Regional Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation Strategist

About the Position:

The Regional Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation Strategist promotes a culture of results and evidence-based programme management in the region. He/ she provides leadership and guidance to the implementation of corporate policies, procedures, principles, monitoring, reporting and evaluation norms and standards at regional and national level, to ensure relevance, efficiency, effectiveness and sustainability of the work of UNFPA in the region.

Key Responsibilities:

• Contribute to the formulation of the Regional Programme, drawing upon the analysis of evaluative evidence of UNFPA support in the region and evidence stemming from corporate evaluations.
• Ensure the integration of evaluation findings, conclusions and recommendations in regional and country-level programming;
• Provide support for planning, monitoring, reporting of the regional, sub-regional and country programmes in the region, ensuring the design and implementation of robust results and resources frameworks;
• Promote results-based monitoring and use of monitored data in the country offices.
• Provide key inputs in the oversight of regional and country programmes;
• Develop and lead the implementation of work plans for regional programme and/or thematic evaluations;
• Ensure result-based monitoring and evaluation plans are implemented, and results acted upon at country and regional levels
• Conduct regional and country-level capacity-building initiatives and workshops in order to strengthen a culture of results and evidence-based programme management in UNFPA and partner institutions;
• Ensure that all PM&E officers/ focal points and staff in the region are knowledgeable about UNFPA PM&E policies and procedures, norms, standards and guidance;
• Participate in Independent Evaluation Office and Programme Division trainings and workshops;
• Contribute to the development and adaptation of tools and guidance as well as training materials and manuals in monitoring and evaluation and support their use for capacity development of partner institutions and UNFPA staff in the region; 
• Contribute to monitoring and analysis of reports on humanitarian, economic, political and social factors in development and management of population and development programmes, such as the UNFPA-supported country programmes and regional programme;
• Contribute to identify and validate regional monitoring and evaluation experts; 
• Coordinate the Country Offices PM&E Focal Points Network to highlight innovations and Programme Monitoring and Evaluation (PME) bottle necks in the region;
• Contribute to the development of policies, procedures and tools for planning, monitoring and evaluation, to the efforts of Programme Division and the independent Evaluation Office respectively;
• Contribute to the analysis, synthesis and dissemination of state-of-the-art knowledge and new approaches to planning, monitoring and evaluation practice, in particular best practices, and make recommendations for their adoption at regional and country levels;
• Support the Regional Office in ensuring the incorporation of monitoring and evaluation results and lessons learned in the updating of specific substantive strategies, policies, tools and approaches, and ensure their availability in the organizational system for lessons learned;
• Disseminate to country offices HQ initiatives on results-based approaches;
• Advise the Regional Director, Deputy Regional Director, and Country Representatives/Heads of Office on planning and funding for evaluations of projects and programmes, as well as evaluation staffing and evaluation management arrangements;
• Contribute to IEO efforts to develop country office evaluation capacities and support the  development of evaluation capacities of UNFPA partners, including young evaluators;
• Support the implementation of IEO-managed activities in the region and managing the regional elements of the evaluation pooled fund, once established;
• Lead the development and implementation of the regional evaluation strategy, including the identification of innovative evaluation methodologies, approaches and tools and promoting their incorporation into UNFPA decentralized evaluations in the region;
• Lead the preparation and implementation of the regional office costed evaluation plan;
• Provide technical advice and quality assurance of evaluations managed by country offices, including technical supervision;
• Guide country offices in preparing quality costed evaluation plans (CEPs) and monitor the implementation of CEPs in the region;
• Quality assure country programme evaluations (CPEs) and project evaluations (as per CEPs) undertaken by country offices, including review and approval of the terms of reference, pre-qualification of evaluation teams, review and approval of evaluation deliverables;
• Quality assure management responses to decentralized evaluations to ensure their timely release and follow up;
• Support partnerships with evaluation networks, professional evaluation bodies, national and regional institutions, UN partners, UNEG and other development partners, and promote peer-to-peer learning to further reinforce national evaluation capacity;
• Together with the regional communications team, lead and implement strategic communication plans for regional evaluations; foster a culture of communicating and utilizing country level evaluations; cross-fertilize evaluation lessons across country offices and partners; and facilitate the long-term utilization of evaluation evidence in programming and decision-making.
• With the support of the Humanitarian Evaluation Adviser in the Independent Evaluation Office in Nairobi, Kenya:
• provide evaluative evidence with a view to accounting for the performance of UNFPA in humanitarian assistance and informing UNFPA's current and future humanitarian programming in the region
• Support the strengthening of humanitarian evaluation across the Arab States region
• Conducting and/or managing (with the Humanitarian Evaluation Adviser in the Independent Evaluation Office) credible and independent centralized humanitarian evaluations and other evaluative studies relating to UNFPA engagement in humanitarian assistance in the Arab States region

Qualifications and Experience:

• Masters degree (or equivalent) in in public health, social science, demography, gender, economics, international relations, international development, public administration, management or other related field.
• Additional training on monitoring and evaluation are an asset.
• At least 10 years of increasingly responsible professional experience in international development, of which five years at the international level.
• At least 5 years of relevant professional experience in managing complex regional, country or programme level evaluations including inter-agency and joint evaluations.
• Strong track record of innovative leadership in managing evaluations, and proven ability to produce high quality evaluations.
• In-depth, up-to-date understanding and knowledge of global and regional geopolitical issues relevant to UNFPA mandate and the implications for evaluation policy.
• In-depth, up-to-date understanding and knowledge of methods and techniques to advance international planning, monitoring, and evaluation.
• Excellent knowledge of programme formulation and implementation and Results Based Management.
• Experience from Country Offices is a strong asset.
• Experience in the United Nations, UNFPA and/or other multilateral organization, field work experience, are highly desirable.
• Experience in one of UNFPA transformative areas is an asset.
• Strong quantitative, qualitative and analytical research skills.
• Strong communication skills, ability to translate results, indicators and measurement language into actionable steps for programme colleagues.
• Ability to synthesize disparate measures, indicators, and results into cohesive narratives on programmatic progress for the purposes of reporting to senior management and donors.
• Excellent planning, goal setting, prioritization and organizational skills.
• Strong people management and conflict resolution and negotiation skills.
• Ability to work across geographical locations.
• Excellent computer / information systems skills (Ms Access, Ms Excel, Ms Project, Ms Word, CsPro, SPSS, Stata, NVivo, kobo collect, powerbi).
• Familiarity with Artificial Intelligence is an asset.
• Fluency in English; knowledge of other official UN languages, preferably Arabic and/or French , is desirable.

Compensation and Benefits:

This position offers an attractive remuneration package including a competitive net salary plus health insurance and other benefits as applicable.