Workforce Planning Specialist, Regional Bureau for Western Africa

Job Title: Workforce Planning Specialist - Regional Bureau for Western Africa (RBD)

Unit/Division: Workforce Planning & Strategy Branch, Human Resources

Contract duration: 11 months

Duty Station (City, Country): Dakar, Senegal

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE OF THE ASSIGNMENT

The World Food Programme (WFP) is the world's largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger globally, part of the United Nations. At WFP, we are driven and defined by our mission to fight world hunger, save lives, feed people’s dreams of a brighter future, reduce risk and help enable people, communities and countries meet their own food and nutrition needs. More than 19,000 people work worldwide to ensure the most vulnerable, particularly women and children, can access the nutritious food they need.

We are currently establishing a Strategic Workforce Planning (SWP) practice within the HR Division. SWP enables WFP to purposefully plan for, manage and prepare its future workforce to respond effectively to the increasing demands of the organisation within a globally complex environment.

You will be part of a dynamic team, helping connect our strategy with our operational needs in terms of people, skills and capabilities required to deliver on our important mandate.

ROLE

This is a Regional role to support the design, delivery and monitoring of workforce plans and structural reviews at Country Office level within a specified region. This role works in close collaboration with internal and external stakeholders, from WFP’s management, to functional subject matter experts, HR colleagues and external experts.

Priorities can often change in a fast-paced environment like WFP, so this role includes, but is not limited to, the following accountabilities:

ACCOUNTABILITIES / RESPONSABILITIES

1. Act as Regional Subject Matter Expert on Strategic Workforce Planning (SWP) and Organizational Alignment Reviews (OA), conducting SWP and/or OA exercises for the Country Offices within the specified region based on established procedures, incorporating the results of functional and global workforce plans.

2. Through desktop reviews and stakeholder meetings, assess the strategic direction of Country Offices as well as possible future scenarios and derive insights into the implications of these on the workforce using a strategic workforce planning software.

3. Identify and analyze the current workforce and its relevant characteristics, including current skills of the workforce through skills gap analyses, talent reviews and/or functional talent assessments.

4. Assess future demand for talent based on strategic direction, and future supply of internal talent through data analysis. Project supply versus demand models for the Country Offices and identify gaps.

5. Work with HR colleagues and management to develop a strategy to close gaps by identifying appropriate workforce and/or talent management solutions to bridge the gaps over short, medium, and long-term including costs, timeframes, and benefits.

6. Analyze Country Office current organizational set-ups, structures, workforce composition and design organizational structures based on the workforce planning results.

7. Provide guidance and advice on formulating detailed implementation plans to ensure that the gaps between the current and future structures and workforce can be smoothly bridged.

8. Prepare appropriate communications materials to keep all stakeholders informed of SWP and structure alignment progress, to request action and to build engagement.

9. Monitor the implementation of Country Office workforce plans through the management of project plans, conduct lessons-learned exercises and contribute to the refining of workforce planning practices across WFP.

10. Coordinate and streamline the collection, interpretation and validation of workforce data and its analysis ensuring that quality standards and data privacy compliance are maintained.

11. Establish regional best practices, benchmarks and knowledge repositories on Strategic Workforce Planning and organizational structures, sharing them proactively with the counterparts in Headquarters and other regions.

12. Other, as required.

QUALIFICATIONS & EXPERIENCE REQUIRED

EDUCATION:

University Degree in Human Resources, Statistics, Economics, Business Administration, Public Administration, or other related field.

EXPERIENCE:

Minimum 6 years of experience in HR management, of which at least 3 in Strategic Workforce Planning, Organizational Design or HR consulting with excellent analytical, communication and project management skills,

At least 3 years of international experience either working abroad or in an international environment, as part of a multicultural team.

TECHNICAL KNOWLEDGE & SKILLS:

• Strong track record on organizational design and change management
• Strong analytical, critical thinking, planning and problem-solving skills
• Strong attention to detail
• Ability to handle ambiguity and change, as well as balance multiple priorities
• Customer orientation
• Excellent written/verbal communication skills
• Ability to build effective relationships across and outside the organization, at all levels
• Proficiency with Microsoft Excel, Word and Powerpoint
• High level of organization to compile and derive insights from data, working with multiple sources and coping with rapidly changing information
• Knowledge of workforce planning tools and data analytics/visualisation/ reporting technology is desirable

LANGUAGES: Fluency in French and English

ABILITY TO TRAVEL****: The position is based in Dakar, Regional with up to 50% of travel required within the Western Africa Region

WHY WORK WITH US?

This is an opportunity for an exciting and challenging position in a multi-cultural and interdisciplinary team, based in a unique location, on a topic with high relevance.

In addition, we offer:

➡️Meaningful and impactful careers: Our day-to-day work makes a difference in the lives of the people we serve

➡️Continuous learning and training: We provide learning tools for our staff to continually develop their careers

➡️Multicultural and stimulating work environment: We encourage gender and cultural diversity to make our teams stronger

Join us to make a difference, watch this video to know more about us!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RnaxfnNKdsM&t=7s

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS: 20 MARCH 2022

All employment decisions are made on the basis of organizational needs, job requirements, merit, and individual qualifications. WFP is committed to providing an inclusive work environment free of sexual exploitation and abuse, all forms of discrimination, any kind of harassment, sexual harassment, and abuse of authority. Therefore, all selected candidates will undergo rigorous reference and background checks.

No appointment under any kind of contract will be offered to members of the UN Advisory Committee on Administrative and Budgetary Questions (ACABQ), International Civil Service Commission (ICSC), FAO Finance Committee, WFP External Auditor, WFP Audit Committee, Joint Inspection Unit (JIU) and other similar bodies within the United Nations system with oversight responsibilities over WFP, both during their service and within three years of ceasing that service.