Innovation Manager (DPG Project Lead), P-4, Stockholm, Sweden

Contract

This is a P-3 contract. This kind of contract is known as Professional and Director staff. It is normally internationally recruited only. It's a staff contract. It usually requires 5 years of experience, depending on education.

Salary

The salary for this job should be between 74,649 USD and 97,747 USD.

Please keep in mind that the salary displayed here is an estimation by UN Talent based on the location and the type of contract. It may vary depending on the organization. The recruiter should be able to inform you about the exact salary range. In case the job description contains another salary information, please refer to this one.

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 history of innovating for children. We believe that new approaches, partnerships, and technologies are critical for achieve improved outcomes for children. The Office of Innovation is a creative, interactive, and agile team in UNICEF that sits at the unique intersection of working on material global issues, startup thinking, technology and partnerships that can scale solutions. We look to form partnerships around frontier technologies (including AI, drones and UAVs, blockchain, new banking tools, wearables and sensors, and 3D-printing) that exist at the intersection of $100 billion markets and 1 billion person needs.

How can you make a difference? Are you that dynamic visionary, with a good understanding of digital public goods and want to put your leadership skills to work for the next 'big thing' in making technology work for good? Then this is the job for you, especially if you have managed complex and agile projects and people helping them start, fail, succeed and scale. Can you can tell a story, sell an idea, and comfortably work with a distributed team of nerds to help build out a vision? Then join us as this role is for a creative, ambitious manager and advocate who can adapt their style and approach for different audiences and is not aligned by pace and complexity. Join us on the Ventures Team to lead our engagement in the Digital Public Goods (DPG) Alliance.

Overall, this position is responsible for:

1. Lead overall implementation of UNICEF’s workplan on Digital Public Goods, as supported by Norway

Develop and implement to track and monitor, project management tools that articulate goals, activities and progress against agreed KPIs

Coordinate the work of relevant team members, including staff and consultants and service providers as needed

Coordinate and streamline work on DPGs with other Divisions, COs and other relevant teams within UNICEF

Provide operational support to ensure timely contracting of resources and smooth operations for the team’s work

Facilitate planning and review sessions with relevant team members

Facilitate regular stand-ups and similar team check-ins, identifying bottlenecks and working with team members to resolve them

Conduct regular reporting to the DPGA roadmap, relevant donor and other internal reports

Act as main focal point for partners

2. Design and implement strategy to increase commitment and engagement from private investors and technology companies in DPGs

Build out value propositions for these stakeholder groups showing how they can benefit from engagement on DPGs, such as investment cases

Develop resources and compile research to support these engagement points

Convene a group of private investors with the aim of building a community of private investors for DPGs

Identify key corporate sector players for engagement in DPGs and develop a plan for their involvement in UNICEF’s DPG work, and potentially the DPG Alliance

Package partnership opportunities for UNICEF’s corporate engagement and to leverage financial and technical resources

3. Lead OOI’s advocacy efforts on DPGs, working in collaboration with relevant OOI and DPGA Secretariat teams

Identify opportunities to promote key advocacy messages – including fora, conferences, high level events

Support UNICEF’s engagement by conducting research and drafting key messages

Coordinating engagement with other DPGA members and the Secretariat

4. Lead overall implementation of UNICEF’s workplan on Digital Public Goods, as supported by Norway

Develop and implement to track and monitor, project management tools that articulate goals, activities and progress against agreed KPIs

Coordinate the work of relevant team members, including staff and consultants and service providers as needed

Coordinate and streamline work on DPGs with other Divisions, COs and other relevant teams within UNICEF

Provide operational support to ensure timely contracting of resources and smooth operations for the team’s work

Facilitate planning and review sessions with relevant team members

Facilitate regular stand-ups and similar team check-ins, identifying bottlenecks and working with team members to resolve them

Conduct regular reporting to the DPGA roadmap, relevant donor and other internal reports

Act as main focal point for partners

5. Design and implement strategy to increase commitment and engagement from private investors and technology companies in DPGs

Build out value propositions for these stakeholder groups showing how they can benefit from engagement on DPGs, such as investment cases

Develop resources and compile research to support these engagement points

Convene a group of private investors with the aim of building a community of private investors for DPGs

