Senior Programme Management Assistant

Org. Setting and Reporting

This position is located within the Operation Planning Service (OPS) under the Division for Special Activities (DSA) in the Department of Operational Support (DOS) based in New York. DOS was established to provide operational advisory services to operating entities across the Secretariat, including other departments, offices-away-from headquarters, field missions, and regional commissions. DSA oversees a range of specialized or cross-cutting operational capacities. A large part of its responsibilities is to support start-up, surge, transition and liquidation requirements and to exercise authority on behalf of entities to which authority has not been granted owing to a lack of capacity or from which authority has been temporarily withdrawn. Within DSA, OPS help identify emerging support requirements, and works with counterparts across DOS and other United Nations entities to provide operational planning capacity, technical assistance and advice for the deployment, establishment, transition and liquidation of client entities. The Senior Programme Assistant reports to a Programme Officer in OPS.

Responsibilities

Within delegated authority, the Senior Programme Assistant will be responsible for the following duties:

• Independently provides full range of programme/project management and implementation assistance at all phases of the programme/project cycle for, typically, a large and highly complex component of the departmental programme/project initiatives, seeking guidance only in exceptional circumstances.
• Researches, compiles, analyses, summarizes, and presents basic information/data on wide range of programmes/projects and related topics, highlighting noteworthy issues/trends for consideration by appropriate parties.
• Monitors relevant developments and maintains up-to-date knowledge of events that affect programme/project content and oversees the preparation of the relevant database(s) to ensure the incorporation of programmatic and other changes enacted by legislation.
• Reviews, appraises and revises, as necessary, all submissions for substantive programmes/projects, ensuring compliance with guidelines and programme/project objectives; identifies problems/issues, seek clarification from departments, assess replies, and prepares a summary for the manager with suggestions for further action.
• Independently provides full range of data analysis at all phases of a data analysis initiative, typically, a large and highly complex component of the departmental data analysis initiatives.
• Assembles data sets in their area, supports assembly of complex data sets
• Provides input to the design and development of data infrastructure and drafts documentation and formal design documents • Maintains data governance, protection and security.
• Maintains data management tools.
• Serves as focal point for coordination, monitoring and expedition of implementation activities and participates in programme/project evaluation; monitor implementation at all stages to ensure work is proceeding according to established plans, including analysing implementation difficulties and initiating remedial action; liaises with diverse organizational units to initiate requests; prepares standard terms of reference against programme/project objectives, obtains necessary clearances, processes and follows-up on administrative actions and resolves issues related to project implementation, e.g. recruitment and appointment of personnel, travel arrangements, organization of and participation in training/study tours, authorization of payments, disbursement of funds, procurement of equipment and services, etc.
• Provides secretariat services to committees, ad hoc tasks forces, working groups, etc.; drafts and circulates agenda notes to members/participants; assembles background documentation; drafts minutes of the meeting; monitors follow-up actions, etc.
• Designs, develops, implements, maintains, and trains users of automated data extraction and reports generation tools; and interactive web-based dashboards, and data visualization solutions relevant to the scope of programme/project activities.
• Supervises office support staff, including distribution and review of work assignments, training, and inputs to performance evaluation.
• Performs other duties as assigned.

Education

• High school diploma or equivalent is required.

Work Experience

• A minimum of ten years of years progressively responsible experience in programme or project administration, data science, data analytics, applied mathematics, information management, data analytics, or related area is required. The minimum years of relevant experience is reduced to five (8) years for candidates who possess a first-level university degree or higher.
• Experience in the analysis, modeling and interpretation of data in support of decision-making is required.
• Experience using PowerPoint and Excel is required.
• Experience with programming language(s), such as SQL, R, Python, or similar, is desirable.
• Experience using data visualization tools, such as PowerBI or similar, is desirable.
• Experience working in the United Nations System or a comparable international organization is desirable.

Languages

• English and French are the working languages of the United Nations Secretariat. For the position advertised, fluency in English is required. Knowledge of another official United Nations language is desirable.

Source: https://careers.un.org/jobSearchDescription/233017?language=en