Director, Office for Innovation (OIN)

Summary of Duties and Functions

Under the policy guidance and general supervision of the Chief Scientist/Assistant Director-General, the Director of the Office for Innovation will provide strategic vision and direction to all activities of the Office. In particular, the incumbent will\:

• Provide managerial and coordination support to the Chief Scientist in order to scale up the innovative work across the organization and for the development and implementation of the Organization’s innovation of macro policies, technology integration and management models;

• Provide technical and policy support to the Chief Scientist in the promotion of innovative approaches and the identification of synergies and trade-offs for innovative policy assistance to countries;

• Oversee and provide guidance to the Office teams on strategic planning and implementation, policy innovation and programme development, technology integration and application by digitalization, and innovation methodology;

• Actively promote the application of innovative approaches in programme and project management and resource mobilization efforts;

• Formulate and establish an internal mechanism to promote and incentivize innovations and coordinate the work among the promoters of innovation at headquarters and decentralized offices;

• Actively contribute to strengthening partnership and engage with public, private, academia and civil society;

• Collaborate with innovation centres of other relevant international organizations and with FAO’s innovation teams at headquarters and decentralized Offices;

• Exercise overall management responsibility, including planning, for the Office’s programme of work, ensuring quality control, progress monitoring and reporting as well as cost-effective use of financial and human resources, in the context of the FAO Strategic Framework and the Medium Term Plan, as per results-based management principles;

• Maintain a motivated and effective workforce by ensuring recruitment of highly qualified staff, by mentoring, coaching and supporting career development of staff, and by implementing effective approaches for performance management;

• Effectively contribute to supporting FAO’s corporate resource mobilization strategy;

• Represent the Organization at high-level meetings and other events relevant to the Office’s field of competence.

• Advanced university degree in a field related to the work of the Organization;

• Demonstrated management and strategic leadership skills;

• Demonstrated knowledge and experience in the field of food security, agriculture, rural development and innovation;

• Ability to lead and work effectively with a diverse team of people of different national and cultural backgrounds in an international UN setting;

• Working knowledge of English and a limited knowledge of one of the other FAO official languages (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish).