Programme Management Senior Officer (Foresight Officer)

*FEMALE CANDIDATES ARE STRONGLY ENCOURAGED TO APPLY

General Background  

UNOPS supports partners to build a better future by providing services that increase the efficiency, effectiveness and sustainability of peace building, humanitarian and development projects.  Mandated as a central resource of the United Nations, UNOPS provides sustainable project management, procurement and infrastructure services to a wide range of governments, donors and United Nations organizations. 

The New York Portfolios Office (NYPO) supports the United Nations Secretariat, as well as other New York-based United Nations organizations, bilateral and multilateral partners in the delivery of UNOPS mandate in project management, infrastructure management, and procurement management.

The Sustainable Development Cluster (SDC) supports diverse partners with their peacebuilding, humanitarian and development operations. It was formed by combining the following portfolios: Grants Management Services (GMS), UN Technology Support Services (UNTSS), Development and Special Initiatives Portfolio (DSIP) It provides Services to partners' programmes that are designed, structured, and managed with a global perspective and primarily serving partners that are headquartered in New York.  The SDC has a footprint of approximately 125 countries. 

UNOPS has signed an agreement with the United Nations to implement the project activities for the UN Futures Lab Global Hub. 

UN Futures Lab

Strategic foresight is part of a broader effort to transform and modernize the United Nations; along with data, innovation, behavioural science, and digital transformation, strategic foresight is part of the UN 2.0 reform effort that focuses – not on structure – but on the people, resources, platforms, and culture of the institution. While different initiatives, networks, and products on futures thinking and strategic foresight exist in individual UN entities or fora, a coherent approach is needed to how we build foresight capabilities across, and within, UN family entities. 

The UN Futures Lab Network supports the nurturing of capabilities at global, regional, country levels, within each UN entity and across the UN family, as well as in the international community and Member State institutions. The UN Futures Lab Network works with governments, academia, civil society, private sector, philanthropic and other actors. ​

The incumbent of this position will be personnel of UNOPS under its full responsibility.

To achieve its goals, the UN Futures Lab is recruiting a Programme Management Senior Officer (Foresight Officer). The role contributes to catalyzing transformation in the UN. It will do so by strengthening anticipatory capacities, supporting the understanding of emerging issues as well as their impacts on the UN’s mandates and priorities, collaborating closely with a diversity of internal and external partners. The incumbent will identify and apply foresight methodologies, tools, and processes to tackle challenges across the UN Family, connecting human rights, peace and security and development. 

The incumbent will be supporting the developing the new foresight workstream including, but not limited to, the provision of substantive and technical expertise by identifying and implementing concepts, services, and processes. The incumbent will actively contribute to building a standing strategic foresight capacity and developing an experiment pipeline. S(he) will also ensure continuous alignment with the strategic priorities of the Executive Office of the UN Secretary-General (EOSG), including on development of the foresight elements of the UN Global Risk Report. The position will also play a key role in supporting implementation of a pilot project to integrate foresight tools into planning processes at the country level through the UN Resident Coordinator Offices. 

The role will collaborate with people within and outside of the UN Family. It will elicit research questions from a diversity of stakeholders and will plan and execute sensing and scanning activities. Using diverse data sets and working with a wide range of people and organizations, the role will identify trends and patterns within which it will be able to develop insights and products supporting decision-making. 

The incumbent will need to drive cross-disciplinary approaches with, inter alia, data and behavioural scientists, and service design and policy experts. It will bridge forecasting and foresight, and quantitative and qualitative methods in a complementary manner, and provide guidelines and policy inputs that promote and incorporate ethical and safe practices.

The position is home based and may require international travel and field missions, as conditions allow. 

The incumbent will work under the supervision of the Programme Management Advisor (Deputy Head) of the Global Hub and will be responsible for the following duties:

1. Team Coordination and Strategic Alignment 

2. Strategic Development and Research

3. Knowledge Creation, Capacity Building and Reporting

4. Communication and Partnerships

1. Team Coordination and Strategic Alignment 

• Coordinate and support the internal team and external contributors, including consultants, ensuring effective collaboration and adherence to project timelines and objectives.
• Facilitate the strategic development and alignment of the foresight workstream with the overall vision and objectives of the UN Futures Lab Network & EOSG.

