National Expert – Parliamentary Digital Eco-System Development

Contract

This is a National Consultant contract. More about National Consultant contracts.

Background

Modern Parliament for a Modern Armenia” Project is designed to strengthen the National Assembly of the Republic of Armenia (NA) in its fundamentally enhanced role within the governance system in carrying out critical functions of law-making, oversight, and representation. With a long-term goal of improving the overall effectiveness of the Parliament as a policy-making institution, the Project is designed to support the newly elected NA to take advantage of the modern governance tools and mechanisms that are focusing on improved quality, transparency and inclusiveness of parliamentary operations and enhanced parliamentary capacity for gender-responsive policymaking.

The Project expected outcomes are:

1. Quality of legislative oversight and policymaking is improved
2. Increased transparency and accountability of the NA
3. Legislative responsiveness, inclusivity and participatory approach is embedded in MP's work

As digital revolution is transforming the world at unprecedented speed, digital technologies proved essential for institutional continuity and demand by people in terms of connecting and exchanging information. The MAP Project recognized the need to develop tools for increased accountability and transparency of the NA. Hence, the Project is set to provide technical support to the National Assembly in terms developing an input into the digital strategy on digital participation and e-parliament.

Before good external digital engagement can be rolled out, there first has to be a review of internal digital structures, assessment where development and investment are needed, and how digital improvement will help to achieve their goals. High quality digital engagement can only happen where every contact stage of a citizen to institution engagement activity is owned by the relevant team, which often cuts across departments.

Citizens have a growing expectation that they can interact with their representative bodies online. Society is increasingly able to interact with large companies and organisations digitally, but is hindered by poor digital infrastructure, an absence of digital responsiveness and service standard, and institutional incoherence when attempting to engage with a parliament.

Digital tools for engagement will generally require data from multiple sources to power them, and it is likely that multiple internal administrators will require the information to be extracted in various useful formats that can be fed into parliamentary activity. This requires digital tools to be built with interoperability with existing or planned parliamentary ICT infrastructure, and to a certain extent, to be as flexible as possible to potential future digital transformation. This also requires information to be recorded in a standardised format so as to be searchable, meaning that simple naming conventions must be adopted across the whole system.

UNDP Armenia hereby seeks the services of two national expert/IT business analysts specialised in e-administration to support future digital transformation and e-parliament unveiling. The expert will work in close collaboration with the NA IT Department, Secretariat and the Digital Transformation Working Group.

Duties and Responsibilities

The expert will act under the overall supervision of UNDP MAP Project CTA and in close consultation with the NA digital transformation working group to develop an analysis on the digital participation aspect to feed into the digital transformation strategy as well as the e-parliament overview of the trends and lessons learnt through the following activities.

• Support the National Assembly IT Department and Working Group in the implementation of the e-parliament and digital engagement tools.
• Plan and organize the technical assessment of e-parliament development by the selected company and provide backstopping.
• Plan for the pilot testing of the e-parliament and digital engagement tools.
• Provide support and inputs into writing digital strategy for international experts.
• Provide advice in assessing information technology requirements with particular reference to the e-parliament and business continuity; consider and assess the related costs, sustainability, and maintenance factors as well as the associated risks and challenges to be used in discussions with the NA counterparts and further programmatic support.
• Identify different systems and applications for optimal content management, knowledge management and sharing, information provision for the long-term NA digital strategy.
• Participate in regular coordination meetings with all counterparts.
• Perform other tasks, duties and responsibilities required for the successful implementation of the Project.

Description of deliverables

Due date

1. Technical assessment of e-parliament development by the selected company organized and finalized organized and finalized

   31 Jan 2022

2. Plan for the pilot testing of the e-parliament and digital engagement tools prepared

15 March 2022

3. Support provided to the NA IT Department and Working Group in the implementation of the e-parliament and digital engagement tools

15 June 2022

4. Backstopping provided to the selected company for development e-parliament

Payment mode:

Payment will be conducted in the following instalments upon completion of the tasks under each output and approval of deliverables by UNDP MAP Project:

• Output 1 - 30%
• Output 2- 30%
• Outputs 3, 4- 40%

Competencies

• Cultural and political awareness, diplomatic skills, ability to adapt and ability to work independently and take responsibility for delivering results; and
• Excellent research, analytical, reporting and writing skills;
• Openness to change and ability to receive/integrate feedback;
• Ability to plan, organize, implement and report on work;
• Ability to work under pressure and tight deadlines;
• Proficiency in the use of office IT applications and internet in conducting research;
• Demonstrates integrity and ethical standards;
• Positive, constructive attitude to work;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability;
• Capacity to interact with senior officials and elected Members and credibly influence senior decision makers;
• Strong analytical, negotiation and communication skills, including ability to produce high quality practical advisory reports and knowledge products;
• Demonstrated practical knowledge and experience in the field of parliamentary assistance;
• Effective and timely delivery of agreed outputs in a high-pressure work environment.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Advanced University degree (MSc, MA, or Ph.D.) in business analysis or hardware/software engineering or related fields. A relevant university degree in combination with qualifying experience in the area may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.

Experience:

• At least 5 years of experience in ITC and in the provision of similar tasks;
• Proven practical experience in information gathering methodology and conducting analysis and assessment in e-sector.
• Experience in working with the Parliament or the Government on e-administration is an asset.
• Previous experience in digitalization transformation;
• Previous experience working with UNDP is an asset.
• Successful experience in planning and leading large-scale information system projects

Languages:

Excellent reading and writing proficiency in the English language is required

CANDIDATES WILL BE EVALUATED BASED ON THE FOLLOWING METHODOLOGY:

Candidates will be evaluated using a cumulative analysis method taking into consideration the combination of the applicants' technical qualifications, experience and financial proposal.The contract will be awarded to the candidate whose offer has been evaluated and determined as technically responsive/compliant/acceptable to the requirements of the ToR and received the highest cumulative (technical and financial) score out of below defined technical and financial criteria.

Only candidates obtaining a minimum of 49 points in the technical evaluation would be considered for financial evaluation.

Technical Criteria - 70% of total evaluation - max. 70 points

Financial Criteria - 30% of total evaluation - max. 30 points.

DOCUMENTS TO BE INCLUDED WHEN SUBMITTING THE APPLICATION.

• Financial Proposal and Availability form: OFFEROR’S LETTER TO UNDP (A total lump sum option is applicable for this assignment)
• CV shall include Education/Qualification, Processional Certification, Employment Records /Experience

General Conditions of Contract is available here: GENERAL CONDITIONS OF CONTRACT

Note: Please note you can upload only one document to this application (scan all documents that should be included in the application in one single PDF file and upload it).