Policy Specialist

Based in Geneva, the Europe and Central Asia Regional Office (ECR) supports UNOPS offices throughout the region through: management, financial and programmatic oversight of global and country-specific portfolios, clusters and operations centres, including hosting services; fund and management advisory services; project implementation; procuring goods and services; and managing human resources.

ECR ensures that projects are executed to the highest standards, providing a shared knowledge base and ensuring that best practices and lessons learned are disseminated between business units and projects across the entire region.

ECR operates global portfolios from offices in Geneva, Brussels and New York, and country-specific programmes from its operations and project centres located in Eastern Europe and Central Asian countries.

Launched in September 2010, the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) Movement catalyses collective action towards ending malnutrition in all its forms. Led by 60 SUN Countries and the Indian States of Jharkhand, Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh, the SUN Movement is an unprecedented effort to bring together stakeholders – governments, national and international civil society organisations, businesses, the UN system, researchers and scientists across different sectors – to create an enabling environment to improve nutrition.

SUN countries, and all stakeholders in the Movement are committed to scaling up nutrition, by strengthening four strategic processes at country-level as set out in the SUN Movement Strategy and Roadmap 2016-2020:

1. Expanding and sustaining an enabling political environment;
2. Prioritising effective actions that contribute to good nutrition;
3. Implementing actions aligned with national common results frameworks;
4. Effectively using, and significantly increasing, financial resources for nutrition.

The SUN Movement Secretariat was established in 2012 as a small coordinating mechanism to support SUN countries, helping them connect with each other for support and advice, and ensuring coordinated and coherent support from actors in a series of networks. The Secretariat also maintains momentum across the SUN Movement, catalyzing interest and action in new or problematic nutrition issues. Finally, the Secretariat tracks and communicates the progress made by each SUN country, and the Movement as a whole.

The SUN Movement Coordinator, a UN Assistant Secretary General, oversees implementation of the Strategy and Roadmap, leads the SUN Movement Secretariat and represents the SUN Movement globally. Day-to-day management of the Secretariat is the responsibility of the Director.

Central to the SUN Movement Secretariat, and reporting to the Coordinator of the Country Liaison Team, is a team of Policy Specialists who liaise with SUN countries. Each Specialist is responsible for establishing and maintaining a dynamic working relationship with 8-10 SUN countries. The Specialist’s primary contact in each SUN country is a SUN Focal Point. Specialists must also work closely with UN agencies, civil society organizations, businesses, academics and other development partners active in each country. Specialists actively assist SUN Focal Points, and the multi-stakeholder platforms they work with, to: achieve their objectives, implement national nutrition plans, strengthen policy, legislation, institutions and actions for improved nutritionat country level.

 Policy specialists  ensure that the broader national or international community of stakeholders is aware of the challenges each SUN country is facing, and mobilized to provide technical assistance. Specialists support the stakeholders in creating and strengthening opportunities in each country for accelerating progress, scaling up results, share and learn. Like all in the SUN Movement, Specialists are vigilant that the SUN Movement’s principles are always upheld, everywhere.

Policy Specialists must therefore be in frequent contact with a large and diverse network of in-country stakeholders, primarily via telephone, teleconference, and email – often in different time zones. They must be able to sustain productive exchanges with actors that are busy, and whose means of communication can be limited. Specialists also travel periodically to the countries in their portfolio, or to selected global events. Specialists produce high-quality written or oral briefs for members of SUN Networks, the SUN Coordinator and the Secretariat, and external audiences. These briefs should make clear recommendations based on political-economy analysis, data and insights into policy processes.

Policy Specialists are expected to be proactive, innovative, entrepreneurial, agile and result oriented, demonstrating a high standard of professionalism and integrity.

Policy Specialists have the following responsibilities in support of a portfolio of SUN Countries

A.    Support SUN Countries  including:

• Support with their strategies and priorities;
• Support (further) development of a stakeholder platform that is aligned and focused on implementation of scalable and replicable results;
• Support with the Identification and encouragement of opportunities for government and other actors to accelerate impact in-country;
• Support peer-to-peer learning between SUN Countries
• Assist with the facilitation of virtual exchanges or meetings among groups of SUN Countries facing similar nutritional challenges, among those in comparable contexts, or neighbors in Regional Economic Communities;
• In response to SUN Countries’ requests, broker access to effective and predictable support from within the Movement, and maintain up-to-date records of country needs and priorities;
• Identify and highlight common, or recurring capacity gaps and support to overcome them and prevent new gaps

B.    Track and analyze country progress, challenges and opportunities, including:

• Assist with the Movement’s Monitoring, Evaluation, Accountability and Learning system;
• Assist SUN countries with organizing and conducting their annual Joint Assessment ensuring their timely and quality participation;
• Assist with the SUN Movement Annual Progress Report, country briefs, case studies, and the SUN website by compiling and analyzing country information, and documenting lessons learnt on effective multi-sectoral and multi-stakeholder approaches to improving nutrition;
• Assist with other documents as required by SUN Countries, Networks, the Executive Committee, and Lead Group

• 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.
• 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
• 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/interns.
Recruitment/internship in UNOPS is contingent on the results of such checks.

This position is based in Switzerland and the fee is subject to taxes levied by the Swiss authorities.

UNOPS supports the successful implementation of its partners’ peacebuilding, humanitarian and development projects around the world. Our mission is to serve people in need by expanding the ability of the United Nations, governments and other partners to manage projects, infrastructure and procurement in a sustainable and efficient manner.

Working in some of the world’s most challenging environments, our vision is to advance sustainable implementation practices, always satisfying or surpassing our partners’ expectations.

With over 7,000 personnel spread across 80 countries, UNOPS offers its partners the logistical, technical and management knowledge they need, wherever they need it.

A flexible structure and global reach means that we can quickly respond to our partners' needs, while offering the benefits of economies of scale.