Job Openings at UNICEF

Regional Political and Contextual Analysis

• Monitor and analyze political, governance, legislative, and socioeconomic developments across countries in the region, including tracking shifts in political leadership, governance frameworks, legislative agendas, public policy debates, and broader socioeconomic dynamics that may influence the operating environment for UNICEF. This includes maintaining situational awareness across multiple country contexts and identifying cross border or regional trends of relevance to UNICEF’s work.
• Assess the implications of regional and country level political trends, elections, policy reforms, and governance shifts for UNICEF’s mandate, programmes, partnerships, and operations, translating complex political developments into clear analysis of potential impacts on programme delivery and organizational positioning. This includes advising on both risks and opportunities arising from changes in the political and policy landscape.
• Produce high-quality regional political briefs and scenario analyses for the Office of the Regional Director, synthesizing country level and regional insights into concise, decision-ready products.

Strategic Advisory Support

• Provide evidence based political advice on emerging risks and opportunities, including anticipating political shifts, advising strategic positioning and engagement options, and proposing risk mitigation or opportunity leveraging measures to support informed decision-making at regional and country levels.
• Support the Office of the Regional Director in preparing for high level engagements with key stakeholders, including by synthesizing political and contextual analysis, and preparing concise, decision ready briefing notes, talking points, and background materials for meetings with governments, UN system leadership, development partners, and other strategic counterparts. This includes coordinating inputs across relevant sections, COE and global divisions as necessary to ensure coherence of messaging, clarity of strategic objectives, and alignment with UNICEF’s regional priorities and positioning.
• Flag emerging political risks affecting programme delivery and UNICEF’s reputation, and propose mitigation measures, This entails assessing the likelihood and potential impact of such programmatic risks for Country Offices and recommending practical mitigation and engagement strategies.
• Support engagement with the Regional Coordination Platform (RCP) by contributing political analysis and strategic insights to inform the development, alignment, and implementation of coherent regional positions. This includes ensuring that political considerations, risks, and opportunities are reflected in RCP discussions, and supporting coordination.
• Provide strategic analysis and advice on UN reform processes, including UN80, by assessing implications for UNICEF’s mandate, positioning, and operating model at regional and country levels. This includes supporting leadership in navigating reform-related shifts, identifying risks and opportunities, and ensuring UNICEF is proactively positioned in inter-agency discussions and evolving UN system architectures.

Stakeholder Mapping and Regional Engagement

• Conduct regional stakeholder mapping and political economy analyses, identifying key political influences/policy makers, regional, multilateral and emerging actors, their interests, influence, power dynamics, and relationships. This includes analyzing how stakeholder positions and incentives shape policy decisions, governance outcomes, and the operating space for UNICEF across countries in the region.
• Support regional engagement strategies with governments, regional bodies, UN entities, development partners, and diplomatic missions, as appropriate, by providing politically informed analysis to guide positioning, sequencing engagements, and messaging. This includes advising entry points for dialogue, potential sensitivities, and opportunities to advance UNICEF’s priorities and partnerships at regional and country levels.

Coordination Support to the Deputy Regional Director

• Develop Briefing Notes, prepare material, strategic papers, though pieces   for the ORD’s high-level engagements (e.g UN system coordination, regional management team, government and partner meetings), ensuring materials are politically informed, coherent, and decision ready.
• Draft and quality assure talking points, briefing notes, and strategic correspondence, ensuring clarity, factual accuracy, and alignment with UNICEF’s positioning
• Serve as a focal point for rapid synthesis of inputs across sections, including gathering and integrating analysis from relevant leads to support timely decision making and senior engagements.
• Serve as a coordination focal point for follow-up on agreed actions and decisions arising from meetings and engagements, liaising with relevant internal stakeholders to support timely implementation and information flow.
• Support coherence between political analysis, programme priorities, and management considerations by ensuring that relevant risks, sensitivities, and contextual insights are reflected in materials prepared for the ORD.
• Support preparation for official missions and priority meetings by coordinating with relevant internal stakeholders to ensure the ORD has complete background information, risk sensitivities, and key asks.
• Provide liaison support, as requested, with internal and external counterparts (e.g., other UN entities and senior offices), ensuring politically consistent messaging and follow through on agreed actions.

Knowledge Management and Information Sharing

• Maintain regional political analysis tools, trackers, and knowledge products, including developing and updating repositories, dashboards, and analytical frameworks that consolidate country level and regional political insights. This ensures consistency, comparability, and ease of access to political analysis across the Regional Office and Country Offices.
• Ensure timely dissemination of key political insights and political economy to relevant regional and country level stakeholders, including the ORD, Regional Management Team, Deputy Representatives, Regional Advisers, and selected Country Office leadership, through regular briefs, updates, and targeted analytical notes that support decision making, planning, and risk management.
• Capture lessons learned and contributed to institutional knowledge on regional political economy analysis, including documenting good practices, emerging patterns, and contextual insights from across the region, and integrating these into regional guidance, planning processes, and knowledge sharing platforms.

