National consultant to extend expert, training and mentoring services on gender responsive budgeting (GRB)

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; the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development; human rights; as well as humanitarian action and peace and security. Placing women's rights at the center of all its efforts, UN Women leads and coordinates United Nations system 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, building effective partnerships with civil society and other relevant actors.

UN Women Programme Office in the Republic of North Macedonia in line with its priorities set in the UN Women strategic plan and in the UN Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework, supports the country on the normative commitments and is working in two thematic areas – governance and national planning and ending violence against women. In fulfilling its mandate, UN Women is cooperating with UN, the government and the CSOs to advocate for women’s empowerment and advancement of gender equality. 

UN Women North Macedonia is implementing the project “Promoting Gender Responsive Policies and Budgets: Towards Transparent, Inclusive and Accountable Governance in Republic of North of Macedonia – phase 2” funded by Switzerland and the programme “Promoting Gender responsive governance in North Macedonia” funded by Sweden. Both initiatives are aimed towards more accountable, transparent and inclusive governance, which would improve the lives of women and girls and advance gender equality in North Macedonia.    

Programme/project interventions focus on strengthening the role of the National Gender Mechanisms in establishing an effective institutional capacity development on Gender Responsive Budgeting (GRB) and systematic integration of gender perspective in Public Finance Management.  At the local level, capacity development and mentoring support on gender responsive policy making and budgeting are provided to forty-one (41)  Local Self-Government Units (LSGUs), which include local administration and elected officials from partner municipalities. Ten of these LSGUs are newly selected and supporting them includes, but not limited to, processes through comprehensive training and mentoring programme. Additionally, extensive support is extended to strengthen oversight and accountability mechanisms in the country, through increased capacities and engagement of key oversight institutions. Finally, part of the interventions focuses on strengthening the capacities of women to voice their needs and advocate for increased accountability and financing for gender equality, while CSOs are supported to promote women’s leadership and participation in decision making and budgeting processes.

To support the capacity strengthening of the new 10 LSGUs to mainstream gender in sectoral programmes and to introduce gender specific objectives and measures and to continue the mentoring support to the 31 LSGUs, UN Women is seeking to recruit one consultant to work as part of a team of experts and jointly coordinate and deliver the training and mentoring programme at local level.

The national consultant will be expected to complete the below tasks within the indicative timeframe:

Duties and Responsibilities

The objective of the assignment is to provide expert, training and mentoring support on gender responsive programme planning and budgeting to LSGUs. More specifically, the aim is to build capacities and skills of the local administration and councillors to mainstream gender in policies and programmes. The support will be provided through assisting the local administration to analyse specific local programmes and budgets and develop gender specific measures and indicators, delivering GRB related trainings, as well as by mentoring the local councillors to review local policies from a gender perspective.

With this ToR, UN Women is seeking to hire one (1) Local Consultant to provide expert, training and mentoring services on gender responsive budgeting to 8 municipalities.

The expert will work under guidance of the UN Women Programme team that coordinates the overall training and mentoring process in the municipalities and ensure the work between the experts is synchronized and well-coordinated.

Based on the above-described objectives of the assignment, under the supervision of the Programme Analyst at UN Women Skopje Office, the local consultant is expected to undertake the following tasks and responsibilities:

• Desk-review of findings of relevant programme analyses conducted in the framework of the project, training evaluations and other materials on gender mainstreaming and gender responsive budgeting to inform their work on the assignment;
• Develop detailed training and mentoring plan tailored to the needs of 8 LSGUs, under guidance of UN Women Programme Team and based on the recommendations for capacity development training module on gender mainstreaming and GRB;
• Deliver standard orientation programme to local administration and members of municipal councils and commission for equal opportunities from the newly selected LSGUs to introduce the objectives of the local level training and mentoring on GRB;
• Extend mentoring support to LSGUs, through tailored interventions based on the needs and capacities of each municipality, provide support in mainstreaming gender in local programming, develop local action plans and/or strategies on gender equality;
• Deliver capacity building support trough mentoring of public administration from targeted departments of the LSGUs, local Commissions for equal opportunities between women and men and Commissions for budget and finance on gender mainstreaming and gender responsive budgeting;
• Facilitate exchange of good practices and lessons learned among LSGUs on GRB;
• Monitor and track progress in engendering local level programs and/or development of new action plans/local strategies;
• Conduct relevant gender analyses for the local component of GRB program and support the cooperation with other UN entities and partners
• Participate in regular planning and coordination meetings with UN Women and other consultants throughout the assignment;
• Provide the UN Women team with regular updates on the progress with implementation of the assignment; 
• Submit monthly time sheets for recording the time spent on each activity;
• Prepare quarterly progress reports summarizing results (changes in capacities, engendered local progammes and budgets, lessons learned, recommendations and pictures from the activities);
• Collect data and provide inputs to the tracking matrix for monitoring the engendered sectoral programmes on semi-annual basis;
• Prepare individual reports on the assignment.

 Reporting

Under the overall supervision of the Programme Analyst at UN Women Skopje Office, the Local consultant will develop and deliver the above listed deliverables in accordance with the indicative timeframe, along with a timesheet, report, and other relevant materials.

All deliverables of an acceptable standard and quality should be submitted to UN Women and in languages as specified above.

Consultant’s Workplace and Official Travel

This is a home-based consultancy. The assignment requires intermittent presence on UN Women premises for coordinative purposes.

As part of this assignment, there are expected travels outside Skopje, North Macedonia. If such engagements are expected, UN Women will cover the transportation and DSA.  

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 

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

FUNCTIONAL COMPETENCIES: 

• Knowledge Management and Learning
• Leadership and Self-Management
• Judgement/Decision-making
• Analytical Thinking
• Change Management

Required Skills and Experience

Education and Certification:

• Master’s degree or equivalent in public administration, public policy, finance, gender studies, 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:

• A minimum of 3 years of demonstrated professional experience in the area of gender equality with focus on gender responsive budgeting and/or public policy and budget monitoring;
• Previous experience in designing and delivering training and/or mentoring programmes on gender equality and gender mainstreaming in policy making and budgeting;
• Experience and knowledge on decentralization, local policy and budget development process in the Republic of North Macedonia;
• Knowledge on results-based management and strategic planning is a strong asset;
• Previous experience working with international organizations would be considered as an asset;

Languages:

• Fluency in Macedonian and English is required.
• Knowledge of Albanian is an asset.

How to Apply

• Personal CV or P11 (P11 can be downloaded from: )
• A short cover letter (maximum length: 1 page) including financial proposal in local currency (MKD), indicating a total lump sum for the delivery as per above description. The financial proposal shall include a breakdown of this lump sum amount (daily consultancy fee, travel and any other possible costs)
• Managers may ask (ad hoc) for any other materials relevant to pre-assessing the relevance of their experience, such as reports, presentations, publications, campaigns, or other materials.