Chf Business Relship Mgmt Off - Collaboration and Communication

Before submitting an application, UNHCR staff members intending to apply to this Job Opening are requested to consult the Recruitment and Assignments Policy (RAP, UNHCR/HCP/2017/2 and the Recruitment and Assignments Administrative Instruction (RAAI), UNHCR/AI/2017/7 OF 15 August 2017.

Chief Business Relationship Management Officer

Organizational Setting and Work Relationships

The Division of Information Systems and Telecommunications (DIST) is responsible for ensuring that UNHCR takes advantage of effective and efficient information and communications solutions that enable and facilitate UNHCR¿s execution of its mandate. DIST aims to create an accessible, service-oriented, effective and efficient ICT service organization that is aligned with the core business of UNHCR, meets the ICT needs of the organization - both in the field and at Headquarters and leverage industry-standard technology for the organization.
Under the leadership of the Chief Information Officer (CIO) and Director, DIST supports UNHCR as it strives to become the global leader in data and information on forcibly displaced persons, ensuring the right solutions are designed, developed and maintained in a cost effective, timely and secure manner. 
This role within DIST, the Chief Business Relationship Officer is principally responsible for ensuring business partners have innovative information and communication technology systems and services that enable them to carry out their mandate efficiently and effectively.  The incumbent is expected to develop strategic relationships with key divisional leaders and, through these relationships, develop a deep understanding of business challenges and provide technological leadership in the development of IT plans and systems.  The staff member also collaborates with a wide array of contacts internal to UNHCR and across DIST, as well as external suppliers and strategic partners in the delivery of solutions.  The key focus of this role is to develop a business partner relationship to understand the business solutions required to enable the organization.
The role will work with business partners from idea and request, through to project concept, development, maintenance, support and promotion of tools and applications across UNHCR.
The post is located within the Business Relationship Management service and reports directly to the Deputy Director.  The incumbent has direct supervisory responsibility over Business Analysts and Service Delivery Managers, as well as matrixed management responsibilities over Solution Engineers, Project Managers and other project and business-as-usual staff performing activities under his/her responsibility.


All UNHCR staff members are accountable to perform their duties as reflected in their job description. They do so within their delegated authorities, in line with the regulatory framework of UNHCR which includes the UN Charter, UN Staff Regulations and Rules, UNHCR Policies and Administrative Instructions as well as relevant accountability frameworks. In addition, staff members are required to discharge their responsibilities in a manner consistent with the core, functional, cross-functional and managerial competencies and UNHCR¿s core values of professionalism, integrity and respect for diversity.

Duties

Strategy & Planning
- Maintain strategic relationships are developed with business partners in the Divisions and Bureaux to exploit full potential of IT in the achievement of business objectives.
- Develop strong collaborative business partnering relationships with Divisions and Bureaux to understand business requirements and deliver continual IT service improvement.
- Engage proactively with partners in the Divisions and Bureaux to identify and prioritize opportunities for business improvement using IT.
- Propose solutions, products and services for optimal business results, as well as analyze and determine operational and financial impact of new product and service offerings.
- Proactively share knowledge of technology risks and opportunities to build competitive advantage and improve efficiency and effectiveness of business units.
- Ensure that Solution Engineers develop and maintain systems and service roadmaps for customer product offerings.
- Secure funding for new initiatives or IT projects and work with other DIST and business partner units to ensure projects are appropriately staffed.
- Oversee and assist in the drafting of requests for proposals and reviewing of support contracts in area of responsibility including, but not limited to Service Level Agreements, Standard Operating Procedures, and Operational Guidelines for internal and external service providers.
- Recommend a sourcing strategy for the section.
- Facilitate the planning and execution of business changes through the use of technology.
Projects & Programme Oversight and Solution Development
- Provide strategic consulting support and guidance for key IT initiatives by leveraging solution engineering resources and/or external subject matter expertise.
- Work collaboratively with business partners to develop project funding requests to the IT governance board (i.e. project goals, benefits, scope, schedule, budget and risks).
- Participate throughout the project lifecycle as an observer on project steering committees and through regular direct engagement with Project Managers especially when issue escalation and resolution is necessary.
- Communicate decisions, priorities and relevant project information to appropriate levels of staff regarding business unit requests, projects and initiatives.
- Assign technical staff to projects.
- Recommend IT projects and new IT services to be included in operational and Headquarters¿ plans.
Service Delivery Management
- Ensure that appropriate support resources, processes and tools are in place before new initiatives, business as usual activities, or IT projects are transitioned into production.
- Ensure business requests for technology platforms and solutions are aligned to the enterprise architecture, fit for purpose, managed and supported using standard Service Management processes with well-defined SLAs.
- Ensure that business-as-usual production support teams and service delivery managers address and resolve application and system problems within agreed service level agreements.
- Provide partners in the Divisions and Bureaux with continuous updates on IT operational status and efforts to maintain, support and improve services.
- Prioritize application and systems related tasks based on business needs, in particular in relation to recovery of critical business processes following interruptions in service.
- Continually seek opportunities to increase customer satisfaction and strengthen client relationships by interacting effectively at all levels of the client organization to assess user satisfaction.
Management and Communication
- Foster positive and collaborative working relationships with internal colleagues, managed service providers and external partners.
- Plan and oversee the management of activities undertaken by the Section, including the work of managed service providers.
- Communicate decisions, priorities and relevant project information to appropriate levels of staff regarding business unit requests, projects and initiatives.
- Develop and implement an efficient and effective resourcing strategy to ensure that business demand is met in a timely manner and delivered with the expected quality.
- Participate in the annual program review process to ensure that budget requirements are captured and that expenditure is within the approved budget.
- Act as the audit focal point for systems and services that fall under the scope of responsibilities.
- Represent business needs and advocate for business interests to the other DIST services and Sections.
- Perform other related duties as required.


