Communications Specialist

WEC Background information

UNOPS Water and Energy Cluster (WEC) supports the design and management of multi-stakeholder initiatives by providing services in financial and grant management, procurement, human resources, and project management.The cluster has supported projects in the areas of water resource management, climate change adaptation, mitigation and transparency, energy access and distribution and environmental conservation under the Paris Agreement. 

The WEC has also supported operations and financial management services, in Vienna, the rest of the ECR region and beyond.The main partners include UN agencies, bilateral agreements (with the Nordics, Germany, and Italy ), the Green Climate Fund and several NGOs (such as CIFF and CWF).

Initiative for Climate Action Transparency

The Initiative for Climate Action Transparency (ICAT) helps countries better assess the impacts of their climate policies and actions, and fulfil their transparency commitments under the Paris Agreement. It does this by increasing the overall transparency capacities of countries, including the capacity to assess the contribution of climate policies and actions on countries’ development objectives, and providing appropriate methodological information and tools to support evidence-based policy-making. ICAT’s innovative approach is to integrate these two aspects.

ICAT works with over 30 developing countries worldwide to support their work on NDCs, including tracking of implementation, further policy development and related MRV.  Work covers sectoral policies (renewables, energy efficiency, transport, etc.) and cross-cutting aspects such as the link to sustainable development benefits, transformational change, and integration of subnational and non-state actors.

ICAT is funded by the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation (CIFF), the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety (BMUB), the Italian Ministry of the Environment (IMELS) and the ClimateWorks Foundation.

Under the overall guidance and supervision of the ICAT Director, the incumbent is responsible for drafting and implementing a communication strategy for ICAT covering internal and external communications, coordinating and administrating the ICAT website and other outreach material, designing and implementing social media content, managing databases and maintaining and updating all digital and online assets. He/She will contribute to the ICAT's communications and outreach goals and targets by providing support to partners, administration, and advice, as well as monitoring of communication activities. 

The Communications Specialist is expected to deliver the following functions:

Communications strategy:

• Develop a proposal for the communications strategy for ICAT, including social media guidelines, to ensure coordinated, targeted and coherent communication with existing partners, future prospects and external audiences in line with key messaging across various initiative and action areas, and coordinate its implementation;
• Coordinate the ICAT communications group in consultation with ICAT Director, consisting of representatives of the ICAT Implementing Partners, which includes managing regular communications calls;
• Provide social media strategies to support and strengthen work by partners and initiatives in order to promote ICAT activities and objectives;
• Prepare usage statistics and other reports and analyze traffic to the website and other related mediums; conduct ad hoc surveys, and keep abreast of current developments in technology and undertake investigations of new initiatives where appropriate; planning on website policy and guidelines,

External communications:

• Maintain the ICAT website, in collaboration with the implementing partners of ICAT;
• Prepare content and creative inputs to ICAT communication activities and events, including follow-up with partners through the planning and execution of integrated multi-channel communication (website, social media, email marketing, webinars, side events to global climate conferences, etc.);
• Preparation of outreach material, such as flyers, brochures, power-point presentations, regular newsletters etc.;
• Specify appropriate communication channels, dissemination methods and media such as video, print, web/online media, traditional media, and social media, among others, to effectively communicate key messages to specific stakeholders;
• Respond to external information requests;
• Support partnership and relationships management with other initiatives and organizations;
• Support donor relationship management, by developing proposals for a donor outreach and fund-raising strategy and support its implementation;

Knowledge management and internal communications:

• Support of the development of a knowledge management activities and preparation of tools for implementing it;
• Support ICAT Director in developing ICAT internal communication flows with the Donor Steering Committee, the Advisory Committee and the Initiative Coordination Team;
• Develop the preparation of project and programmatic documents for expanding ICAT;
• Provide any additional support as required.

Education and Experience

• Advanced University degree (Master's degree or equivalent) in International Relations, Environmental Management, Communication or any other relevant subject is required;
• A first level University degree with a combination of 2 additional years of relevant past experience may be accepted in lieu of advanced university degree.
• A minimum of 5 years (7 years if combined with a Bachelor’s degree) of progressively responsible experience within the fields of communication is required. Experience with climate policy and sustainable development  is highly desirable;
• Experience of working within the international development sector, and on climate action and transparency matters in particular, is a significant asset; 
• Experience in web design is desirable;
• Experience working with social media and website management (including content creation) is desirable;
• Knowledge of the UN climate process is desirable.

• Strong Microsoft Office Suite skills required. Experience with Adobe In-Design is an asset.

• Fluency in English is required
• Working knowledge of another, official UN language is desirable

• Please note that the closing date is midnight Copenhagen time
• Applications received after the closing date will not be considered.
• Only those candidates that are short-listed for interviews will be notified.
• Qualified female candidates are strongly encouraged to apply.
• UNOPS seeks to reasonably accommodate candidates with special needs, upon request.
• Work life harmonization - UNOPS values its people and recognizes the importance of balancing professional and personal demands. We have a progressive policy on work-life harmonization and offer several flexible working options. This policy applies to UNOPS personnel on all contract types
• UNOPS seeks to reasonably accommodate candidates with special needs, upon request.
• For staff positions only, UNOPS reserves the right to appoint a candidate at a lower level than the advertised level of the post
• The incumbent is responsible to abide by security policies, administrative instructions, plans and procedures of the UN Security Management System and that of UNOPS.  

It is the policy of UNOPS to conduct background checks on all potential recruits.
Recruitment in UNOPS is contingent on the results of such checks.