Consultant – National Coordination (12 months)

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! 

Pakistan was the sixth country in the world to sign and ratify the Convention on the Rights of the Child less than one year after it was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1989. However, children and adolescents living in Pakistan still face acute challenges.

UNICEF supports the Government of Pakistan to accelerate progress for children, work to achieve Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and help children realize their rights under the Convention on the Rights of Children. This will be made through, among others things, strong partnerships with provincial authorities, teachers and health professionals, frontline workers and social mobilizers, communities, and families, and, of course, the children and adolescents themselves. 

In particular, UNICEF will work so that:

• Every child survives and thrives — being in good health, immunized, protected from polio, and accessing nutritious food.
• Every child learns.
• Every child is protected from violence and exploitation and registered at birth.
• Every child lives in a safe and clean environment, with access to safe drinking water and adequate sanitation.

To learn more about UNICEF’s work in Pakistan, please visit the country website www.unicef.org/pakistan and videos on YouTube and Vimeo

UNICEF is seeking a highly skilled Senior National Consultant to provide expert technical advice and support to the leadership of the various provincial child protection authorities in the effective implementation of their child protection mandate, specifically on responses to children at risk and survivors of child protection violations. The consultant will play a crucial role in supporting advocacy efforts and providing technical guidance to various stakeholders involved in child protection case management system, including government officials, deputy commissioners, police, health professionals, the judiciary, etc.

You can make a difference by executing the following tasks and deliverables:

 Deliverables:

The consultancy will be full time for a duration of 12 months.

1. Senior level consultancy  that will require continued engagement with senior level government officials. The consultant will be based at Federal Directorate for Immunization.
2. She/He will Lead the team of UNICEF consultants based at Federal Directorate on Immunization in daily meetings; timely collect the agenda of the meetings and share with UNICEF Immunization team, ensure that UNICEF EPI Workplan related activities are included in the agenda, record key discussion points/salientfeatures/highlights of the meeting and share with Immunization team on daily basis.
3. Monitor the activities of UNICEF consultants based at Federal Directorate and ensure that they are performing their activities as per their deliverables.
4. Coordinate timely approvals of all UNICEF-led activities as requested by UNICEF CO/FO from FDI and organize UNICEF advocacy sessions with high level government officials.
5. Collect, analyze, and triangulate data for routine EPI; PEI Zero dose data, SHRUCS data, vaccination coverage of areas reporting outbreaks and highlights high risk UCs /areas, UCS/Areas with high number of zero dose children and share with all UNICEF team and thematic area technical lead for their reference and use for informed decision making.
6. Strengthen the NICC: update the list of NICC members and organizations, develop TORs for the NICC (purpose, mission and functions), establish linkages between NICC and other EPI committees as required (PEI, NITAG, Polio TAG, NRA, health system coordination committee), develop regular coordination mechanism with different partners, establish and agree on a yearly agenda of the NICC, produce technical documents and presentations for NICC meetings in collaboration with all partners, ensures that clear actionable guidelines are resulting from NICC committees, share minutes of meetings to all relevant partners, monitor implementation of NICC decisions and build the capacity of the NICC chairs based on WHO reference documents.
7. Support synergy activities between EPI and PEI teams both in routine immunization strengthening and SIAs: ensure good and timely information is given to both sides when coordination is required, background information/ presentation is provided to both parts to prepare for meeting and minutes of meeting outcomes are filled and shared.
8. Contribute to the development of proposals for HPV introduction, BCU (big catchup), MR and any other initiative in RI strengthening and campaign mode and contribute to the planning, implementation and M&E of these activities including post campaign monitoring and LQAs.
9. National Focal person for MNTE elimination agenda: coordination between all partners and provinces; implement corrective campaigns and plan / implement, report on pre validations and validations missions.
10. Facilitate access to National Electronic Immunization Registry (NEIR) to retrieve 24/7 birth dose and urban immunization activities from all provinces, using the list of vaccinators to retrieve their performance in real time and link to verification before payment order to third party, as well as access to the dashboard for UNICEF teams.
11. Organize, coordinate regular periodic quarterly review meetings with FDI (presented by respective UNICEF thematic areas/Technical leads) to review UNICEF workplan implementation and achievements and document the minutes of meeting, action points and ensure follow up.

