Chief Librarian

COMPANY PRESENTATION

WHO began when our Constitution came into force on 7 April 1948 - a date we now celebrate every year as World Health Day. We are now more than 7000 people from more than 150 countries working in 150 country offices, in 6 regional offices and at our headquarters in Geneva.
- Our primary role is to direct and coordinate international health within the United Nations system and our main areas of work are health systems; health through the life-course; noncommunicable and communicable diseases; preparedness, surveillance and response; and corporate services.
- We support countries as they coordinate the efforts of governments and partners - including bi
- and multilaterals, funds and foundations, civil society organizations and the private sector.
- Working together, we attain health objectives by supporting national health policies and strategies.
- WHO works worldwide to promote health, keep the world safe, and serve the vulnerable.
- Our goal is to ensure that a billion more people have universal health coverage, to protect a billion more people from health emergencies, and provide a further billion people with better health and well-being.

Find in-depth information on careers with WHO and related cinfo's support on cinfo.ch:
**Position number: 405045**

**OBJECTIVES OF THE PROGRAMME**

Within the Department of Science, Information and Dissemination (SID), the Library and Knowledge Sharing (LKS) teams contribute to implementation of knowledge management, dissemination, sharing and translation in support of health systems development regionally andwithin WHO. The Library and Knowledge Sharing (LKS) is a key part of this work through improving the access to and availability of health information resources and dissemination of WHO information products.

**DESCRIPTION OF DUTIES**
- Coordinate and implement the work of Library, Knowledge and Sharing (LKS) and its acquisitions, financial and human resources, with appropriate work plans.
- Ensure timely production, marketing, distribution, sales and electronic publishing of WHO/EMRO information products. This covers identification, selection and management of vendors' relations, quality control of productions, monitoring and evaluation of impact of products and overall management of databases of address and publications.
- Supervise the archiving and digitization projects to monitor, share and disseminate WHO information products and recommending or taking actions as appropriate to preserve institutional memory. Build a dynamic e-library and knowledge management and sharing
- , including EMR Virtual Health Sciences Library (VHSL), Index Medicus of the Eastern Mediterranean Region (IMEMR), Institutional Digital Repository (IDR), and Resrach4Life programmes to foster universal access to the world's health related publications and information in the Regional Office, Country Offices, and the Member States.
- Collaborate with public and private partners to set agendas in access to health knowledge and contribute to the development of appropriate policy frameworks, local capacities and systems, and innovative mechanisms for technical assistance to EMR countries in need. Provide technical advice to the planning and implementation of EMR countries' libraries and health knowledge sharing
- , and conduct needs assessment. Work with other UN agencies and collaborating centers on development and implementation of joint
- .
- Participate in relevant meetings and forums representing the organization at interagency, international and national meetings as assigned by Director/SID.
- Perform any other related incident-specific duties as required, including supporting the advocacy and fund-raising

**REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS**

**Education**

**Essential**: University degree from a recognized university in library and information sciences or knowledge management.
- Training in emerging technologies for Library and Knowledge Management and publication processes.**Experience**

**Essential**: Five years of experience with international exposure working in library and health information services.
- **Desirable**: Experience within UN or other international organizations.
- Working experience with databases and/or repositories.
- Experience in managing digital multilingual information products.
- Experience of managing publication processes and -houses.

**Skills**
- Excellent knowledge of modern health information product and library sciences, documentation services, information production and dissemination and information sciences and technology.
- Knowledge of proprietary and opensource library databases and repository systems.
- Familiarity with international information preservation and interoperability standards - such as Dublin Core, MARC21, AACR2, MeSH, NLM Classification, OAI-PMH, OAI-ORE, Open URL, etc.
- Strong ICT background, including web-based systems and portals.
- Sound judgement, tact and ability to communicate with staff at different levels and in