Programme Support Intern

Background

With ten years into the crisis, the scale, severity, and complexity of needs across Syria remain deep and far-reaching. Over half of the country’s population have fled their homes: 5.5 million people have sought refuge in the region and beyond, and 6.1 million people are internally displaced. According to the HNO 2020, 11.1 million people remain in need of humanitarian assistance. Of these, 5.6 million people face acute humanitarian needs. Millions of people have fallen into poverty, forced to resort to harmful coping strategies and faced with increasing protection risks. With hostilities continuing in some parts of the country, COVID 19 preventive measures and impact of the financial crisis in Lebanon, humanitarian needs are expected to deepen in these areas.  In 2020 with no end to the crises in sight, humanitarian needs are expected to continue to grow in scale, severity, and complexity.  Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) and the successor arrangement to the UNSF are expected to play a role in strengthening the Humanitarian-Development-Peacebuilding Nexus by strengthening Resilience of the affected population in Syria.  The role of Resilience is expected to grow in importance and significance due to the need to accelerate the transition from immediate Humanitarian assistance to IDPs and affected population to more sustainable and recovery-oriented support, including support to potential returns of IDPs as well as refugees. 

The priorities of UNDP Syria are, as stipulated in the Country Programme Document 2016-2017 (extended till the end of 2020), to enhance the resilience and socio-economic stabilization of individuals and communities through restoring the disrupted livelihoods of the affected communities; and restoring, rehabilitating and maintaining sustainable basic services and infrastructure in damaged areas and host communities. Embedded in each priority is an institutional crisis response capacity development component for key national and local partners. Mindful of the scale of the crisis, the scaled-up, targeted, and rapidly responsive interventions of UNDP Syria would strive to mitigate displacement and movement of refugees, including forced, illegal, and unsafe migration and the trafficking of refugees, and to support potential returns of the IDPs.

Under the guidance of the unit team leader and direct supervision and coaching/mentoring of the Programme Support Officer, the Programme Support Intern provides support to the unit performing a variety of standard clerical/administrative processes ensuring high quality and accuracy of work. The Intern promotes a client, quality, and results-oriented approach.

 The Intern works in close collaboration with the team, Operations, Programme and projects staff in the CO to exchange information and ensure consistent service delivery.

Duties and Responsibilities

• In coordination with IM and MSU Team, establishes and manages an effective e-archiving system using corporate systems (MS SharePoint, Teams).
• Contributes to the establishment and manages multiple databases and systems as needed, using proper software on ongoing tasks ‘timelines, and regular reports produced by the unit.
• Follows up on deadlines, commitments made, actions taken and coordination of collection and submission of the reports to head of unit.
• Works with team members on new initiatives and existing processes to support her/his learning and building necessary skills and competencies.
• Assistance in the preparation and review of project’s budgets and workplans, and provisions of information for audit.
• Provides full support to unit’s tasks and follows up with different teams to meet deadlines.
• Supports administrative and logistical services including conferences, workshops, retreats.
• Perform any other duties as assigned.

Competencies

Core

• Innovation: Ability to make new and useful ideas work.
• Leadership: Ability to persuade others to follow.
• Communication: Ability to listen, adapt, persuade, and transform.
• Delivery: Ability to get things done while exercising good judgement.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Applicant should meet one of the following requirements:

• Enrolled in a postgraduate degree programme (such as a master’s programme, or higher).
• Enrolled in the final academic year of a first university degree programme (such as bachelor’s degree or equivalent);
• Have recently graduated with a university degree (as defined in (a) and (b) above) and, if selected, must start the internship within one-year of graduation.
• Be enrolled in a postgraduate professional traineeship program and undertake the internship as part of this program

Experience:

• Sound experience in the usage of computers and office software packages (MS Word, Excel, etc.) and advance knowledge of spreadsheet and database packages; is highly desirable.
• Have demonstrated keen interest in the work of the United Nations and have a personal commitment to the ideals of the Charter, is desirable.
• Have demonstrated the ability to successfully interact with individuals of different cultural backgrounds and beliefs, which include willingness to try and understand and be tolerant of differing opinions and views, is desirable.

Language Requirements:

• Proficiency in Arabic & English.