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UNICEF works in some of the world’s toughest places, to reach the world’s most disadvantaged children. To save their lives. To defend their rights. To help them fulfill their potential. 

Across 190 countries and territories, we work for every child, everywhere, every day, to build a better world for everyone. 

And we never give up. 

For every child, Connectivity 

UNICEF has a 70-year history of innovating for children. We believe that new approaches, partnerships and technologies that support realizing children’s rights are critical to improving their lives.

The Office of Innovation is a creative, interactive, and agile team in UNICEF. We sit at a unique intersection, where an organization that works on huge global issues meets the start-up thinking, the technology, and the partners that turn this energy into scalable solutions.

About Giga

Launched in 2019 as a joint initiative between UNICEF and ITU, Giga has set the ambitious goal to connect every school in the world to the internet. Half of the world’s population has no regular access to the Internet. Millions of children leave school without any digital skills, making it much more difficult for them to thrive and contribute to local and global economies. This has created a digital divide between those who are connected and those who are not, a divide that has become even wider during the Covid-19 pandemic. UNICEF and ITU have therefore joined forces to create Giga, an initiative to connect every school in the world to the Internet and address this new form of inequality.

Giga focuses on connecting schools so that children and young people have access to information, opportunity, and choice. It also uses schools as anchor points for their surrounding communities: if you connect the school, you can also connect local businesses and services. This creates opportunities for service providers to generate revenue from paying users, making connectivity more sustainable. A 2021 report by the Economist Intelligence Unit found that a 10% increase in school connectivity can increase effective years of schooling by 0.6% and increase GDP per capita by 1.1%.

Based in Switzerland with an open-source technology centre in Barcelona, Giga not only aims to provide children and young people with access to information but also envisions schools as anchor points to uplift entire communities.

You can read more about Giga’s work at https://giga.global/ and by following us on twitter @Gigaglobal

How can you make a difference? 

We are seeking a capable Technical Partnerships Specialist to support the growth and increase the value of Giga’s technical partnerships portfolio, who is:

• Experienced in navigating the universal access eco-system, and able to engage different types of organizations and roles played by public, private and third sector organization at national and international levels.
• Driven to advance partnership success with the various stakeholders in ways that bring value to Giga’s work, attracting assets, technical capacity and financial contributions.
• Able to create cohesive strategies and messaging to attract and optimize the value of partnerships towards furthering Giga’s goals.
• Motivated to identify, create and grow value-add partnerships for technology and innovation with a wide range of stakeholders.

Key responsibilities include:

In collaboration with the broader Giga team, Office of Innovation, the Partnerships and Communications teams, and the Private Fundraising and Partnerships Division of UNICEF, the consultant will be responsible for: 

• Developing and managing across teams to deliver on key shared value investments and technical partnership objectives with key industries, with focus on emerging markets and new sector players,
• Design and lead the execution of a strategy to engage with the digital technology and telecommunications sector, connectivity technical community and universal access stakeholders,
• Build relationships with key stakeholders from the digital technology/ telecommunications sectors and the connectivity technical community, 
• Developing powerful communications about the impact made possible by partners' contributions, and identifying opportunities to bring existing and new partners closer to Giga's work,
• Identifying options for collaboration around both financial and  in-kind contributions that align with Giga’s strategic vision and team priorities, 
• Tracking and responding to possible thematic, operational or communications related requests from partners, 
• Coordinating and communicating within the Giga team and wider UNICEF environment
• Creating regular reports and progress updates, according to reporting schedule

Please access the full Term of Reference (ToRs) and read a more detailed description of the assignment in this file in order to prepare your financial proposal and know more about the role:  Terms of Reference - Tech Partnerships Specialist.pdf

To qualify as an advocate for every child you will have… 

• An advanced university degree (Master’s or higher) in one of the following fields: public and/or private sector partnerships, communications, social sciences, communication, public relations, business administration and management. *A first University Degree in a relevant field combined with 2 additional years of professional experience may be accepted in lieu of an Advanced University Degree.
• A minimum of 5 years of progressively responsible experience in partnerships/project management, corporate fundraising, shared value partnerships and a track record of organizing and managing partnerships, especially between the technology sector and development/non-profit organizations.
• Knowledge of the telecommunication’s regulatory ecosystem, its actors, interactions between stakeholders, processes and trends is a plus
• Exposure to fundraising and partnerships management in UNICEF is a plus
• Demonstrated planning, communication, fundraising and very strong writing and editing skills
• Ability to manage multiple perspectives and sets of priorities, driving toward consensus across several stakeholders
• Experience and strength in customer relationship management
• Capacity to prioritize and manage a diverse range of partners, projects and activities
• Must be a natural project manager - keeping resources and conversations organized a requirement
• Fluency in English is required. Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish) or a local language is an asset.