To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have…

Education:

•  Advanced university degree in Political Science, International Relations, Public Policy, Development Studies, Law, or a related field.
• A university degree in combination with qualifying experience may be accepted in lieu of an advanced university degree.

Work Experience:

• Minimum eight (8) years of progressively responsible experience in political analysis, governance, policy advisory, international development, or a closely related field.
• Experience providing substantive, strategic, and confidential advisory support to senior level officials, including the preparation of policy briefs, analytical reports, briefing notes, and high-level correspondence on sensitive and politically complex issues, to inform management decision making and external engagement.
• Proven experience in providing high level coordination support, including managing and synchronizing inputs across multiple sections and offices; overseeing workflow systems, monitoring tools, and tracking mechanisms; and ensuring timely follow up and implementation of priority actions and senior management decisions in complex, multistakeholder environments.
• Experience in data analytics to support evidence-based analysis, risk assessment, and decision making is desirable.
• Experience working with or within the UN system or a comparable international organization is an advantage.

Language Proficiency [ III ]

• Fluency in English is required. Working knowledge of French and Portuguese is an asset.

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Purpose of Assignment:

• The GPD Gender Equality team provides strategic leadership and guidance on UGEAP 2026-29, working closely with our network of staff to support UNICEF to deliver on its commitments in the UGEAP and Strategic Plan 2026-2029 – including targeting commitments to adolescent girls in each sectoral area and through multisectoral, at-scale programming for adolescent girls.
• The gender team oversees global initiatives including and supporting a large portfolio country programmes, under the POWER4Girls umbrella initiative, working to promote adolescent girls’ wellbeing, empowerment and leadership through multisectoral models, particularly on skills, protection and health. Our priority in 2026-2029 is to focus on scaling up and sustainable financing of the ‘best buys’ in proven policy solutions and programme solutions that advance UNICEF’s targets for tangible changes in adolescent girls’ lives .
• A key aspect of this is to be able to measure changes in adolescent girls leadership, agency and decision making more concretely.

In alignment with UNICEF’s Gender Equality Action Plan, UNICEF’s Adolescent Girls’ Programme Strategy, and UNICEF’s Strategic Plan ‘adolescent girls accelerator’ commitments, UNICEF is seeking a consultant to support the adolescent girls’ agenda. Specifically, this consultancy will focus on:

• Need and deliverable based support on research and evidence synthesis of UNICEF adolescent girls programming and research
• Identify knowledge and evidence gaps across adolescent girls priority areas to guide UNICEF research priorities
• Work with a core team on support to COs for research, evidence methodology testing, review and quality oversight
• On demand technical support to COs identified by ROs/HQ rolling out any evidence or measurement product related to adolescent girls.
• 2 working briefs on ‘what works’ on topics related to adolescent girls.
• Technical support to new workstream on adolescent boys and advice on U report poll design
• Guidance and support on any other evidence pieces related to work on gender equality in adolescence.

Minimum requirements: Qualifications/Experience/ Knowledge/Expertise/Skills

• Education:

• Advance University degree (Masters) in the social sciences (i.e. sociology, demography, psychology, political science, social policy or economics), public health, public policy, public administration, international development, or in an area relevant to UNICEF’s sectoral work (e.g. Health, Nutrition, WASH, Education, Child Protection, Social Inclusion, HIV/AIDs, etc.).
• Academic credentials in gender and/or adolescence.

• Work Experience:

• Minimum eight years of relevant professional experience and demonstrated track record of having undertaken and led substantive programming and research on gender/adolescent girls and development in key issue areas that are the focus of UNICEF’s Gender Action Plan 2026-2029.
• Experience of practice-based research
• Experience of capacity building and technical support to teams in carrying out evidence pieces

• Skills:

• Strong experience in designing research and evidence practices and rolling out surveys
• Proven experience drafting quality research outputs for different stakeholders and audiences is required.
• Experience working in a development setting, managing programmes and / or research is required.
• Demonstrated excellence in writing and verbal communication;

Language Requirements:

• Excellent English oral and written skills; proficiency in another UN language (Spanish, French or Arabic) desirable.

