Site & Monitoring Engineer

About UN-Habitat

Organizational Setting and Reporting Relationships: 

The position is located with the Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific of the Regional Programmes Division and based in Kabul, Afghanistan.

The Regional Programmes Division is responsible for consolidating and enhancing the linkages between UN Habitat's activities in the field with the Strategic Plan, the 2030 Agenda, and the UN-Habitat’s overall future priorities and to make sure that they are appropriate to the country context.

UN-Habitat’s Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific manages UN-Habitat’s project portfolio in the Asia and Pacific region. It ensures that country priorities are in alignment with the UN-Habitat’s organizational policies and strategic objectives and brings through its Regional Representative to the attention of the Executive Management Committee (EMC) opportunities and challenges in the region, allowing for timely feedback and responses to urgent demands and requests from the Member States.

Since 1992, UN-Habitat has worked closely with Afghan communities, contributing to the physical and social reconstruction of the country. Our work has focused on the development of urban policies and regulations; strategic urban planning; increasing municipal revenue; establishing community-based organizations; addressing the land and housing needs of IDPs and returnees and contributing to the provision of basic urban services.

The August 2021 fall of Afghanistan’s government has caused a humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan’s cities. Over half a million people have been displaced by conflict in 2021; many have sought refuge in the relative safety of cities. In this context, critical government functions have ceased, resulting in lifesaving municipal services being suspended. In addition, as development aid has been withdrawn, incomes of urban dwellers have declined, while the cost of food and other essential items have increased dramatically. The unfolding crisis in Afghan cities is occurring in a context of underlying vulnerabilities, including infrastructure deficits, insecure livelihoods and pervasive tenure insecurity. Most at risk are displaced people in informal settlements, with women, disabled and ethnic minorities being particularly vulnerable.  

UN-Habitat’s community-centered People’s Process is a proven and effective to reduce vulnerability at scale in the Afghan context. Since 1992, UN-Habitat has partnered with communities in informal settlements to reintegrate displaced urban Afghans into sustainable settlements. The People’s Process delivers support for the urban displaced through Community Development Councils (CDCs) and Gozar Assemblies (GAs). UN-Habitat-community partnerships center participatory spatial planning to enable communities to identify and implement priority service and infrastructure investments to support their socioeconomic development. Through the People’s Process, the incumbent will support a community-centered approach to secure tenure, upgrade basic services and infrastructure for highly vulnerable displaced people living in urban informal settlements in Afghan cities.  In doing so, the incumbent will support the implementation of activities that meet the immediate needs of vulnerable urban residents and contribute to sustainable development and peacebuilding.

A key implementation UN-Habitat implementation modality supports coordinated actions among UN agencies and other partners for durable solutions. A key partnership the incumbent will support is UN-Habitat and UNHCR project that pursues common community-based protection goals for the benefit of displaced, returnee populations as well as affected host communities in target Priority Areas of Return and Reintegration (PARR) in Afghanistan. The Project activities are part of strategy for creating conducive conditions for the sustainable reintegration through strengthened essential services and facilities in Priority Areas of Return and Reintegration (PARRs) while fostering social cohesion.

Job Summary

Reporting Relationships

Under the overall supervision of the Country Programme Manager and HLP Advisor, the site & monitoring engineer will undertake the following tasks and activities:

Duties & Responsibilities

Duties and Responsibilities:

Management of programme activities:

• Support the day-to-day technical and financial management of programme work planning, budgeting, procurement, and monitoring of project activities in the field;
• Support in the co-ordination with de facto authorties for accessing field locations for project implementation, including liasing with the Humanitarian Access Group (HAG);
• Lead in results-based reporting on activities and outputs in line with donor requirements;
• Support to ensure results-based monitoring and evaluation efforts in all project locations and for the programme duration.

2)           Data collection activities:

• Lead data collection in infomal settlements by using Patricparty Hazard Vulnerbaility and Capacity surveys (PHVCAs);
• Support the production of settlemet maps through data collection;
• Training and supervising enuerators for data collection;
• Data processing and reporting as required by project team.

3)         Planning and Monitoring site works:

·        Planning a schedule of engineering works for settlement upgrading based on the site plan;

·        Regular field visit to provide technical support to field engineers.

·        Provide technical support to field engineers to close physical projects.

·        Assist field Engineers to achieve their weekly and monthly plan;

·        Assist field Engineers to improve quality of sub- project implementation

·        Assist field Engineers for on time response on monitoring finding.

·        Assist field Engineers to accelerate process of 2nd installment requests.

·        Frequent field visit to monitor ongoing projects.

Contribute to UN-Habitat's support to partners:

• Identify and foster opportunities for improved programmatic collaboration with community-based organisations, UN, NGO and other civil society partners;
• Coordinate capacity development activities on programme components and technical guidelines;
• As a member of Senior Strategic Management Team of UN Habitat, contribute in development and consolidation of the UN-Habitat portfolio.

Perform other duties and responsibilities which are within the expertise and experience as may be required by HLP advisor and Project Officers in support of the activities of the agency and programme.