Travel:

• The consultant is expected to travel to Barcelona, Spain 1 time – requiring a stay of 3 nights.
• Duty mission travel expenses will be reimbursed upon completion of travel and submission of an invoice, accompanied by supporting documentation, including proof of payment, tickets, boarding passes, and any other reimbursable expenses as outlined in the contract. In accordance with UNICEF’s Travel Policy, a reasonable travel budget will be established and included as a separate line item in the contract. No travel cost estimate is required for duty mission travel.
• The consultant must only include all travel-related expenses, including airfare and accommodation costs, for travel to and from the duty station in Geneva, Switzerland.
• The consultant is responsible for arranging his/her own travel, including visa and travel insurance.

Payment details and further considerations:

• • Payment of professional fees will be based on the submission of agreed deliverables. UNICEF reserves the right to withhold payment in case the deliverables submitted are not up to the required standard or in case of delays in submitting the deliverables on the part of the consultant.   
  • Consultant is responsible for his/her own health and travel insurance.
  • Consultant is responsible to arrange his/her own travel, including visa.
  • This consultancy is based in Geneva.
  • UNICEF will facilitate the process for obtaining local permits exclusively for the consultant, excluding any dependents.
  • For more information on Non-staff members IO based in Geneva, you can visit this link. 

How to apply:

• Interested applicants are required to submit a financial proposal with an all-inclusive fee. Please see the financial proposal template here:  Consultancy Financial Offer template.docx
• Financial proposal must include travel costs (economy class) and daily subsistence allowance, if travel is required as per TOR and any other estimated costs: visa, travel/health insurance.
• Applications without a financial proposal will not be considered.

For every Child, you demonstrate… 

UNICEF's values of Care, Respect, Integrity, Trust, Accountability, and Sustainability (CRITAS).

To view our competency framework, please visit here.

UNICEF is here to serve the world’s most disadvantaged children and our global workforce must reflect the diversity of those children. The UNICEF family is committed to include everyone, irrespective of their race/ethnicity, age, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, religion, nationality, socio-economic background, or any other personal characteristic.

UNICEF offers reasonable accommodation for consultants/individual contractors with disabilities. This may include, for example, accessible software, travel assistance for missions or personal attendants. We encourage you to disclose your disability during your application in case you need reasonable accommodation during the selection process and afterwards in your assignment.

UNICEF has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UNICEF, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. UNICEF also adheres to strict child safeguarding principles. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles and will therefore undergo rigorous reference and background checks. Background checks will include the verification of academic credential(s) and employment history. Selected candidates may be required to provide additional information to conduct a background check.

Remarks: 

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process.

Individuals engaged under a consultancy or individual contract will not be considered “staff members” under the Staff Regulations and Rules of the United Nations and UNICEF’s policies and procedures and will not be entitled to benefits provided therein (such as leave entitlements and medical insurance coverage). Their conditions of service will be governed by their contract and the General Conditions of Contracts for the Services of Consultants and Individual Contractors. Consultants and individual contractors are responsible for determining their tax liabilities and for the payment of any taxes and/or duties, in accordance with local or other applicable laws. For more information on non-staff members IO based in Geneva, you can visit this link.

The selected candidate is solely responsible to ensure that the visa (applicable) and health insurance required to perform the duties of the contract are valid for the entire period of the contract. Selected candidates are subject to confirmation of fully-vaccinated status against SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) with a World Health Organization (WHO)-endorsed vaccine, which must be met prior to taking up the assignment. It does not apply to consultants who will work remotely and are not expected to work on or visit UNICEF premises, programme delivery locations or directly interact with communities UNICEF works with, nor to travel to perform functions for UNICEF for the duration of their consultancy contracts.