Management System and that of UNOPS.  

It is the policy of UNOPS to conduct background checks on all potential recruits/interns. Recruitment/internship in UNOPS is contingent on the results of such checks.

This position is based in Switzerland and the contract fee is not exempt from Swiss laws, including but not limited to laws regarding taxation, social security, accident and health insurance.

Contract type, level and duration

Contract type: Individual Contractor Agreement (ICA)
Contract level: International ICA Level 1 (I-ICA 1) - ICS-8
Contract duration: Open-ended, subject to organizational requirements, availability of funds and satisfactory performance.’



For more details about the ICA contractual modality, please follow this link:
https://www.unops.org/english/Opportunities/job-opportunities/what-we-offer/Pages/Individual-Contractor-Agreements.aspx 

This vacancy is now closed.
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