General
Description of assignment title: Innovation Analyst
Assignment country: Kenya
Expected start date: 08/26/2024
Sustainable Development Goal: 9. Industry, innovation and infrastructure
Volunteer category: National UN Volunteer Specialist
Host entity: UNICEF
Type: Onsite
Duration: 12 months
Number of assignments: 1
Duty stations: Nairobi
Details
Mission and objectives
UNICEF, also known as the United Nations Children’s Fund, is a United Nations agency responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to children worldwide. The agency is among the most widespread and recognizable social welfare organizations in the world, with a presence in 192 countries and territories. UNICEF’s activities include providing immunizations and disease prevention, administering treatment for children and mothers with HIV, enhancing childhood and maternal nutrition, improving sanitation, promoting
education, and providing emergency relief in response to disasters.
Context
The fundamental mission of UNICEF is to promote the rights of every child, everywhere, in everything the organization does — in programs, in advocacy and in operations. The equity strategy, emphasizing the most disadvantaged and excluded children and families, translates this commitment to children’s rights into action. For UNICEF, equity means that all children have an opportunity to survive, develop and reach their full potential, without discrimination, bias or favoritism. To the degree that any child has an unequal chance in life — in its social, political, economic, civic and cultural dimensions — her or his rights are violated. There is growing evidence that investing in the health, education and protection of a society’s most disadvantaged citizens — addressing inequity — not only will give all children the opportunity to fulfill their potential but also will lead to sustained growth and stability of countries. The Innovation Unit, where this position is based, is a catalytic unit supporting acceleration of results and helping test out new innovative ways to address bottleneck in reaching children and youth. The Unit supports all sectors of the UNICEF Kenya programme in achieving its planned results for the period 2022-2026 and also UNICEF’s contribution to the Kenya Generation Unlimited partnership.
Task description
Under the direct supervision of the Innovation Manager at UNICEF Kenya, the UN Volunteer will undertake the following tasks: Supporting UNICEF and partners in delivering the agenda for children and young people, including trialing, testing, and documenting innovations and technology for development initiatives. Ensure that new initiatives that are tested are linked to other youth platforms such as Yunitok/Ureport, YOMA, and Generation Unlimited.
Provide human-centered design and
project management input to new and ongoing innovation and programmatic initiatives to improve efficiency, impact, and relevance.
Collaborate with UNICEF colleagues and stakeholders on the design of projects, initiatives, and pilots to quickly validate new ideas and test/assess the effectiveness of identified initiatives. This includes (but is not limited to) monitoring progress/impact, formulating hypotheses, and supporting the assessment of initiatives.
Assisting the identification of non-tech innovations and frontier methodologies or adapting existing methodologies to enhance services and information for children and young people.
Develop operational prototypes and document methodologies and lessons learned.
Support the presentation and analysis of various data on geospatial platforms. Develop visual information products (infographics, factsheets, thematic profiles, etc.) to support programme planning, monitoring, and decision-making.
Scanning and mapping the innovation and technology ecosystem, partners, and stakeholders in Kenya for initiatives and services for children, including e-learning, connectivity, social enterprises, etc.
Support the innovation manager in updating the innovation inventory (INVENT) and working with innovation program leads in sharing progress externally, including using social media.
Furthermore, UN Volunteers are required to: Strengthen their knowledge and understanding of the concept of volunteerism by reading relevant UNV and external publications and take active part in UNV activities (for instance in events that mark International Volunteer Day);
Be acquainted with and build on traditional and/or local forms of volunteerism in the host country;
Reflect on the type and quality of voluntary action that they are undertaking, including participation in ongoing reflection activities;
Contribute articles/write-ups on field experiences and submit them for UNV publications/websites, newsletters, press releases, etc.;
Assist with the UNV Buddy Programme for newly arrived UN Volunteers;
Promote or advise local groups in the use of online volunteering or encourage relevant local individuals and organizations to use the UNV Online Volunteering service whenever technically possible.