Other task required by DG FDI and UNICEF Senior manager EPI.

Tasks/Milestone:

1. Lead the team of UNICEF consultants based at the Federal Directorate on Immunization in daily meetings; timely collect the agenda of the meetings, and share with the UNICEF Immunization team, ensure that UNICEF EPI Workplan-related activities are included in the agenda, record key  discussion points/salient features/highlights of the meeting and share with Immunization team on daily basis.

2. Monitor the activities of UNICEF consultants based at the Federal Directorate and ensure that they are performing their activities as per their deliverables.

 3. Coordinate timely approvals of all UNICEF led activities as requested by UNICEF CO/FO from FDI and organize UNICEF advocacy sessions with high level government officials.

4. Strengthen the NICC: update the list of NICC members and organizations, develop TORs for the NICC (purpose, mission and functions), establish linkages between NICC and other EPI committees as required (PEI, NITAG, Polio TAG, NRA, health system coordination committee), develop regular coordination mechanism with different partners, establish and agree on a yearly agenda of the NICC, produce technical documents and presentations for NICC meetings in collaboration with all partners, ensures that clear actionable guidelines are resulting from NICC committees, share minutes of meetings to all relevant partners, monitor implementation of NICC decisions and build the capacity of the NICC chairs based on WHO reference documents.

5. Contribute to the development of proposals for HPV introduction, BCU (big catchup), MR, and any other initiative in RI strengthening and campaign mode and contribute to the planning, implementation and M&E of these activities including post campaign monitoring and LQAs.   5 Monthly Report contains description of activity if held in the month and Monthly administrative data analysis report.

6. Facilitate access to National Electronic Immunization Registry (NEIR) to retrieve 24/7 birth dose and urban immunization activities from all provinces, using the list of vaccinators to retrieve their performance in real time and link to verification before payment order to third party, as well as access to the dashboard for UNICEF teams.

7. Organize, Coordinate regular periodic quarterly review meetings with FDI to review UNICEF workplan implementation and achievements, presented by respective UNICEF thematic areas/Technical leads, document the minutes of meeting, action points and ensure follow up.

8. Collect and analyze and triangulate data for routine EPI, PEI Zero dose data, SHRUCS data, vaccination coverage of areas reporting outbreaks, highlights highrisk UCs /areas, UCS/Areas with high number of zero dose children and share with all UNICEF team and thematic area technical lead for their reference and use for informed decision making.

9. Coordinate planning of mass vaccination campaigns, Big MR catchup, advocate for timely decision by FDI regarding UNICEF proposed agenda points, and share insights of the meeting with UNICEF EPI team for timely decision and response.

10. National Focal person for MNTE elimination agenda: coordination between all partners and provinces;

implement corrective campaigns and plan / implement, report on pre validations and validations missions.

11. Organize, coordinate regular periodic quarterly review meetings with FDI (presented by respective UNICEF thematic areas/Technical leads) to review UNICEF workplan implementation and achievements and

document the minutes of meeting, action points and ensure follow up

Deliverables/Outputs:

1. The monthly report contains a description of activity if held in the month and a monthly administrative data analysis report.

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

• An advanced university degree (Master’s or above)  in Medicine/ Public Health
• A minimum of 5 years of relevant experience in Public Health
• The consultant should have a technical understanding and expertise of the complexities of Immunization program.
• He/She should have strong interpersonal communication skills to ensure that he can advocate for the different strategies
• Familiarity with the local context and challenges related to child protection governance.
• Ability Fluency in English and Urdu is required. Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish) or a local language is an asset.

For every Child, you demonstrate… 

UNICEF’s values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, Accountability, and Sustainability (CRITAS). 

To view our competency framework, please visit  here. 

 UNICEF is here to serve the world’s most disadvantaged children and our global workforce must reflect the diversity of those children. The UNICEF family is committed to include everyone, irrespective of their race/ethnicity, age, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, nationality, socio-economic background, or any other personal characteristic.

UNICEF offers reasonable accommodation for consultants/individual contractors 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. 

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:  

• Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process.
• Applicants must submit a financial quotation indicating consultant fee against monthly deliverables as part of the application 
• Consultant will be based in Islamabad, will be required to travel with in-country as and when required .
• Consultant needs to produce a copy of their health insurance coverage at the time the contract is awarded

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.