Minimum Qualifications

Education & Professional Work Experience

Years of Experience / Degree Level

For P5 - 12 years relevant experience with Undergraduate degree; or 11 years relevant experience with Graduate degree; or 10 years relevant experience with Doctorate degree


Field(s) of Education

Computing Science; Business Administration; Social or Hard Sciences;
Economics; International Relations Computer Engineering; Computer Science;
Information and Communication Technology; Information Systems; Information Technology;
Management Information Systems; or other relevant field.
(Field(s) of Education marked with an asterisk* are essential)


Certificates and/or Licenses

Information Technology; Project Management Prof. (PMP); Project Management;
Governance of Enterprise IT; Information Management; Prince2-Project Management;
Computer Science; Programme Mgmt; ITIL V3 Foundation Level.
(Certificates and Licenses marked with an asterisk* are essential)


Relevant Job Experience

Essential
- 11 years of relevant experience, 8 of which are at the managerial level.
- Significant experience managing business relationships with customers in a service provider and partnership role, as well as developing short-, medium- and long-terms business plans and strategic roadmaps.
- Demonstrable experience engaging with senior business leaders and influence their plans to adopt new IT services and ways of working.
- Ability to understand and analyze complex business issues and processes.
- Direct experience developing and/or supporting enterprise-wide, mission-critical systems such as ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning Software), CRM (Customer Relationship Management), Enterprise Content Management, Enterprise Collaboration Platform, Enterprise Business Intelligence Platform.
- Experience and thorough understanding of major systems operations and maintenance support including running an on-call support team covering 24 hours by 7 days.
- Experience successfully delivering IT projects and/or managing the development/support of major IT applications/systems.
- Demonstrated capacity of solid knowledge on information management, wide range of mobile and collaboration tools.
- Demonstrated ability to envision web-based services that meet consumer needs or solve business problems.
- Familiar with cloud services, including big data analytical processing.
- Knowledge of data analytics/business intelligence and related technologies and approaches including data storage solutions and visualization.
- Strong supervisory experience including leading a matrixed team to ensure collaboration and effective operations.
- Demonstrated ability to lead a team of staff from different business and technical disciplines.
- Ability to work with Managed Service Providers to develop SLAs and oversee/enhance service delivery.
- Familiarity with the procurement processes, and drafting requests for proposals.
- Strong verbal communications and executive-level presentation skills.
- Willingness to travel internationally up to 25% at a short notice.

Desirable
- Business experience working in operational environments managing programs and/or humanitarian and/or development activities.
- Experience with Agile, DevOps and Systems Development Life Cycle (SDLC) and Project Management Life Cycle (PMLC); Management of successful programme best practices and methodologies.
- Knowledge of UNHCR specific IT processes and technologies.
- Experience with large software development and/or infrastructure projects.
- Experience and working knowledge of ITIL processes.
- Experience operating in humanitarian, development, or United Nations organizations.



Functional Skills

IT-IT Cloud Hosting Services*;
MG-Client Relationship Management*;
IT-IT Collaboration & Communications Tools*;
MG-Leadership*;
MS-Presentation*;
MG-Project Management*;
MG-Decision Making;
IT-IT Project, Program or Portfolio Management*;
IT-IT Audit and Compliance Management;
MG-Managerial experience;
IT-IT Service Delivery Management Software;
MG-People Management;
IT-IT Risk Management*;
IT-Budget & Financial Management*;
IT-IT Policy Development.
(Functional Skills marked with an asterisk* are essential)

Language Requirements

For International Professional and Field Service jobs: Knowledge of English and UN working language of the duty station if not English.
For National Professional jobs: Knowledge of English and UN working language of the duty station if not English and local language.
For General Service jobs: Knowledge of English and/or UN working language of the duty station if not English.

This is a Standard Job Description for all UNHCR jobs with this job title and grade level. The Operational Context may contain additional essential and/or desirable qualifications relating to the specific operation and/or position. Any such requirements are incorporated by reference in this Job Description and will be considered for the screening, shortlisting and selection of candidates. C001L4 - Accountability Level 4
C002L4 - Teamwork & Collaboration Level 4
C003L4 - Communication Level 4
C004L4 - Commitment to Continuous Learning Level 4
C005L4 - Client & Result Orientation Level 4
C006L4 - Organizational Awareness Level 4
M001L4 - Empowering and Building Trust Level 4
M002L4 - Managing Performance Level 4
M006L4 - Managing Resources Level 4
M005L4 - Leadership Level 4
M003L4 - Judgement and Decision Making Level 4
M004L4 - Strategic Planning and Vision Level 4
X003L4 - Technological Awareness Level 4
X001L4 - Analytical Thinking Level 4
X008L4 - Stakeholder Management Level 4

The UNHCR workforce consists of many diverse nationalities, cultures, languages and opinions. UNHCR seeks to sustain and strengthen this diversity to ensure equal opportunities as well as an inclusive working environment for its entire workforce. Applications are encouraged from all qualified candidates without distinction on grounds of race, colour, sex, national origin, age, religion, disability, sexual orientation and gender identity.

Please note that UNHCR does not charge a fee at any stage of its recruitment process (application, interview, meeting, travelling, processing, training or any other fees).

Please note that the closing date for vacancies in this September 2020 Compendium is Tuesday 20 October 2020  (midnight Geneva time).