Results/Expected Outputs
Generation Unlimited supported through robust testing of young engagement platforms such as Youth Agency Market Place, U-Report and Generation Unlimited Youth Challenge
Reports on Products and initiatives developed and disseminated.
Frontier technologies and solutions to enhance services and protection of children identified and supported to scale.
Updated mapping of the innovation and T4D ecosystem to support programmes for children including GIGA project, elearning, connectivity and health systems.
Learnings from innovation and T4D initiatives captured, documented.
The development of capacity through coaching, mentoring and formal on-the-job training, when working with (including supervising) national staff or (non-) governmental counterparts, including Implementing Partners (IPs);
Age, Gender and Diversity (AGD) perspective is systematically applied, integrated and documented in all activities throughout the assignment
A final statement of achievements towards volunteerism for peace and development during the assignment, such as reporting on the number of volunteers mobilized, activities participated in and capacities developed
Eligibility criteria
Age: 18 – 80
Nationality
Candidate must be a national or legal resident of the country of assignment.
Requirements
Required experience
3 years of experience in the implementation of innovation initiatives, research, design, project management, and data analytics,
Previous experience as a volunteer and/or experience of another culture (i.e. studies, volunteer work, internship) and work with start-ups would be highly regarded
Familiarity with the innovation ecosystem in Kenya, networks/hubs, players, and partners.
Familiarity with methodologies such as human centred design, half double metholdogoly and tech savy.
Area(s) of expertise
Arts and design, Development programmes, Information technology
Driving license
Languages
English, Level: Fluent, Required
Swahili, Level: Working knowledge, Desirable
Required
education level
Master degree or equivalent in Design, Development Studies, Statistics, Entrepreneurship, Computer
Science, or another relevant field may be accepted in lieu of a bachelor’s degree.
Competencies and values
Creativity
Empowering Others
Knowledge Sharing
Technological Awareness
Working in Teams
Other information
Living conditions and remarks
The Republic of Kenya is an equatorial nation on the coast of East Africa, neighboring Somalia, Ethiopia, Sudan, Ugan-da, Tanzania, and the Indian Ocean. Kenya has two levels of Government; National Government and 47 sub-national Governments called Counties. Kenya is a multi-party state with Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branch-es. Kenya’s population of more than 45 million is growing at an annual rate of 2.2%. The country’s GNP per capita esti-mated at purchasing power parity (PPP) is $975, and the GNP is growing at an average rate of 0.1% annually. More than 26% of Kenya’s people live below the international poverty line of $1 per day. Kenya’s main food crops are “maize, wheat, pulses, roots and tubers.” (FAO).
Nairobi is a modern metropolitan city where most basic goods and services, health facilities, public transport, telecommunication and banking services and educational facilities are readily available. The city is widely connected through its main airport, Jomo Kenyatta International Airport and the smaller Wilson Airport. Air transport is also available to many up-country destinations. The city is home to some 3,000 UN personnel mainly attributed to the fact that it serves as the headquarters for both the UN HABITAT and UNEP.
The socio-economic and cultural background of the immediate society the UNV would be living and working in is diverse and prevailing security conditions at the place of assignment is modest. The topographic and climatic features of the assignment location is highland cool and warm tropical cli-mate
Inclusivity statement
United Nations Volunteers is an equal opportunity programme that welcomes applications from qualified professionals. We are committed to achieving diversity in terms of gender, care protected characteristics. As part of their adherence to the values of UNV, all UN Volunteers commit themselves to combat any form of discrimination, and to promoting respect for human rights and individual dignity, without distinction of a person’s race, sex, gender identity, religion, nationality, ethnic origin, sexual orientation, disability, pregnancy, age, language, social origin or other status.
Reasonable accommodation
UNICEF offers reasonable accommodation for UN Volunteers 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 recruitment process and afterwards in your assignment.
Note on Covid-19 vaccination requirements
In addition to duty station-specific vaccine requirements, appointments 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 appointment. It does not apply to UN Volunteers 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 contracts.
More Information
- Job City Nairobi