Desirables:

• Experience with qualitative and/or quant data collection methods and analysis techniques highly desirable.
• Relevant experience in a UN system agency or organization is considered as an asset.
• Familiarity/ background with emergency contexts is considered as an asset.
• Experience with proposal writing is considered as an asset

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Key responsibilities: 

Leadership of Unit:

•  Provide leadership of the unit including oversight of the unit's overall portfolio of work (audit and advisory engagements). Manage and provide strategic direction to individual staff assigned to the unit and to engagements in the Chiefs portfolio.
• Ensure audit and advisory engagements are conducted in accordance with applicable standards and other requirements as well as the OIAI Charter and are based on approved engagement plans.
• Ensure outputs of the unit are of the highest quality and effectively communicate audit and advisory results. This entails using best practices and methodologies including an agile approach and ensuring audits conducted by the unit are risk-based, efficient, and focused on achieving maximum value and impact for UNICEF.
• This also entails providing strategic and technical guidance and directions to audit teams; making sure engagements are adequately planned and resourced prior to any mission and take full advantage of technology and analytics, supervising engagement teams; providing advisory services as needed by assigned clients and/or in thematic areas; reviewing and approving working papers; preparing and/or overseeing the preparation of high-quality work products such as engagement plans and reports for review and approval by the Director and/or Deputy Director; making sure that the reported implementation of recommendation and/or actions agreed with clients are objectively reviewed and closed based on adequate supporting evidence; establishing, managing and maintaining productive relationships with senior managers across UNICEF, clients and other stakeholders critical to the assurance and advisory work of the unit. (40%)

People Management: 

• Establish, discuss, and agree on performance plans with staff in the unit and identify and address skills gaps. Provide objective feedback to staff throughout the performance period.
• Coach and mentor assigned staff and hold career discussions.
• Conduct periodic performance appraisal of assigned staff, taking into consideration engagement-specific feedback received by the staff member from other Chiefs, Audit and Engagement Team Leaders and other staff inside and outside OIAI. Provide engagement-specific feedback on the performance of other units' staff who are assigned to engagements for which the chief is responsible.
• Identify and address staffs individual training needs, ensuring staff have opportunity to learn and grow professionally. Lead by example and proactively address staff issues and update the Deputy/Director on people management issues. Contribute to the recruitment of high calibre staff.
• Promote an environment of management excellence and foster a respectful work culture, staff well-being, diversity and inclusion .
• Ensure adequate preparation for rollout and effective management of virtual team/processes and/or accountabilities in line with the organization's guidelines, policies and procedures. (20%)

Thematic Focus: 

• Serve as a focal point for the Audit Section for assigned thematic, geographic and/or function areas and/or specific clients.
• This will include monitoring and keeping abreast of developments and emerging risks relevant to the assigned area, ensuring OIAl's risk register and work plans are updated accordingly.
• This also includes building and maintaining relationships with leadership and other key staff in the assigned area of responsibility. This also includes identifying and making the business case for potential assurance or advisory services relevant to the assigned areas of responsibility. ( 20%)

Leadership of OIAI and the Audit Section: 

• Participate in and contribute to the management of the Internal Audit Section and as a member of the OIAI leadership team.
• This includes providing senior level contribution to the Section's risk-based work planning activities, identifying and responding to emerging risks, and ensuring the preparation and updating of the Section's Work Plan.
• This also includes serving as a thought leader, both inside UNICEF and externally, on the evolving role of internal audit within similarly situated organizations, and keeping abreast of innovations, developments and best practices in internal auditing to facilitate continuous learning and improvements in the work of OIAI.
• This also includes contributing to and leading the Section's development and implementation of standard operating procedures, as well as the application of the International Standards for the Professional Practice of Internal Auditing and their implication for oversight in the United Nations System.
• This also includes acting on behalf of the Deputy Director for Audit as required and carrying out other task as may be assigned by the Director or Deputy Director for Audit (20%)

Minimum requirements

Education:

• Master or equivalent (Advanced University Degree) in Computer Science,Accounting,Finance,Business Administration, Advanced university degree, preferably in Computer Science, Information Technology, business administration, economics, finance, auditing, accounting, or another related field.
• A first-level degree (bachelor's or equivalent) in the specified fields with additional 2 years experience in auditing may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.
• Professional accreditations (e.g. CPA, CA, ACCA, CIA, or CISA) from a recognized professional body is preferred. or related fields. and any other related fields.

Work Experience:

• At least 10 years of relevant work experience in Experience: A minimum of 10 years of progressively responsible experience in ICT audit management, with significant experience in managing complex IT audits, and external service providers, preferably in a UN or international environment.
• At least 10 years of experience in auditing (e.g. financial and performance, or operational) is desirable. Extensive experience in a directly related field may also be acceptable.. and any other related fields.

Skills:

• ICT Audit & Technical Expertise, Risk Management, Leadership & People Management, Strategic & Analytical Thinking, Ability to Build and Maintain Partnerships, Innovative..

Language Requirements :

• English - Proficient/Fluent

Desirables

• Language: Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish) or a local language
• Chartered accountant, CPA, CA, performance management, nurture talent, coaching
• Relevant experience at country level, particularly in development, fragile settings and humanitarian contexts.