2. Strategic Development and Research

• Assist in the development and management of a strategic foresight experiments portfolio, collaborating with internal and external partners to identify emerging needs and projects.
• Provide technical expertise in data scanning, analysis, and sensemaking, contributing to the visualization of insights.
• Support the integration of foresight into programmatic objectives and processes to facilitate organizational transformation.
• Assist in the adaptation of tools and processes to specific contexts, ensuring inclusive, safe, and ethical approaches.
• Manage budgets and procurement activities in collaboration with administrative staff.
• Contribute to the development of foresight product roadmaps to facilitate sustainable adoption and continuous improvement.
• Stay abreast of latest technologies, trends, developments, and approaches in futures and foresight.

3. Knowledge Sharing and Capacity Building

• Create foresight capacity development initiatives for internal and external partners, including documenting best practices, developing tools, resources, and training materials.
• Assist in monitoring and reporting tasks, contributing to the development of monitoring and evaluation frameworks and portfolio impact management approaches.

4. Communication and Partnerships

• Create impactful visualizations, communications and engagements around emerging trends and issues catering for the senior UN decision-makers and agenda setters. 
• Support strategic communications, partnerships, resource mobilization, and expert ecosystem development in the substantive area.
• Support the UN Futures Lab at events, workshops and conferences as required.
• Facilitate the planning and execution of co-creation sessions with diverse groups of stakeholders.

3. Monitoring and Progress Controls

The role will report on progress and ensure the agreed outputs in coordination with the UN Futures Lab staff. The incumbent is expected to exercise flexibility and agility, including adapting to working arrangements to deliver outputs online/electronically. 

• Development, International Relations, Computational Social Sciences, Social Sciences, Behavioural Sciences, Economics, Interaction Design or another relevant discipline.
• A first university degree (Bachelor's degree) and an additional two years of relevant experience may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.

Experience:

Required Experience:

• A minimum of two (2) years of relevant experience is required in any combination of strategic planning/development/consulting and/or project or product management, strategic foresight, innovation, data, development, innovation or design research, digital development or other related fields. 
• A minimum of one (1) year of experience on futures and foresight work in organizational settings is required. 
• A minimum of one (1) year experience developing speculative scenarios, horizon scanning, or trend analysis is required. 

• Experience working in diverse country contexts and/or with multilateral organizations is desirable. 
• Proven ability to collaborate with a wide range of stakeholders is desirable. 
• Experience in delivering high-quality research and analysis (preferably quantitative and qualitative approaches) and communicating the insights through accessible multimedia formats is desirable. 

Language requirement:

• Fluency in English, French and Spanish (oral and written) is required. 

• Please note that UNOPS does not accept unsolicited resumes.

• Applications received after the closing date will not be considered.

• Please note that only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process, which involves various assessments.

• UNOPS embraces diversity and is committed to equal employment opportunity. Our workforce consists of many diverse nationalities, cultures,  languages, races, gender identities, sexual orientations, and abilities. UNOPS seeks to sustain and strengthen this diversity to ensure equal opportunities as well as an inclusive working environment for its entire workforce. 

• Qualified women and candidates from groups which are underrepresented in the UNOPS workforce are encouraged to apply. These include in particular candidates from racialized and/or indigenous groups, members of minority gender identities and sexual orientations, and people with disabilities.

• 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. 

• We would like to ensure all candidates perform at their best during the assessment process.  If you are shortlisted and require additional assistance to complete any assessment, including reasonable accommodation, please inform our human resources team when you receive an invitation.

• This position will be Homebased
  
  

Terms and Conditions 

• For staff positions only, UNOPS reserves the right to appoint a candidate at a lower level than the advertised level of the post. 

• For retainer contracts, you must complete a few Mandatory Courses (they take around 4 hours to complete) in your own time, before providing services to UNOPS. For more information on a retainer contract here.

• All UNOPS personnel are responsible for performing their duties in accordance with the UN Charter and UNOPS Policies and Instructions, as well as other relevant accountability frameworks. In addition, all personnel must demonstrate an understanding of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in a manner consistent with UN core values and the UN Common Agenda.

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