Independent Consultant to Conduct Preliminary and Post Assessment on Inter-community Dialogues on Peacebuilding, Collective Leadership, and Women’s Engagement in Communities (Local post for nationals of Sri Lanka)

Background

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security. Placing women’s rights at the center of all its efforts, UN Women leads and coordinates the United Nations system’s efforts to ensure that commitments on gender equality and gender mainstreaming translate into action throughout the world. It provides strong and coherent leadership in support of Member States’ priorities and efforts towards building effective partnerships with civil society and other relevant actors.

The UN Security Council Resolution 1325, unanimously adopted in October 2000, stressed the importance of the equal participation and full involvement of women in all efforts to maintain and promote peace and security. In the years since, seven additional resolutions on Women, Peace and Security have been adopted, creating a robust framework for implementing the Women, Peace and Security agenda and reinforcing global commitments, treaties, and conventions on women’s rights, including the 1979 Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women and the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action. To deliver these commitments at the national level, the United Nations has encouraged Member States to adopt policies to implement the resolutions and monitor the progress of the Women, Peace and Security agenda, including National Action Plans on Women, Peace, and Security.

In Sri Lanka, the Government adopted country’s first-ever National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security in February 2023. The development of this National Action Plan was led by the Ministry of Women, Child Affairs, and Social Empowerment, with technical support from UN Women in partnership with the Government of Japan, in consultation with Sri Lankan women across all 25 districts of the country. Following the adoption of the National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security, UN Women is committed to support the implementation of the Women Peace and Security agenda through the increased engagement of national and local level government authorities, civil society organizations, women leaders and the development community.

Against this background, UN Women is seeking to hire a consultant to conduct a preliminary and post assessment of the Inter-community, Multi-stakeholder Dialogues (IMDs) at grassroot level to promote women’s engagement in peacebuilding through collective leadership. IMDs are conceptualized and implemented under the project “Pathways to Peace: Realizing the National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security in Sri Lanka” with the funding support from the Government of Japan.

The project “Pathways to Peace” is implemented in the districts of Anuradhapura, Batticaloa, Mannar and Mullaitivu. 3 divisions from each district are selected for the interventions targeted under the project. The IMDs that are implemented as part of the “Pathways to Peace” Project are expected to engage community-level women leaders, local-level government officials, CSO representatives, religious bodies, media representatives in the project districts. Out of the 3 divisions selected for the Project, 2 will be selected to part of the IMDs and about 85 participants will be selected combinedly from the 2 divisions for each of the 4 project districts. 

Duties and Responsibilities

Under the supervision and guidance of the UN Women Head of Office of Sri Lanka, the consultant is expected to conduct 1) a preliminary assessment and 2) post assessment IMDs, The main objective of this exercise is to determine the effectiveness of IMDs that will be facilitated by a team of UN Women consultants.

A preliminary assessment would need to be made in all three divisions of the four districts respectively. While IMD’s will be facilitated in two of the three divisions, the third division would identify as the baseline control group for the assessment. In order to gain a comprehensive understanding of the context, the preliminary assessment should be able to establish, through a baseline, existing leadership roles, with a focus on women involved in local governance structures and leadership roles within the community. The assessment must include disaggregated data by sex, district, age, ethnicity, religion, disability to qualitatively assess understanding trust and collaboration among diverse groups within the community.

Note: IMD’s are scheduled to commence in August 2024 and as such the data collection for the preliminary assessment would be required to be completed ahead of the dialogues.

The post assessment will focus on providing a comparative analysis of indicative factors such as the quality of IMD’s, women’s participation, its corresponding impact of peacebuilding and leadership and precursors for sustainability of impact.  The assessment should include qualitative and quantitative indicators of tangible outcomes such as the number of joint initiatives or projects initiated as a direct result of the dialogues, changes in community perceptions towards conflict resolution, evidence of improved decision making processors and inclusivity including women’s role in leadership.

Note: IMD’s are scheduled to conclude on the 17nd February 2025 and as such the post assessment would proceed the following weeks thereafter.

Note: The consultant is encouraged to mobilise a team to support the consultant with data collection, translation/ simultaneous interpretation, data entering and data cleaning.

Deliverables

Consultant’s Workplace and Official Travel

The consultancy is expected to be started on 18 July 2024 and continue until 30 May 2025. The Consultant is expected to visit the project locations to undertake the project activities, if travel is not restricted by national health authorities or UN Women due to the COVID 19 health emergency. For all travel, the cost of most economic and direct travel on mission must be pre-approved by the Head of Office of UN Women Sri Lanka and will be reimbursed following UN Women travel guidelines. Daily Subsistence Allowance (DSA) and travel costs in compliance with UN Women Travel Guidelines will be reimbursed to the consultant at actual amount upon submission of receipts and travel stubs. 

Competencies

Core Values: 

• Respect for Diversity 
• Integrity 
• Professionalism 

Core Competencies: 

• Awareness and Sensitivity Regarding Gender Issues 
• Accountability 
• Creative Problem Solving 
• Effective Communication 
• Inclusive Collaboration 
• Stakeholder Engagement 
• Leading by Example 

Functional Competency

• Excellent analytical skills with strong drive for results and capacity to work independently.

Please visit this link for more information on UN Women’s Core Values and Competencies:  

Required Skills and Experience

Education and Certification:

• Master’s degree or equivalent in Conflict and Peace Studies, Gender and Development, International Relations, Public Administration, Statistics, Law, Human Rights or a related field is required.
• A first-level university degree in combination with two additional years of qualifying experience may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.

Experience:

• At least 5 years of progressively responsible work experience in working on programmes on peacebuilding and reconciliation, governance and WPS.
• Proven extensive experience in being the lead in conducting base line and end line assessments/evaluations for women and youth on women’s leadership in governance and peacebuilding is required.
• Experience of working with provincial/local community engagement is required.

Languages:

• Fluency in English and Sinhala or Tamil is required.
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How to Apply

Interest candidates are encouraged to submit electronic application to with cc to    no later than 15 July 2024.

Submission package includes:

• Personal CV and P11 (P11 can be downloaded from: )
• A cover letter (maximum length: 1 page)
• Two Sample evaluation/assessment report developed for similar assignments will be requested from shortlisted candidates.

Payments

Payments for this consultancy will be based on the achievement of each deliverable and certification that each has been satisfactorily completed. Payments will be based on the number of days worked in correlation to the completion of each stated deliverable within the indicated timeframes. Payments will be made upon submission of deliverables with an approval of the Head of Office of UN Women Sri Lanka.

Diversity and Inclusion Statement

At UN Women, we are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment of mutual respect. UN Women recruits, employs, trains, compensates, and promotes regardless of race, religion, color, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, ability, national origin, or any other basis covered by appropriate law. All employment is decided on the basis of qualifications, competence, integrity and organizational need.

If you need any reasonable accommodation to support your participation in the recruitment and selection process, please include this information in your application.

UN Women has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UN Women, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to UN Women’s policies and procedures and the standards of conduct expected of UN Women personnel 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.)