Consultancy – Brochure to Promote Business Engagement in Key Strategies for Humanitarian Preparedness and Response - LACRO, Panama City

UNICEF LACRO is looking for a consultant to develop 2 to 4 page brochures to explain to the private sector - current partners and prospects - how they can engage more strategically across the humanitarian cycle and according to the Core Commitments for Children in Humanitarian Action in order to safeguard children’s rights and ensure more efficient and impactful response to disasters.

UNICEF works in some of the world’s toughest places, to reach the world’s most disadvantaged children. To save their lives. To defend their rights. To help them fulfill their potential. 

Across 190 countries and territories, we work for every child, everywhere, every day, to build a better world for everyone. 

And we never give up. 

For every child, empowerment

How can you make a difference? 

Background

UNICEF promotes the rights and welfare of all children and adolescents in everything we do. Together with our allies, we work in 190 countries and territories to transform this commitment into practical actions that benefit all children, especially focusing our efforts on reaching the most vulnerable and excluded, worldwide.

The UNICEF Latin America and Caribbean Regional Office is based in in Panama, operating in 36 territories, including 24 country offices.

UNICEF works to put the rights and well-being of the most disadvantaged children at the heart of the social, political, and economic agenda, in line with our equity focus, working across our organization and with our partners in government, civil society and the private sector to support shifts in public policy, fuel social engagement, and increase investment for children. For more information about UNICEF and its work. (www.unicef.org/lac).

The Business and Community Resilience (BCR) initiative was officially kicked off in 2020 with a bootcamp that introduced the initiative and allowed participants to explore and share ideas about how they felt the private sector could catalyze child-centered humanitarian action and resilience. Since then, four BCR focal points are in place at the regional and country levels (Eastern Caribbean Area, Guatemala and Peru), steering the initiative forward. Private sector engagement in relation to humanitarian action and resilience was embedded into the three BCR country CPDs (MCDP case of ECA) and further streamlined through annual work plans. Since 2020 there are 13 CPDs that mention working with the private sector in relation to humanitarian action and resilience, which clearly highlights the interest to not only diversify resources, but also the importance to build partnerships with private sector actors at the national level catalyzing localization agendas in line with the Core Commitments for Children. Also, since the inception of BCR in LAC eight countries have shown interest in the initiative.

During the past 20 months, key public and private relationships have been fostered with the national civil defense and inter-governmental bodies, multi-stakeholder business platforms, individual companies, UN agency private sector initiatives and more. Government bodies are keen to develop and execute training material, while private sector platforms interested in strategically finding ways to connecting with public entities to respond to disasters and build community resilience.

Preparedness continues to be an area that needs to be intentionally addressed. Everyone realizes it is priority but how and when needs grounding. UNICEF should not only include the private sector in its sectorial preparedness planning and activities, but it should also advocate with its partners to involve the private sector in preparedness activities (simulations, tabletop activities, contingency/response planning). The private sector is clearly seen as a partner in the Core Commitments for Children and private sector engagement is a cross-cutting change strategy. Also, there is space to work on Children’s Rights and Business in relation to the Children’s Rights and Business Principles – No. 9, focusing on respecting Children’s Rights in the context of emergencies and the increased focus of businesses on Environment, Social and Governance (ESG).

The Latin America and Caribbean regional office seeks to support UNICEF country office teams with their engagement and partnerships brokering with business. Currently the country offices face the challenge of lacking clarity or specificity when presenting the opportunity space and pitch to their business counterparts. This consultancy seeks to address this gap/ need with the development of brochures that feature the value proposition in key areas.

Purpose of the Assignment

UNICEF technical and representative staff need clear and concise materials that they can use and share with their counterparts from companies and industry chambers to start the conversation and open the door for creative ways of engagement across the humanitarian cycle.

UNICEF seeks a consultant to develop 6 brochures on the main strategies / interventions that UNICEF promotes towards the private sector in humanitarian action in the Latin America and Caribbean region.

The development of these brochures will be based on:
- Previous successful experiences and examples of participation of business in emergency preparedness and response, with UNICEF or with the humanitarian sector in general
- The prioritization of the most relevant ones to engage with business in their context
- The spaces where UNICEF Emergency, Climate Environment, Disaster Recovery and Risk Reduction (CEED), Development Programmes, Operations, Comms and Social and Behaviour Change (SBC) specialists see the most clear opportunities and relevance for children, adolescents and families in LAC
- The strategies which, according to UNICEF’s corporate / philanthropy partnerships specialists, would be best accepted by the private sector

In order to produce these brochures the consultant will consult the previously mentioned stakeholders, and then identify the most relevant strategies for the private sector and develop a solid, inspiring and engaging “commercial” pitch for each.

These brochures will clearly refer to the benchmarks of the Core Commitments for Children in Humanitarian Action (CCCs) and reinforce the message of “do no harm”, ensuring to protect children rights in any intervention proposed,
and support families of workers of these same companies. They will invite companies and sector to include children rights and needs of families in their Business Continuity Plans, thus also ensuring a stronger community and children resilience. They will also invite companies and chambers to participate to their national humanitarian coordination mechanisms and invite them to make their expert staff available when this expertise can be useful to prepare or respond to an emergency.

