Consultancy 10 months: Device Expert for Meaningful Connectivity (Giga), Geneva, Switzerland

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? 

Giga seeks a Device Expert for Meaningful Connectivity to join one of the most innovative and impactful initiatives at the United Nations whose aim it is to connect every school in the world to the Internet and every young person to information, opportunity and choice. This consultant will map current initiatives and stakeholders involved in providing appropriate devices (tablets, computers, among others) for educational purposes around the globe, establish relations with those initiatives and key industry players, as well as develop a framework to integrate adequate and affordable devices into the schools that are connected.

Under the supervision and guidance of Giga’s Programme Manager, the Device Expert will engage with Giga’s multidisciplinary team, particularly with the Procurement, Country Support and Tech streams, to develop a strategy for UNICEF to provide support to governments interested in integrating affordable and adequate devices to their connected schools. The successful candidate should possess expertise in the information technology industry and skills in management consulting in emerging and developing countries, including hands-on experience in providing technical guidance to governments or UN agencies for informed decision-making in technology sourcing and procurement for social development

Key responsibilities include:

1. Demand Needs Assessment: Identify the specific device needs of schools in Giga-connected countries, breaking countries into various groups / clusters according to the assessment of needs, in collaboration with Giga’s County Engagement team.
   • Activities:
     • Consultations with Country Office colleagues on state of play / plans to date in country.
     • Review existing programs and initiatives by UNICEF, governments, and other international development organizations related to the provision of devices.
     • Identify critical needs and features of devices per group of countries.
     • Identify success or failure stories in the provision of devices and integrate these lessons into future work.
2. Supply Landscape Assessment: Understand the current landscape of the device industry, supply chains, large-scale procurement processes, and opportunities for sourcing affordable devices through the lens of Giga’s activities and in the countries that Giga is currently working with.
   • Activities:
     • Do a quick assessment of the industry and suppliers, key trends on devices for education, and cost drivers.
     • Review existing programs and initiatives by organizations such as educational NGOs, philanthropic foundations, tech startups focused on education, and other international development agencies, as well as umbrella groups like GSMA, WEF, PDAA, and UNECA, who are all exploring this area. Understand these organizations’ strategies for the procurement or sourcing of devices.
     • Identify key industry players and stakeholders, as well as their own initiatives for the provision of affordable devices for education, with a particular emphasis on those based in Switzerland.
     • Identify partnership opportunities for UNICEF.
3. Recommendations on Technical Specifications: Based on the demand needs and supply assessment, develop a Target Product Profile (TPP) with the technical specifications for the most suitable and affordable devices for education, according to different schools and countries’ context, and consult industry and governments to validate these recommendations.
   • Activities:
     • Draft a Target Product Profile and consult it with the industry and governments in collaboration with the Giga Procurement and Country Support teams.
4. Policy and Advocacy: Recommend policies that support the availability of affordable devices in connected schools.
   • Activities:
     • Create a policy and advocacy framework to integrate adequate and affordable devices to connected schools.
     • Work with Giga’s management team to find out where to integrate device affordability into broader connectivity policies
     • Identify possible experts who could create business cases linking connectivity provision to device pricing/purchasing in a few markets.
5. Guidance and Support: Provide guidance and support to countries on who to talk to (i.e., being the traffic officer, directing inquiries) not actually providing the guidance as Giga.
   • Activities:
     • Develop resource list / experts list.
     • Set up several Geneva-based workshops during the year bringing experts together (supported by Giga).

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:  Device Expert for Meaningful Connectivity TOR.pdf

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

• An advanced university degree (Master’s or higher) in Information Technology, Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Telecommunications, Business Administration, Economics or related degree is required
  *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 relevant professional experience in in the technology industry or in management consulting, with some hands-on experience in providing technical guidance to governments or UN agencies for informed decision-making in technology sourcing.
• Experience in consulting and advising on relevant technology for development areas.
• Experience with government or UN agencies is an asset.
• Experience in telecommunication infrastructure sector is an asset.
• Demonstrated strong writing and presentation skills in English and the ability to communicate effectively to management.
• Ability to plan and implement projects in coordination with multiple stakeholders.
• Ability to work with a diverse team in a rapidly changing work environment and adapt to unforeseen changes.
• 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 the countries Giga is supporting on five (5) trips, for a stay of 5-6 nights each, additionally to Supply Division in Copenhagen and Office of Innovation.
• The consultant is expected to travel to two Giga countries (2 trips), for a stay of 5 nights.

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.
• The consultant is responsible for his/her own health and travel insurance.
• The consultant is responsible for arranging 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. 

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.