Infrastructure Project Management (IPM) Advisor (mentoring) - Retainer, multiple positions, Multiple positions

UNOPS is an operational arm of the United Nations, supporting the successful implementation of its partners’ peacebuilding, humanitarian and development projects around the world. Our mission is to help people build better lives and countries achieve peace and sustainable development.

UNOPS areas of expertise cover infrastructure, procurement, project management, financial management and human resources.

Working with us

UNOPS offers short- and long-term work opportunities in diverse and challenging environments across the globe. We are looking for creative, results-focused professionals with skills in a range of disciplines.

Diversity

With over 5,000 UNOPS personnel and approximately 7,400 personnel recruited on behalf of our partners, spread across 80 countries, our workforce represents a range of nationalities and cultures. We promote a balanced and diverse labour force — a strength that helps us better understand and address our partners’ needs. We continually strive to improve our gender balance through initiatives and policies that encourage the recruitment of qualified female candidates.

Work life harmonization

UNOPS values its people and recognizes the importance of balancing professional and personal demands.

Within UNOPS, Implementation Practices and Standards (IPS) is responsible for the UNOPS delivery practices. IPS provides thought leadership, standards and oversight as support to the successful delivery of programmes and projects within UNOPS service lines (infrastructure, procurement, project management, human resources and financial management services). IPS is comprised of the Infrastructure and Project Management Group and the Procurement Group which aims to reduce organizational risks, improve project performance, and promote excellence across UNOPS projects through the Standards Management Framework; and provides organisational oversight on the application of standards. These Groups also support the positioning of UNOPS in the UN system and development sector in Infrastructure, Project Management and Procurement.

IPMG has identified a need for a bilingual Infrastructure Project Management (IPM) Advisor (Retainer) to provide mentoring to UNOPS Project Executives and Head of Programmes through the Corporate Learning budget. It is planned that the scope of this development activity will expand to also provide coaching/mentoring to Project Managers as part of their onboarding and/or professional development/learning path. 

The successful candidate is expected to have in depth knowledge and hands-on experience in portfolio and/or programme and/or project management throughout the project lifespan. This will include, but not be limited to, portfolio and quarterly assurance management understanding, development and acceptance of new projects, project governance, project delivery, management by exception, risks, issues and lessons learned recognition, use of oneUNOPS Projects, etc. 

This is a home-based retainer contract. This retainer position falls under the UNOPS Corporate retainer pool, which is administered by the Implementation Practices and Standards (IPS) Portfolio Support (PS) team. Several contracts will be offered under this recruitment, with the intent to recruit a mix of personnel with various language capacity, in English, French and Spanish. 

The functions/responsibilities/key results of this job description are generic and may not always be applicable, nor be comprehensive, for all missions/assignments under this job title. The specific tasks and deliverables for each retainer assignment may vary and will be detailed in the terms of reference developed for each assignment by the requesting office/unit. Under this contract type, the assignments will vary in scope and duration - ranging from short term assignments of a few hours at a time to longer blocks of time (e.g. several weeks or months full time, and up to a year). Work may also vary with regards to the time zone / location. Whilst most assignments can be delivered working from home, some may require presence in HQ and/or international travel on occasion, including to remote or post-conflict environments. 

All UNOPS personnel are required to share a common understanding of UNOPS’ and the UN’s mandate, policies and activities. To this end, UNOPS Personnel must complete a set of mandatory courses, at no cost to UNOPS. Refer to the section “additional information (general)”.

Additionally, for this role, the successful incumbents will be required to take the UNOPS Project management certification (Level 1 and Level 2) when made available. The study time will be covered by UNOPS.

All corporate retainers are invited to participate to a one-hour induction session (or two 30 minutes sessions), at no cost to UNOPS, where they are guided through UNOPS retainer management tool, the retainer contract modality and their expertise area in the UNOPS context.

The objective of this assignment is the provision of one on one coaching to Project Executives and/or Engagement Authorities, as well as Project Managers throughout offices in UNOPS, to improve their understanding of their accountabilities as per the PMM. At times, this will be driving operational process changes and providing supporting technical information to help Project Executives manage their portfolios of projects and Project Managers deliver their projects. The role will require:

1. Contribute to the development of a methodology to identify and select eligible personnel (Project Executives, Engagement Authorities, Project Managers) for this development activity, as well as relevant KPIs for monitoring and evaluation purposes.

2. Contribute to the development of support materials, presentations, guidance material, tool, techniques and approach.

3. Coordination with relevant Regional Offices and IPMG as well as the other mentors/coaches involved with this development activity on choice of PEs/EAs for each advisor to contact.

4. Develop a capacity building plan and organise meetings/sessions with selected UNOPS personnel.

5. Provide tailor made coaching/mentoring and training, based on knowledge and best practices sharing at peer level.

6. Provide monthly reports.

As a technical expert, the incumbent may be asked to provide advice on the project approach relevant to specialist areas of expertise, noting this is in line with the KM and PMM recognition for use of technical experts where appropriate.

