Home-Based Consultancy (7 months; 2 consultants): Experts on community engagement and accountability to affected population to support setting up feedback and complaints mechanisms (FCMs)

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, Health

Background & Rationale

The current armed conflict in Ukraine has generated a large-scale movement of population both inside the country and towards neighbouring and other countries in Central and Eastern Europe. As of 23 August 2022, over 6.8 million refugees from Ukraine were recorded across Europe, with 3.9 million registered for temporary protection and social services.

Children and their families require access to basic food, hygiene, medical care, and systematic protection services. They also need timely and efficient information and counselling on a variety of protective measures, on their rights, on available humanitarian aid, and on availability and use of social services. In addition, building social cohesion, fighting discrimination, and supporting effective inclusion in host communities are emerging and crucial components of the SBC response. All these require putting in place effective engagement and participation opportunities for refugees’ groups, along with creating feedback and complaints mechanisms (FCMs), both on- and off-line, for collecting and responding to IDPs’ and refugees’ complaints, feedback, and contributions, as part of the Accountability to Affected Populations (AAP). Thus, the needs and interests of the Ukrainian IDP and refugees could be placed at the centre of the response decision-making and programming, to ensure the quality of the response interventions and the most appropriate and relevant outcomes for them, while preserving their rights and dignity and increasing their resilience to face the current crisis.

As a cross-sectoral strategy, Social and Behavioral Change (SBC) is called to 1/ support affected groups’ access to life-saving information, information about services, rights and entitlements and adoption of positive behavioral practices and use of services; 2/ Support engagement of crisis affected groups’ and host communities for improved programme and services design and provision, strengthened social cohesion and inclusion; 3/ Ensure accountability (feedback and complaints) mechanisms are in place for a dignified and people’s centered response (AAP).

In this context, ECARO SBC team supports affected countries (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Moldova, Romania, Belarus, Croatia, Greece, Montenegro, Serbia) to put in place effective and efficient FCMs, which would include three main components:

• Enabling complaints and feedback, which includes all arrangements for enabling people to make complaints and provide their feedback. These arrangements or methods should be people oriented, visible, recognizable, and accessible for everybody.
• Responding to complaints and feedback. All complaints and feedback should be responded to promptly and handled objectively, fairly, and confidentially. Response actions will be conducted and there will be a system to analyze and review response actions.
• Ensuring accountability and learning. Complaints and feedback are used to stimulate improvement in humanitarian and development programming.

To achieve this, advocacy with Governmental and non-governmental partners and building their capacity in the area of SBC/AAP is needed, along with supporting co-creation of joint/shared mechanisms, which built on the existing systems and feedback channels.

Purpose of the Assignment

UNICEF Regional Office for Europe and Central Asia is looking for 2 experts on community engagement and accountability to affected population with proven experience in setting up/enhancing feedback and complaints mechanisms, to support with setting up, revising and strengthening Feedback and Complaints Mechanisms (FCMs) and capacity building in countries with refugee and migrants response (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Moldova, Romania, Belarus, Croatia, Greece, Montenegro, Serbia). Each consultant will be assigned 5-7 countries to engage with and support.

Scope of Work

The SBC consultants will be hired for a period of 7 months (full time). The consultants will:

• Review current UNICEF response in the country to identify existing feedbacks and complaints mechanisms and identify entry points for establishing new ones (where relevant). Interview/discussion with UNICEF staff and partners will be conducted at this stage. Develop and propose a work plan with details for each country.
• Review existing sources and channels of offline and on-line feedback in each of the concerned countries. This includes channels put in place for the refugee response, as well as existing governmental and non-governmental feedback mechanisms built-in the regular social services (health, education, protection, etc.), and municipal and national public systems.
• Support UNICEF and partners to setup up feedback and complaints mechanisms and/or revise and enhance existing feedback mechanisms. Develop/adapt SOPs as needed, for roles and responsibilities in collection, processing, analysis, response on the feedback and monitoring of response actions.
• Build the capacity of the national partners and UNICEF staff in the area of SBC, community engagement in emergency and AAP, with a focus on setting up full fledged FCMs. Organize trainings for the staff involved in setting feedback mechanisms where necessary.
• Support COs in the advocacy to secure the commitment of governmental and non-governmental partners to join the efforts around a full fledged FCM, comprising: 1/ Enabling feedback and complaints; 2/ Responding through actions and communication; 3/ Ensuring accountability to affected populations and learning.
• Support COs to organize consultations with affected population and host communities on preferred feedback approaches and channels. Organize co-creation workshops, involving UNICEF and its governmental and non-governmental partners in each of the concerned countries, to jointly design feedback mechanism guidelines and agree on roles and responsibilities, including cross-linkages, processing data, shared monitoring of actions taken on the feedback, and shared dashboards where possible.
• Support the development of process indicators and monitoring tools. Support relevant partners and country staff to properly report on feedbacks and complaints received through the established mechanisms.
• Document the process in each country and share the lessons learned, good practices and recommendations for next steps.
• Develop and submit monthly reports with description of key activities, achieved results, challenges and recommendations for action.
• Support with other related tasks, as required.

