Knowledge management and communication intern for Prevention of Violent Extremism

Background

UNDP’s Crisis Bureau (CB) has corporate responsibility for UNDP’s corporate crisis-related work and driving UNDP’s vision and priorities for crisis prevention, response, and recovery, to support the strategic results, outcomes and outputs of UNDP's Strategic Plan. CB teams provide technical advice to Country Offices; advocate UNDP corporate messages; represent UNDP as required, including at multi-stakeholder fora, public-private, and government-civil society dialogue initiatives; promote and support South-South and Triangular cooperation initiatives; and engage in UN interagency coordination in the areas of work the Strategic Plan – building resilience to shocks and crises, in order to safeguard development gains.

Within the CB, the Conflict Prevention, Peacebuilding and Responsive Institutions (CPPRI) team works on the integration of governance, conflict prevention and peacebuilding interventions. The CPPRI team leads and coordinates UNDP's corporate, global approach on how to prevent violent extremism (PVE) from a development perspective. This approach continues to evolve and develop in response to the changing strategies of violent extremist groups, government responses and development of new policy frameworks. In support hereof, UNDP commissions new research, identifies best practices and promote knowledge sharing across multiple stakeholders supporting the prevention of violent extremism.

It is within this context that UNDP is seeking a Knowledge Management Intern to support the development of knowledge products, systems and platforms. The intern will engage with the PVE Team in New York as well as colleagues in Country Offices and Regional Hubs to enhance knowledge exchange and learning across the practice.

This position will expose the intern to unique insights on implementation of peacebuilding and prevention of violent extremism programmes across the 34 countries in which UNDP implements PVE projects. Furthermore, the nature of the tasks will offer the intern great opportunities to develop analytical skills, strategic writing and communication within international development. The intern will have a unique opportunity to operate in a diverse and dynamic global workspace and expand personal and professional networks. The supervisor will work closely with the intern to identify and track learning objectives, provide quality assurance and feedback.

Duties and Responsibilities

The intern will assist the Prevention of Violent Extremism (PVE) Team by supporting knowledge generation and management, including through UNDPs Communities of Practice on PVE. Specifically, the intern will:

• Extract lessons learned, best practices and case studies from UNDP projects and draft summary analysis for publication and briefing notes;
• Enhance the PVE knowledge management taxonomy and develop a database for lessons learned, results and activities from across the practice area;
• Provide support in the planning and organization of online Community of Practice events and identify new ways of exchanging knowledge across the PVE practice;
• Content and user management of the PVE Microsoft Teams Channels including uploading new information, creation of folders/channels, correction/movement of misplaced content etc.;

• Develop thematic briefing notes, newsletter stories and case stories to facilitate learning and communication;
• Support data and knowledge visualisation through developing knowledge maps, visually appealing learning summaries, and basic design of knowledge products.
• Flag relevant new research and publications;
• Other tasks as required by the project team.

Competencies

• A well-organized individual with the ability to multi-task;
• Ability to work productively and effectively with others and individually;
• An analytical mindset and an ability to identify gaps in knowledge and identify issues and solutions;
• A tech-savvy individual with passion for creating enabling structures supporting organizational knowledge and learning;
• Respect for the principles of the United Nations Charter and the UNDP Statement of Purpose.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Applicants to the UNDP internship programme must at the time of application meet one of the following requirements: 

• Be enrolled in a graduate school programme (second university degree or equivalent, or higher);
• Be enrolled in the final academic year of a first university degree programme (minimum bachelor’s level or equivalent); 
• Have graduated with a university degree in relevant fields such as Environmental Sciences, Health Sciences, Communication, Social Sciences, ICT or other related fields, and, if selected, must start the internship within one-year of graduation.

 Work Experience & Skillset:

• Some experience in knowledge management, database management, information management or related activities is required;
• Familiarity and experience with Peacebuilding, conflict prevention and/or prevention of violent extremism;
• Knowledge of data visualization using graphic software such as Photoshop and InDesign preferred;
• Excellent verbal and written communication;
• Research and analytic skills;
• Trained in or first-hand experience in structuring an archive/document management system and/or in optimising document flows;
• Strong IT skills including high level of comfort with Microsoft Office, including PowerPoint, Excel, Teams and SharePoint solutions;
• Previous related work experience in a national or an international entity would be an asset but is not required.

 Languages:

• Fluency in English required.
• Fluency in French preferred.