• An Advanced University degree (Master's or equivalent such as MEng, MSc) in a relevant related field is required.

• A Bachelor degree combined with 2 years of relevant work experience can be accepted in lieu of the Master’s degree.

• A combination of project management and civil engineering education is desired.

• A minimum of 7 years of experience (when combined with a Master’s Degree) is required, as follows:

  • combined experience in Project Management and/or Infrastructure is required.

  • Out of the above 7 years, a minimum of 3 years of previous experience in a leadership role or relevant management position at UNOPS is required. 

  • Previous experience as Senior Project or Programme Manager with UNOPS may be considered in combination with experience in a leadership role.

  • Please note that this VA is advertised externally to attract former UNOPS personnel with relevant experience, in addition to internal candidates. However, UNOPS experience is required.

• Experience in developing countries is required.

• Experience in a role that includes building the capacity of personnel, coaching or mentoring is required. Coaching certification is considered as a strong asset.

• Experience in post-conflict context is an asset.

• The candidates are encouraged to enclose a cover letter, which will highlight how their experience matches the requirements described above.

Certifications:

• Certification in Prince2 is an asset.

• Certification in PMP is an asset.

Languages:

• Fluency in English required; 

• Fluency in either French or Spanish is desirable.

Contract type: International ICA
Contract level: IICA-3
Contract duration: one year, renewable subject to performance and business needs

For more details about the ICA contractual modality, please follow this link:

Additional information (general)

• 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 and candidates from the Global South 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

• All UNOPS personnel are required to share a common understanding of UNOPS’ and the UN’s mandate, policies and activities. To this end, UNOPS Personnel must complete a set of mandatory courses. As a UNOPS ICA retainer, you are required to complete at least two (2) online courses upon signature of your contract and prior to commencing any retainer assignment related to Ethics and Integrity, the Prevention of Sexual Exploitation and Abuse. If you go on official mission, you are required to complete an online course related to security awareness. These courses are available for free on UNOPS learning platform and shall be completed within the first three months following the contract signature, at no cost for UNOPS. UNOPS reserves the right to request a refresher of the mandatory courses is taken or newly promulgated mandatory courses are completed at no cost for UNOPS.

• The incumbent is responsible to abide by security policies, administrative instructions, plans and procedures of the UN Security Management System and that of UNOPS.

• All retainer assignments will be handled via the UNOPS online retainer management tool, including the request for the retainer’s services and the provision of feedback for each assignment. 

Additional information (contract modality)

There are two potential different types of contracts to consider in this vacancy announcement:

(1) A retainer contract on project or assignment basis, or,

(2) A full-time employment for a specified consecutive period of time (up to one year).

More information on retainer contracts:

• A retainer ICA does not accord any exclusivity to the Individual Contractor with respect to the Services listed in the job description. UNOPS shall have no limitation on its right to obtain Services of the same kind from any other source at any time.

• A retainer Individual Contractor Agreement (ICA) is issued for a period of time during which the services of the individual contractor may be required intermittently.

• A retainer ICA will specify a unit price (e.g. amount per day actually worked). For budgetary purposes, a monetary limit will be specified at the time the ICA is awarded and issued.

• UNOPS shall have no obligation to obtain any minimum quantity of Services from the Individual Contractor during the duration of the retainer ICA.

• Payment will be made only after completion of work (if any) or reaching agreed milestones.

• UNOPS Individual Contractors must comply with the standards of conduct required of a UN civil servant, when carrying out their official UNOPS responsibilities and also all other times. This includes the standards of conduct set forth in the UN Secretary-General’s Bulletin of 9 October 2003 entitled “Special Measures for Protection from Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse” (ST/SGB/2003/13) and the UN Secretary-General’s Bulletin of 18 June 2002 entitled "Regulations Governing the Status, Basic Rights and Duties of Officials other than Secretariat Officials, and Experts on Mission" (ST/SGB/2002/9) as they may be amended from time to time.

• UNOPS Individual Contractors must comply with all applicable UNOPS policies and instructions. This includes the obligation to declare any outside activity that could result in an actual or perceived conflict with the interests of the UN; as well as to refrain from using information gained through the UNOPS Individual Contractor Agreement contract for the Individual Contractor’s own purposes or to help a third party (unless the information is already in the public domain), in particular but not only in relation to procurement of works, goods and services.

• UNOPS Individual Contractors must abide by UN safety and security policies, instructions, directives, plans and procedures of the UN Security Management System and that of UNOPS.

• The standard terms and conditions of the UNOPS ICA as of the present date can be found at https://content.unops.org/HR-Documents/ICA_contract/Annex-A-ENGLISH.pdf

• Given the nature of this position, particular attention should be given to section 11 on Confidentiality.