The incumbent will ensure the completion of the following activities in according to the work plan and to a high standard:

(i)                 Spatial and community-based planning: (a) identify the communal service and infrastructure needs of 50,000 vulnerable displaced people, focusing on the needs of women, youth and the disabled; (b) plan lifesaving WASH, services, and community infrastructure investments.

(ii)               Based on action (i), implement, and monitor for quality assurance community-based upgrading of WASH, services, and community infrastructure for 50,000 people most in need.

Job Requirements

Competencies (Select 3 Maximum)

Professionalism: Ability to identify and resolve budgetary problems and identify sources for data collection. Shows pride in work and in achievements; demonstrates professional competence and mastery of subject matter; is conscientious and efficient in meeting commitments, observing deadlines, and achieving results; is motivated by professional rather than personal concerns; shows persistence when faced with difficult problems or challenges; remains calm in stressful situations. Takes responsibility for incorporating gender perspectives and ensuring the equal participation of women and men in all areas of work.

Communication: Speaks and writes clearly and effectively; listens to others, correctly interprets messages from others and responds appropriately; asks questions to clarify and exhibits interest in having two-way communication; tailors’ language, tone, style and format to match audience; demonstrates openness in sharing information and keeping people informed.

Teamwork: Works collaboratively with colleagues to achieve organizational goals; solicits input by genuinely valuing others’ ideas and expertise; is willing to learn from others; places team agenda before personal agenda; supports and acts in accordance with final group decision, even when such decisions may not entirely reflect own position; shares credit for team accomplishments and accepts joint responsibility for team shortcomings.

Planning& Organizing: Develops clear goals that are consistent with agreed strategies; identifies priority activities and assignments; adjusts priorities as required; allocates appropriate amount of time and resources for completing work; foresees risks and allows for contingencies when planning; monitors and adjusts plans and actions as necessary; uses time efficiently.

Accountability: Takes ownership of all responsibilities and honors commitments; delivers outputs for which one has responsibility within prescribed time, cost and quality standards; operates in compliance with organizational regulations and rules; supports subordinates, provides oversight and takes responsibility for delegated assignments; takes personal responsibility for his/her own shortcomings and those of the work unit, where applicable.

Creativity: Actively seeks to improve programmes or services; offers new and different options to solve problems or meet client needs; promotes and persuades others to consider new ideas; takes calculated risks on new and unusual ideas; thinks “outside the box”; takes an interest in new ideas and new ways of doing things; is not bound by current thinking or traditional approaches.

Client Orientation: Considers all those to whom services are provided to be “clients” and seeks to see things from clients’ point of view; establishes and maintains productive partnerships with clients by gaining their trust and respect; identifies clients’ needs and matches them to appropriate solutions; monitors ongoing developments inside and outside the clients’ environment to keep informed and anticipate problems; keeps clients informed of progress or setbacks in projects; meets timeline for delivery of products or services to client.

Commitment to Continuous Learning: Keeps abreast of new developments in own occupation/profession; actively seeks to develop oneself professionally and personally; contributes to the learning of colleagues and subordinates; shows willingness to learn from others; seeks feedback to learn and improve.

Technological Awareness: Keeps abreast of available technology; understands applicability and limitation of technology to the work of the office; actively seeks to apply technology to appropriate tasks; shows willingness to learn new technology.

a)      Education:

At least a bachelor’s degree with 8 years of work experience or master’s degree with 2 years of work experience in civil engineering.

b)     Experience: 

- managing complex urban development programming in Afghanistan.

- Managing the collection, analysis and presentation of social and geospatial data;

- overseeing and proving quality assurance for civil engineering projects; and

- familiarity with the UN system in Afghanistan.

c)      Language:

English and French are the working languages of the United Nations Secretariat. For the post advertised, fluency in oral and written English and Local/National Language of the duty station is required.

d)     Other: 

Build support with national counterparts, during the programme period; Ensure high-quality and timely achievement of relevant activties and targets; Support capacity development efforts with programme partners for the required components; Support UN-Habitat's contribution to multi-stakeholder national coordination and advocacy forums; Support 'learning by doing' capacity development efforts throughout the programme period with programme partners for improving local safety and security, especially for women, youth and marginalised urban groups; Support coordination with other partners’ programmes in target cities

Submission Guideline

Interested Afghan National Candidates should submit the following required documents.

1.      A cover letter that shows how your qualifications and experience meet the VA requirement.

2.      An update CV+P11 form for individual contractor (IC) that contains all your information to the unhvacancies@unhabitat-afg.org indicating on the SUBJECT line the vacancy number of the position, please note that applications received after the closing date (07 April 2022) will not be given consideration. Only short-listed candidates whose applications respond to the above criteria will be contacted for an interview.

Note: Subject line must be: (2022-04-202) or your application may not be considered.

Submission Email: unhvacancies@unhabitat-afg.org 

For more details about UN-HABITAT and UN-HABITAT Afghanistan Country Programme refer Website: www.unhabitat.org and www.unhabitat.af

Functional Area

Monitoring and Evaluation

Countries

Submission Email

unhvacancies@unhabitat-afg.org

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