Monitoring & Evaluation Specialist at UNICEF

Purpose of the Position: Under the supervision of the Regional Chief of Programme Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation (PPME) of UNICEF Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Office (ESARO), the incumbent of the post will support UNICEF ESARO and all the 21 country offices in the region to strengthen the capacity and performance of monitoring and evaluation systems and the implementation, monitoring and reporting on UNICEF’s evaluation policy.

The incumbent will lead the monitoring and evaluation team in the regional office, to track programme performance, commission high quality and ensure the use of evaluations for programming and undertake situation analysis of women and children to guide the design of programme in the ESARO and country offices.

Key Expected Results

• Responsible for supporting the implementation of the evaluation policy in the region and putting in place systems for achievement of the evaluation KPIs related to evaluation planning, quality of evaluations and use of evaluations. This includes the roll of the development of Integrated Monitoring and Evaluation Plans (IMEPs), maintenance of evaluation quality assurance facility and development and tracking of management responses for evaluations undertaken in the regional office and country offices.
• Lead in the design and conduct of regional thematic evaluations and programme evaluations in developments and humanitarian settings and participate as needed in the conduct of country evaluations.
• Lead in the design and implementation of a knowledge management system in the regional office and support training of country teams and partners in evaluation standards and methodology.
• Contribute towards the identification of knowledge gaps and research needs at the country and regional level and assist in planning, implementation, dissemination and use of evaluations, assessments and studies for programming.
• Contribute to programme performance monitoring including assuring the quality of results frameworks, establishment of programme monitoring and reporting systems, consolidation of regional programme performance and preparation of midyear reviews, annual reviews and Regional Office Analysis Report.
• Lead in monitoring the situation of women and women in the region, and provide support country offices, as needed, to undertake, publish and use evidence from analysis of situation of women and children for programming. Maintain a database of the situation of women and children in the region.
• Promote partnerships with other UN Agencies, International Financial Institutions and Voluntary Organization for Professional Evaluators in support of national evaluation capacity and systems development and facilitate setting up national evaluation associations.
• Provide any other type of technical support on evaluation and monitoring as required by the regional and country offices.

Qualifications of Successful Candidate

• An advanced university degree (Master’s) in Social Sciences, Demography, Development, Planning, Monitoring & Evaluation, Statistics or related field(s) is required.
• A minimum of eight (8) years of relevant experience, at the national and international levels, in design, conduct and managing research, programme development and evaluation is required.
• Previous knowledge and work experience in data analysis and dissemination, research management, social statistics, evaluation design and quality insurance, and use of quantitative/qualitative/mixed methods.
• Previous work experience in an emergency duty station and/or humanitarian context is considered an asset
• Fluency in English (written & verbal) is required. Knowledge of an additional UN Language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian, Spanish) is considered an asset.

Competencies of Successful Candidate

Core Values  

• Commitment
• Diversity and Inclusion
• Integrity

Core competencies

• Communication (Level 2)
• Working with People (Level 2)
• Drive for Result (Level 2)

Functional Competencies

• Leading and Supervising (Level 2)
• Formulating Strategies and Concepts (Level 2)
• Analyzing (Level 2)
• Applying Technical Expertise (Level 2)
• Planning and Organizing  (Level 3)