Consultancy, Giga, User Experience & Interaction Specialist, 11.5 months, Remote

Contract

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UNICEF works in some of the world’s toughest places, to reach the world’s most disadvantaged children. To save their lives. To defend their rights. To help them fulfill their potential.

Across 190 countries and territories, we work for every child, everywhere, every day, to build a better world for everyone.

And we never give up.

For every child, innovate

UNICEF has a 70-year history of innovating for children. We believe that new approaches, partnerships and technologies that support realizing children’s rights are critical to improving their lives.

UNICEF and ITU have launched “Giga”, a new initiative to connect every school to the internet, and every young person to information, opportunity and choice. It also serves as a platform to create the infrastructure necessary to provide digital connectivity to an entire country, for every community, and for every citizen.

Providing connectivity to the world remains a challenge. According to the ITU, nearly 3.7 billion people remain unconnected from the internet, and by extension, unconnected to digital products and services that could dramatically improve their lives. Approximately 29% of 18-24-year-olds, most of them in Sub-Saharan Africa, do not have digital access (~360m people) and thereby lack access to the same information, opportunity and choice as their more-connected peers. Unless things change, a big part of this rapidly growing group of young people is in danger of being left behind, excluded from the modern digital world.

UNICEF has a 70-year history of innovating for children. We believe that new approaches, partnerships and technologies that support realizing children’s rights are critical to improving their lives.

UNICEF and ITU have launched “Giga”, a new initiative to connect every school to the internet, and every young person to information, opportunity and choice. It also serves as a platform to create the infrastructure necessary to provide digital connectivity to an entire country, for every community, and for every citizen.

Providing connectivity to the world remains a challenge. According to the ITU, nearly 3.7 billion people remain unconnected from the internet, and by extension, unconnected to digital products and services that could dramatically improve their lives. Approximately 29% of 18-24-year-olds, most of them in Sub-Saharan Africa, do not have digital access (~360m people) and thereby lack access to the same information, opportunity and choice as their more-connected peers. Unless things change, a big part of this rapidly growing group of young people is in danger of being left behind, excluded from the modern digital world.

Closing the digital divide requires global cooperation, leadership, and innovation in finance and technology. Giga leverages data, innovative finance and new technologies to bring the power of meaningful connectivity to fast-track young people’s access to educational resources and opportunities.

How can you make a difference?

We seek a strong self-motivated UX/UI Specialist who can maintain strong design sensibilities even under tight time constraints, who can work with a diverse interdisciplinary team to create a plan of action to best communicate ideas. This position will range from project support to owning projects and seeing them through completion. The UX/UI Specialist will collaborate with an interdisciplinary team to develop, prototype and advise on new products and solutions that will help Giga achieve the ambitious goal of connecting every school, and every community to the Internet.

Within this role, the UX/UI Specialist will work with multiple teams from the concept stage to delivering the final design package. Our team takes large ideas and makes them a reality; being able to communicate complex and abstract ideas using visual, verbal and written language is crucial.

Due to the diversity of the role, the team is looking for a hybrid designer, who can ideally work across various devices and platforms. The candidate should exemplify a strong expertise in user experience and interaction design, research and consultation for web-based designs, apps, and data information systems, information architecture and systems mapping design.

Your main responsibilities will be:

• Work closely with the Giga tech team to continue a healthy evolution of current and future products such as Project Connect or ProCoChain.
• Coordinate the work of vendors who will iterate on concepts already established by the Giga team.
• Create and validate mockups and wireframes for websites, software, and dashboards for different projects, as necessary while ensuring that branding and technical guidelines are upheld across the various mediums.
• Produce user requirements, personas, storyboards, journey maps, scenarios, flow charts etc. to give shape to any preliminary idea.
• Support on maintaining and evolving other products that have digital interface components.

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

• An advanced university degree (Master’s or higher) in interaction design, human-computer interaction, information design and information architecture or other relevant field. *A first University Degree in a relevant field combined with 2 additional years of professional experience may be accepted in lieu of an Advanced University Degree.
• A minimum of 5 years of relevant professional experience in UX/UI product design experience
• Strong information design experience with a solid foundation in UX design research and heuristics
• Strong understanding of design systems and front-end architecture
• Experience in creating interactive prototypes in tools like Sketch, Adobe CC, Invision, etc.
• Preferred knowledge of capabilities and limitations of Web technologies such as HTML, JavaScript, and CSS
• Developing country work experience and/or familiarity with emergency is considered an asset.
• Fluency in English is required. Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish) or a local language is an asset.

For every Child, you demonstrate…

UNICEF's values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, and Accountability (CRITA) and core competencies in Communication, Working with People and Drive for Results.

The UNICEF competencies required for this post are...

• Relating and Networking - Level 2
• Apply Technical Expertise - Level 2
• Creating and Innovating - Level 2

To view our competency framework, please visit here.

Click here to learn more about UNICEF’s values and competencies.

UNICEF is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages all candidates, irrespective of gender, nationality, religious and ethnic backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities, to apply to become a part of the organization.

UNICEF has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UNICEF, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. UNICEF also adheres to strict child safeguarding principles. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles and will therefore undergo rigorous reference and background checks. Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check.

Payment details and further considerations

• Monthly payment, based on monthly tasks and progress reports, approved upon monthly review with supervisor.
• Consultant is responsible for his/her own health and travel insurance
• Consultant is eligible for standard DSA for all work-related travel

Remarks:

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process.

Individuals engaged under a consultancy or individual contract will not be considered “staff members” under the Staff Regulations and Rules of the United Nations and UNICEF’s policies and procedures, and will not be entitled to benefits provided therein (such as leave entitlements and medical insurance coverage). Their conditions of service will be governed by their contract and the General Conditions of Contracts for the Services of Consultants and Individual Contractors. Consultants and individual contractors are responsible for determining their tax liabilities and for the payment of any taxes and/or duties, in accordance with local or other applicable laws.