Principal Evaluation Officer

Grade: IS-5
Deadline: 21 May 2023 (11:59 PM KST)
Job Category: International
Salary: USD 138,750 net (plus attractive benefits, that include the following allowances (as appliable): Relocation, dependency, education assistance and home country travel)

Introduction
The Green Climate Fund (GCF) is a multilateral fund created to make significant, ambitious contributions to the global efforts to combat climate change. GCF contributes to achieving the objectives of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Paris Agreement. In the context of sustainable development, GCF aims to promote a paradigm shift towards low-emission and climate resilient development pathways by providing support to developing countries to limit or reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and to adapt to climate change, while accounting for their needs and supporting particularly those that are vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change. The GCF is governed by a Board, composed of an equal number of members from developed and developing countries. It is operated by an independent Secretariat headed by an Executive Director. The Independent Evaluation Unit (IEU) of the GCF is mandated by the GCF Board under paragraph 60 of its Governing Instrument to inform its decision making. The IEU has a mandate for both an accountability function and for supporting learning. These are central to the GCF as a learning organization as also laid out in its Governing Instrument.

The IEU has several objectives: 
a)    Informing the decision-making by the Board and identifying and disseminating lessons learned, contributing to guiding the Fund and stakeholders as a learning institution, providing strategic guidance; 
b)    Conducting periodic independent evaluations of the Fund’s performance in order to provide an objective assessment of the Fund’s results and the effectiveness and efficiency of its activities; and 
c)    Providing evaluation reports to the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) for purposes of periodic reviews of the financial mechanism of the Convention. 
 

Position Objective
The Independent Evaluation Unit (IEU) of the Green Climate Fund (GCF) is seeking to recruit a Principal Evaluation Officer. The Principal will report to the Head of the IEU or another officer designated by the Head, and will be responsible for undertaking various functions under the pillars of the IEU. 

The incumbent will participate in and assist in oversight of the IEU work related to learning, uptake, dissemination, and syntheses. The incumbent will play a key role in engaging IEU stakeholders, synthesizing lessons from evaluative evidence (internal and external) and ensuring that the IEU is using state of the art methods to assure uptake and use of evaluative evidence using behavioral insights and communication techniques. He/she will also play a key role in ensuring that IEU’s dissemination is state of the art and multi-platform and speaks with a diversity of audiences while advocating for the need and use of high-quality credible evidence. She/he will also lead in generating lessons learned, good practices and recommendations that can further strengthen the design and implementation of GCF operations. The incumbent will disseminate outcomes of evaluation syntheses while keeping abreast of developments in the field. The position requires that the incumbent has two types of skills and experience – skills on evaluation and high quality synthesis work, and skills and training on communications and dissemination. The incumbent will find themselves best equipped if they are formally trained in communications, facilitation or outreach. It is expected that the scope of this role will expand to include some management work depending on the needs of the Unit. The incumbent should have a keen instinct to learn and train him/herself in skills that he/she may not have at the beginning.

Purpose

• Conduct and lead evaluations to assess / review the efficiency and effectiveness of GCF’s policies and strategies, operations structures and funded activities; 
• Provide syntheses of evaluation findings and contribute in other ways to IEU’s knowledge and outreach; 
• Provide intellectual leadership to the IEU on evaluation methods (in particular, qualitative tools), and substantive issues related to evaluations; 
• Identify key insights with qualitative and quantitative approaches to synthesize findings from evaluation reports and related sources;
• Engage with experts to help generate and curate evaluation related evidence;
• Be able to use and leverage creative methods to ensure high participation events such as conferences, workshops, seminars and other IEU related events;
• Work closely with key stakeholders including the Head of IEU and other consultants and staff to develop sensitivity and understanding around key concepts of evaluation including summative evaluations, implementation/process evaluations, and impact evaluations;
• Perform other related duties including travel, as required.

Engagement

• Be an excellent advocate for high quality credible evaluative evidence in climate change and be IEU’s representative internally within the GCF and externally;
• Highlight the strategic implications of findings and raise strategic issues for further consideration for GCF Secretariats and governing bodies;
• Be able to build a wide network that responds to and uses IEU’s work;
• Be a good team member with an excellent attitude, ethic for hard work and be able to troubleshoot;

Delivery

• Participate in and manage, as required, the IEU work on learning, syntheses, knowledge management, uptake and dissemination. 
• Participate in and manage, as required, IEU-led evaluations under the overall guidance of the Head of the Independent Evaluation Unit or designate;
• Create and successfully deliver knowledge products and processes that help consolidate evaluation knowledge and share and strengthen IEU’s evaluation feedback and learning objectives;
• Be able to think creatively while using key insights from behavioral insights to help construct knowledge related communication products that go the extra mile to ensure take-up and use;
• Inspire and feed into IEU’s syntheses, learning, communication and uptake sub-strategy with key insights from various disciplines while ensuring that the IEU is at the forefront of this thinking and practice.

Requirements (Education, experience, technical competencies required of the job)

• Master’s or Ph.D. degree in natural resources, environment policy, communications, or evaluation; 
• 11 years of relevant experience or equivalent combination of relevant education and experience after a Master’s degree; Or bachelor degree plus two more years of experience. 
• Significant experience with evaluations for a multilateral institution, diverse evaluation experience is essential; candidates may be asked to share samples or executive summaries of three evaluations they have led or co-led;
• Deep experience with devising and implementing strategies for uptake and dissemination is essential; excellent vision related to communication, advocacy for high-quality evaluations and evidence and Evidence-based action and policy;
• Expertise in methods for evaluations, in particular to strengthen IEU capacity on qualitative tools;  
• Expertise in at least one sector related to climate change (e.g., biodiversity, livelihoods, etc.) in addition to expertise in evaluations; 
• A strong track record of peer-reviewed publications in a relevant discipline is an advantage;
• Experience living and working in a developing country is an advantage;
• Experience across multiple sectors would serve well in this role that works with multiple partners; 
• Ability to speak publicly and represent the IEU, in additional to an ability to undertake individual level engagement and advocacy on behalf of the Unit and the Head; 
• Strong interpersonal skills, and highly developed cultural sensitivity in communicating with all levels of staff and external clients, both orally and in writing; 
• Willingness to cooperate with other staff in a team and contribute to a harmonious environment is essential; 
• Proven ability to work innovatively within a team environment;
• Mature judgment and absolute commitment to confidentiality; 
• Excellent communication skills and high emotional quotient; and 
• Excellent written and oral communication skills in English are essential for this position; knowledge of another UN language would be an advantage.
• Candidates who meet most of the core requirements but fall short of educational or total full-time work experience, may be considered for underfill at the discretion of the hiring manager/Division Director. 
   

The closing date for application is 21 May 2023. Applications submitted after the deadline may not be considered.

*The person assessed by the Selection Panel as most suitable for the position will be proposed for appointment. Selection among short-listed candidates will also take into account performance at interview, appropriate testing, and references.

Applications from women and nationals of developing countries are strongly encouraged.