Identify key corporate sector players for engagement in DPGs and develop a plan for their involvement in UNICEF’s DPG work, and potentially the DPG Alliance

Package partnership opportunities for UNICEF’s corporate engagement and to leverage financial and technical resources

6. Lead OOI’s advocacy efforts on DPGs, working in collaboration with relevant OOI and DPGA Secretariat teams

Identify opportunities to promote key advocacy messages – including fora, conferences, high level events

Support UNICEF’s engagement by conducting research and drafting key messages

Coordinating engagement with other DPGA members and the Secretariat

Support engagement (including advising the Director of Innovation and other internal stakeholders) in key UN related processes, such as the Global Digital Compact

Design campaigns that can be promoted through communications channels

7. Provide oversight and management support to various workstreams implemented by the team, including development of innovative open source prototypes, technical standard setting and implementation of support, and country engagement strategy

Working closely with the DPG Tech Lead and Product Manager, oversee development of concepts and roadmaps

Support the identification of relevant technical partners and vendors

Oversee integration of these prototypes into the DPG platform and apply them to other ongoing work within the Ventures team

Ensure ongoing management to open toolkits, addressing feedback provided on GitHub and other fora, promoting and monitoring their use (e.g. the DPG Operational Toolkit, the DPG Accelerator Guide)

Develop and expand country engagement and pathfinder strategy in consultation and based on Country Office needs 8. Project manage overall the implementation of UNICEF’s workplan on Digital Public Goods, as supported by Norway

Develop and implement to track and monitor, project management tools that articulate goals, activities and progress against agreed KPIs

Coordinate the work of relevant team members, including staff and consultants and service providers as needed

Provide operational support to ensure timely contracting of resources and smooth operations for the team’s work

Facilitate planning and review sessions with relevant team members

Facilitate regular stand-ups and similar team check-ins, identifying bottlenecks and working with team members to resolve them

Conduct regular reporting to the DPGA roadmap, relevant donor and other internal reports

Act as main focal point for partners

9. Support UNICEF’s Board members in their engagement

Track key agenda topics for discussion and decision, compiling main feedback and talking points

Identify agenda items for submission to the Secretariat

Follow-up on any actions identified for Board members

Prepare documents as needed to support external engagement and internal updates on UNICEF’s engagement in the DPGA as needed

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

• An advanced university degree (Master’s or higher) in Engineering, Technology, Computer Science, and/or other relevant field.

*A first University Degree in a relevant field combined with ten (10) years of professional experience, may be exceptionally accepted in lieu of an Advanced University Degree.

• A minimum of eight (8) years of relevant professional experience in open source project management, development or strategy development.
• Demonstrated expertise in some of the required technical areas, including: software quality assurance, Open Source license strategies or community management, developing and piloting Open Source technology products; relevant advocacy strategy and engagement.
• Experience in delivering guidance, technical support and mentorship to individuals, teams, start-ups or other groups on complex challenges.
• Experience engaging, ideally through advocacy, with stakeholders from different backgrounds and coordinating multi stakeholder activities.
• Knowledge of the open-source software and open data eco-systems.
• Demonstrated strategy development and project management skills, including coordination of resources and consultants.
• Piloting and scaling of technology solutions in UNICEF programme countries desired; developing country work experience and/or familiarity with emergency is considered an asset.
• Familiarity with international development.
• Fluency in English is required. Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish), and or the local language is considered an asset.

For every Child, you demonstrate...

UNICEF's values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, and Accountability (CRITA). To view our competency framework, please visit here.

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.

Remarks:

Mobility is a condition of international professional employment with UNICEF and an underlying premise of the international civil service. Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process.

UNICEF appointments are subject to medical clearance. Issuance of a visa by the host country of the duty station, which will be facilitated by UNICEF, is required for IP positions. Appointments may also be subject to inoculation (vaccination) requirements, including against SARS-CoV-2 (COVID). Government employees that are considered for employment with UNICEF are normally required to resign from their government before taking up an assignment with UNICEF. UNICEF reserves the right to withdraw an offer of appointment, without compensation, if a visa or medical clearance is not obtained, or necessary inoculation requirements are not met, within a reasonable period for any reason.