Ideally, we will test these strategies during a simulation exercise of a regional emergency (12-16 June) and then have the opportunity to make final adjustments depending on the reception of each brochure and learning from this simulation exercise.

Specific Tasks

1. In coordination with the Emergency Unit and the KM focal point, interview at least 10 key colleagues of UNICEF from Emergency, CEED, but also specific sectors (Supply, Monitoring, Private partnerships, etc.) in the regional office and globally when relevant.

2. Gather relevant data, examples, and identify UNICEF’s unique action along the emergency / humanitarian cycle, and those here business should be engaged and can provide a unique value.

3. Propose an impactful format for the brochures in terms of commercial narrative and content (very executive – 2 to 4 pages each).

4. Develop the brochures, together with expert colleagues.

5. Validate the brochure with the steering committee and with few selected business stakeholders (current UNICEF partners at regional and local level, from the sectors prioritized in the brochures), ideally in a simulation exercise.

Expected Results

The consultant will tentatively develop 7 brochures, for the following priorities:

1. General brochure on UNICEF's value chain in Emergency Preparedness and Response (EPR), outlining the entry points for business to strategically engage with UNICEF along the emergency / humanitarian cycle (from
preparedness, early warning / early action, standing capacity, early response and consolidated response). This "operational framework" will differentiate the role of business (large, medium and small companies), as well
as chambers, industry sectors and other relevant business actors). It will be the basis for developing a more detailed sectorial-focus support in EPR.
2. WASH,
3. Education,
4. Supplies and Logistics,
5. Data / Information management,
6. Social and behavior change & Accountability to Affected Populations,
7. Early Warning Systems.

The final list of brochures will be agreed with the steering committee (Emergency, CEED, PFP/ Partnerships) after the initial conversations of the consultants with colleagues as per described above.

The consultant will not be responsible for translation and design of the brochures.

Deliverables

To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have… 

Minimum Requirements and Qualifications

- Education University degree in business, humanitarian, communications or similar.

Work Experience

- A minimum of 5 years of relevant work experience in corporate / philanthropy partnership & fundraising
- Experience in marketing, sales or similar is an asset.
- Experience in humanitarian work is an asset.

Languages

- Fluency in Spanish and English is required.

Other skills and attributes

- Ability to work independently, with low levels of supervision. Strong focus on results.
- Able to work effectively in a multicultural environment.

Administrative details

Supervision

The contractor will work under the direct supervision of the LACRO Corporate Alliances Specialist, and report deliverables to an ad-hoc steering committee.

Workplace

This is a home-based consultancy.

Duration

The duration of this consultancy is for approximately 2.5 months, from 17th of April until the 30th of June 2023

Insurance

The selected contractor must demonstrate a proof of medical insurance prior to the beginning of the consultancy and must be valid for the entire duration of the contract. In duty stations where UNICEF provides medical evacuation, the medical insurance that the contractor holds should include provisions for medical evacuation.

How to Apply

Application should be submitted online and should include: Resume, Cover Letter and Financial proposal. Qualified candidates are requested to submit daily, monthly, and total fees in their financial proposal.

Travel

No travel is involved for this consultancy.

For every Child, you demonstrate… 

UNICEF's values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, Accountability, and Sustainability (CRITAS). 

To view our competency framework, please visit  here. 

******  

UNICEF is here to serve the world’s most disadvantaged children and our global workforce must reflect the diversity of those children. The UNICEF family is committed to include everyone, irrespective of their race/ethnicity, age, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, nationality, socio-economic background, or any other personal characteristic.

UNICEF offers reasonable accommodation for consultants/individual contractors with disabilities. This may include, for example, accessible software, travel assistance for missions or personal attendants. We encourage you to disclose your disability during your application in case you need reasonable accommodation during the selection process and afterwards in your assignment. 

UNICEF has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UNICEF, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. UNICEF also adheres to strict child safeguarding principles. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles and will therefore undergo rigorous reference and background checks. Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check. 

Remarks:  

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process. 

Individuals engaged under a consultancy or individual contract will not be considered “staff members” under the Staff Regulations and Rules of the United Nations and UNICEF’s policies and procedures, and will not be entitled to benefits provided therein (such as leave entitlements and medical insurance coverage). Their conditions of service will be governed by their contract and the General Conditions of Contracts for the Services of Consultants and Individual Contractors. Consultants and individual contractors are responsible for determining their tax liabilities and for the payment of any taxes and/or duties, in accordance with local or other applicable laws. 

The selected candidate is solely responsible to ensure that the visa (applicable) and health insurance required to perform the duties of the contract are valid for the entire period of the contract. Selected candidates are subject to confirmation of fully-vaccinated status against SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) with a World Health Organization (WHO)-endorsed vaccine, which must be met prior to taking up the assignment. It does not apply to consultants who will work remotely and are not expected to work on or visit UNICEF premises, programme delivery locations or directly interact with communities UNICEF works with, nor to travel to perform functions for UNICEF for the duration of their consultancy contracts.