Lead Quality Engineer

UNOPS will be leading the implementation of a three-year World bank funded multi million USD Project “Enhancing Community Resilience and Local Governance (ECRP)' in South Sudan starting in August 2020 with the Objective is to improve access to basic services and strengthen community institutions in South Sudan.  

The ECRP is a follow on Project to the Local Governance and Service Delivery Project (LGSDP) that was implemented in South Sudan from 2014 and involved the transfer of block grants from the national government directly to county government with the Objective of helping develop an annual intergovernmental fiscal transfer system for local development. 

The ECRP Project will be implemented by UNOPS and the International Organisation for Migration, with UNOPS being the primary grant recipient and responsible authority for the establishment and implementation of the Project Management Unit (PMU) whose primary tasks will include: project management, stakeholder and communication management, fiduciary and procurement management, community engagement, results management and risk management.  UNOPS will be the grant recipient  and will  be directly accountable to the World Bank in all aspects related project delivery (Project Management - Social and Environmental Safeguards, Fiduciary Oversight and Procurement Planning, Infrastructure Quality and Standards; Project Implementation – of community infrastructure as per agreed scope; as well as directly liaising with the Government of South Sudan).

The ECRP comprises the following four components:-

Component 1: Community Infrastructure and Services This component will provide block grants to boma-level communities to fund infrastructure and service delivery initiatives based on the priorities established by Boma Development Councils (BDCs). Other than a short negative menu of projects that the program cannot fund, communities are free to identify a wide variety of other types of initiatives to meet their needs.    

Component 2: Local Institution Strengthening. This component will provide support and capacity building assistance to boma and payam level institutions as well as county governments. The primary focus of ECRP’s capacity-building will be among boma level counterparts, followed by payam and county level institutions.

Component 3: Project Management and Learning.   This component will support (a) project management including technical planning, financial management (FM), procurement, social and environment risk management, and communications; (b) project monitoring which includes a geo-enabled monitoring system and beneficiary feedback/grievance redress mechanism (GRM); (c) continuous data collection on beneficiary impacts and social dynamics; and (d) just-in-time studies as and when needs arise. Such studies may include O&M study, technical assessment of the subprojects, GBV assessment, and so on.

Component 4: Contingency emergency response. A contingency emergency response component (CERC), initially without a budget allocation, will allow for the rapid reallocation of project funds in the event of natural or man-made crisis and major disease outbreaks of public health importance during the implementation of the project,

The ECRP will be implemented throughout the country’s 10 states and select target counties. The community infrastructure sub-projects are divided by area and implemented by IOM and UNOPS separately. While the two UN-agencies will implement their respective projects, a harmonized approach will be managed and governed by UNOPS through the Infrastructure Compliance Guidelines and the Project Implementation Manual. The anticipated sectors for sub-projects will include water supply and sanitation; rural roads; primary health facilities; primary schools; small scale irrigation schemes and community markets. UNOPS will be responsible for quality assurance of all sub-projects during the planning, design and construction stages, through a monitoring plan. IOM will be responsible for community mobilization and capacity support envisioned in Component 2.

The Lead Quality Engineer will be part of the ECRP Project Management Unit and will provide advice, oversight and support to all infrastructure projects across the project. The Lead Quality Engineer will report to the PMU Senior Project Manager

S/he must be able to apply, independently, the below duties and responsibilities of the project success criteria:

General Construction:

• Support community  infrastructure Project managers  and engineers to plan and coordinate work activities.
• Review Bill of Quantities (BoQ) prior to procurement actions, when needed
• Support Project managers develop and monitor their respective Quality, Health and Safety, Environment plans.
• Provide monthly reports to the PMU Senior Project Manager summarizing problems related to quality, health and safety, environmental issues  and other issues relating to possible delays, cost overruns, variations and any other matter related to infrastructure projects following discussions with PMs.

Feasibility study/needs assessment

• Support PMs complete construction needs assessment, organize preliminary studies
• Support the review of requests for new construction and/or rehabilitation works.
• Review assessments and reports with recommendations for follow up actions.
• Assist the Project Managers in redacting the tender dossier, with particular focus to the technical documents (drawings, BoQ, technical specification and standards).

Design Management

• Assist the Project managers to outline design requirements (e.g. timeline) to procure design services, including concept, preliminary and final stages where applicable.
• Assist the Project managers to manage the design plan ensuring deliverables are available on time, and to the required quality.
• Support all infrastructure Project managers across all Components with their design review submissions to HQ.
• Assist the procurement team with technical assistance in preparation of tender documentation and bid analysis where required.

 Construction supervision and oversight

• Ensure all infrastructure projects have effective quality control systems in place.
• Support PMs, if needed, that the overall management of works implementation to ensure construction works are completed on time, within budget and to quality standards.
• Provide spot checks of supervision of the project work progress and quality for on time delivery.
• Assist the Project manager  in the preparation of project/contracts related documentations such as periodic progress reports, site monitoring reports, stakeholder meeting minutes, engineer’s instructions and variation orders, contractor’s bills review reports, certifications, client hand-over documents and contracts close-out reports.

Knowledge management

• Assist in providing training and technology transfer to project personnel and contractor’s personnel and advice on good construction practices, good environmental management practices, and appropriate health and safety standards during construction.
• Contribute to the dissemination and sharing of best practices and lessons learned for development planning and knowledge building.

Reporting

• Ensure accurate and timely reporting (monthly, quarterly, annual) and as required internally and externally
• Prepare and submit to the PMU Senior Project manager reports of the month-end, summarizing progress quality control issues, resourcing and scheduling issues, and any other pertinent facts as required.
• Produce any appropriate documentation identified by the  PMU Senior Project Manager in a professional and accurate manner.