The consultants will work closely with SBC ECARO team, the AAP team, SBC and AAP focal points in country offices, national stakeholders, other consultants.

Work Assignment Overview

Tasks / Milestone******Deliverables / Outputs******Timeline / DeadlineGeneral workplan, with proposed approaches.Work planBy end of October 2022Monthly work plans and reports, reflecting implemented activities, achieved results, challenges and recommendations for action.Monthly plan. Monthly reportsBy 25th of each monthDevelop and propose a work plan with details for each country.Country work plansContinuousReview of existing sources and channels of offline and on-line feedback in each of the concerned countries.Country profilesBy end of October 2022Build the capacity of the national partners and UNICEF staff in the area of SBC in emergency and AAP.Training materials – concept notes; support materialsBy end of November 2022Organize and facilitate trainings for the staff involved in feedback mechanisms where necessaryTraining events reportsOn demandSupport COs in the advocacy to secure the commitment of governmental and non-governmental partners to join the efforts around a full fledged FCM.Activity reports – engagement with partners for advocacy efforts.ContinuousSupport UNICEF and partners to setup up feedback and complaints mechanisms and/or revise and enhance existing feedback mechanisms. Develop/adapt SOPsActivity reports – FCMs set; SOPsContinuousOrganize and facilitate co-creation workshops to design feedback mechanism guidelines and agree on roles and responsibilities. Develop SOPs. Support COs to organize and facilitate consultations with affected population and host communitiesFM guidelines, SOPs designed. Consultations organised.November 2022 – January 2023Support the development of process indicators and monitoring tools. Support partners and country staff to report on feedbacks and complaints received through the established mechanisms.Process indicators and monitoring toolsContinuousDocument the process in each concern country and share the lessons learned, good practices and recommendations for next steps.Report by countryMay 2023Estimated Duration of the Contract

7 months, full-time (between October 2022 and May 2023)

Consultants' Work Place and Official Travel

The consultants will be home-based. Travel to specific countries in Europe may be required.

Estimated Cost of the Consultancy & Payment Schedule

UNICEF will issue a contract in USD. The payment will be made in USD by bank transfer on a monthly basis, based on a narrative report and invoice. The consultant will submit a monthly invoice and payment will be made upon satisfactory completion of deliverables. If the reports and documents are not submitted per the deliverables and timeframe stated in this TOR, the payments will be withheld. UNICEF reserves the right to withhold all or a portion of payment if performance is unsatisfactory, if work/outputs is incomplete, not delivered or for failure to meet deadlines. All materials developed will remain the copyright of UNICEF and UNICEF will be free to adapt and modify them in the future. Please indicate an all-inclusive monthly fee to undertake this assignment.

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

Minimum qualification required

• A post-graduate degree in social sciences, preferably on social and behaviour change, communication for development, social psychology.

Experience

• Five (5) years responsible work experience in emergency/humanitarian response, AAP, social and behaviour change, social sciences, social research, communications or similar field, preferentially including experience in/with middle and upper middle-income countries.
• Experience in setting up feedback and complaints mechanisms.
• Experience in capacity building on FCMs, AAP, SBC, communication in emergency and related fields.
• Experience in analyzing data from social monitoring systems, social listening, feedback mechanisms, monitoring and evaluation work, or surveys.
• Experience in designing and conducting co-creation activities and applying other participatory methods in programme design.
• Experience in design, testing, and implementation of qualitative research methodologies, data collection tools, measuring behavioural results, supporting/conducting SBC innovative activities.

Desirable

• Experience in advocacy with governmental and non-governmental counterparts.
• Experience with analysing data and communicating findings to non-technical audiences.
• Field experience in humanitarian operations and SBC in emergency is an asset.

Languages

• Oral and written proficiency in English is required.
• Knowledge of Ukrainian and/or Russian language is considered an asset.

For every Child, you demonstrate…

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

View our competency framework at http://www.unicef.org/about/employ/files/UNICEF_Competencies.pdf

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, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks, and will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles.

Remarks:

Please include a full CV and/or Personal history form (downloadable from https://www.unicef.org/careers/documents/p11-form) and a cover letter describing applicant’s expertise on AAP and setting-up/strengthening FCMs. Please also include a Financial Proposal in your application by indicating your availability and monthly rate (in US$) to undertake the terms of reference above (excl. travel). Applications submitted without a monthly rate will not be considered. 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.

The selected candidate is solely responsible to ensure that the visa (applicable) and health insurance required to perform the duties of the contract are valid for the entire period of the contract. Selected candidates are subject to confirmation of fully-vaccinated status against SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) with a World Health Organization (WHO)-endorsed vaccine, which must be met prior to taking up the assignment. It does not apply to consultants who will work remotely and are not expected to work on or visit UNICEF premises, programme delivery locations or directly interact with communities UNICEF works with, nor to travel to perform functions for UNICEF for the duration of their consultancy contracts.

UNICEF offers reasonable accommodation for consultants with disabilities. This may include, for example, accessible software, travel assistance for missions or personal attendants. We encourage you to disclose your disability during your application in case you need reasonable accommodation during the selection process and afterwards in your assignment.