Office Assistant

IMPORTANT NOTICE: Please note that Closure Date and Time displayed above are based on date and time settings of your personal device

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Staff in the General Service category are recruited locally from the Primary Location area, which is where the office is located

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• FAO is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality, background and culture
• Qualified female applicants, qualified nationals of non-and under-represented member nations and person with disabilities are encouraged to apply
• Everyone who works for FAO is required to adhere to the highest standards of integrity and professional conduct, and to uphold our values. FAO has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and FAO, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination.
• All selected candidates will undergo rigorous reference and background checks
• All applications will be treated with the strictest confidentiality
• The incumbent may be re-assigned to different activities and/or duty stations depending on the evolving needs of the Organization.

Organizational Setting

The Food and Agriculture Organization is the specialized Agency of the United Nations leading international efforts to defeat hunger. FAO works in over 130 countries worldwide to achieve food security for all and make sure that people have regular access to high-quality food. FAO's Office of Emergencies and Resilience leads the Organization's efforts to support member countries in their endeavours to save agricultural livelihoods of people and communities and enhance their resilience in the face of disasters, crises and conflicts. The Organization strives to secure sustainable development gains while ensuring that all interventions to support agriculture and food systems are risk-informed and sustainably productive. Food crisis contexts require a well-organized, highly prioritized, and well-resourced humanitarian and resilience programme to play a meaningful role in the relevant fora at national, regional and global levels. To claim its rightful place and to contribute meaningfully to relevant SDGs in food crises contexts, timeliness and speed in generating quality information and analysis together with agility in processes, partnerships, and delivery are central. In short, prevention and mitigation of disasters, whether related to natural hazards, plant and animal pests and diseases and/or conflict, together with being prepared and able to respond when disasters hit, require structured and agile system that is able to carry out effective processes of risk assessment and risk management. The Office of Emergencies and Resilience (OER) is composed of three main clusters. These are: 1) Overall Leadership and Management of OER, including the Global Food Security Cluster and the Global Network Against Food Crises; 2) Programme Quality and Management, including the Strategic Positioning team, the Evidence for Programming team, the Programme and Results team and the Enabling Environment team; 3) Programme Implementation including the Country Support team, the Global Support team and the Resource Mobilization and Communication team.

Main Purpose

The Office Assistant performs a large variety of routine administrative transactions and office support functions contributing to the smooth and efficient running of the work unit.

Supervision Received/Exercised

The Office Assistant reports to one or more professional staff and receives guidance from the Emergency and Rehabilitation Officer of the Country Support team. He/she acts independently in routine matters. Supervision received is focused on the quality of the work performed and provides for on-the-job learning.

Working Relationships

The Office Assistant usually interacts with a wide variety of colleagues within the work unit and with immediate clients within the Organization, providing routine administrative and office support services.

Key Functions/Results

• Arrange appointments for the supervisor, receive visitors, place and screen telephone calls and respond to routine requests for information;
• Provide office, administrative and logistics support to meetings, committees, conferences, etc.;
• Review, record, distribute and process incoming mail and correspondence; follow-up on pending actions;
• Respond or draft responses to standard/ routine correspondence and other communications; use word processing package to produce a wide variety of large, complex documents and reports;
• Proofread documents and format texts for accuracy, grammar, punctuation and style, as well as for adherence to established standards;
• Initiate general administrative tasks in the computerized financial / travel / human resources systems;
• Make travel and hotel arrangements and prepare travel authorizations/claims for staff as required;
• Provide assistance in the administrative processing of vacancy announcements and consultants' contracts;
• Research, compile and organize information and reference materials from various sources for reports; create spreadsheets and presentations; manage and update databases for mailing lists and other information; and maintain electronic and paper files;
• Perform other duties as required.

Impact Of Work

The incumbent's work impacts on the timely and efficient delivery of office support services and on the overall output of the work unit.

CANDIDATES WILL BE ASSESSED AGAINST THE FOLLOWING

Minimum Requirements

Education: Secondary School Education
Experience: Three years of relevant experience in office support work
Languages: Working knowledge (Level C) of English and limited knowledge (Level B) of one of the other FAO languages (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish).
IT Skills: Good knowledge of the MS Office applications, Internet and office technology equipment

Competencies

• Results Focus
• Teamwork
• Communication
• Building Effective Relationships
• Knowledge Sharing and Continuous Improvement

Technical Skills

• Good knowledge of communication and documentation standards
• Good knowledge of corporate computerized financial / travel / human resources systems and administrative procedures and policies

Desirable Qualifications And Skills

• Good knowledge of the organizational structure
• Knowledge of FAO HR, procurement, budget procedures
• Experience in emergency operations

Assessment

Evaluation of qualified applicants may include an assessment exercise and a technical / competency-based interview.

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