United Nations World Food Programme
WFP celebrates and embraces diversity. It is committed to the principle of equal employment opportunity for all its employees and encourages qualified candidates to apply irrespective of race, colour, national origin, ethnic or social background, genetic information, gender, gender identity and/or expression, sexual orientation, religion or belief, HIV status or disability.
ABOUT WFP
The United Nations World Food Programme is the world’s largest humanitarian agency fighting hunger worldwide. The mission of WFP is to help the world achieve Zero Hunger in our lifetimes. Every day, WFP works worldwide to ensure that no child goes to bed hungry and that the poorest and most vulnerable, particularly women and children, can access the nutritious food they need.
ORGANIZATIONAL CONTEXT
In July 2023, the World Food Programme (WFP) Zambia commenced a new five-year Country Strategic Plan (CSP), informed by and aligned with national and United Nations priorities and global commitments under the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It embraces the Government’s long-term Vision 2030; aligns with 16 key strategic areas of the 8th National Development Plan (NDP8); and contributes to the joint Zambia-United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Framework (UNSDCF).
WFP Zambia’s integrated and pragmatic CSP shifts away from unsustainable localized and micro-level interventions, to embrace more effective advocacy and engagement with national policies, systems, and programmes to achieve national impact on SDG2. Given the Government’s commitment to budgetary support for nutrition, social protection, and agriculture, despite the constraints in the country’s fiscal position, WFP’s overarching strategy seeks to strengthen the government’s capacities to meet its national priorities through stronger systems, expertise, and resources for implementation. This means a decisive shift of WFP’s country positioning towards the provision of innovative, sustainable, and upstream technical assistance to support nationally owned solutions.
Advancing the global WFP Strategic Plan (2022-2025), the CSP addresses both SDG2 and SDG17, and WFP’s Strategic Results 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. WFP will implement seven activities to achieve five Strategic Outcomes (SO) under the CSP. These SOs include: (SO1) responding to crises and shocks ensuring that crisis-affected people, including refugees, are able to meet their urgent food and nutrition needs; (SO2) addressing the root causes of malnutrition; (SO3) building the resilience, enabling environment and market access for smallholder farmers, especially women; (SO4) supporting government institutions to provide social protection systems (including home grown school meals) and disaster preparedness and response; and (SO5) improving access to supply chain services for humanitarian and development actors.
JOB PURPOSE
To provide a range of specialised support for efficient planning, monitoring and analysis of project financial performance to enhance optimal use of financial resources.
KEY ACCOUNTABILITIES (not all-inclusive)
- Review budget plans, monitor and analyze project financial performance, and make recommendations in compliance with WFP financial policies and procedures and best practices, to support financial analysis and optimization of resources.
- Provide comprehensive analysis of fund and grant balances identifying surpluses and deficits, and suggest corrective measures, to support maximum fund utilization and decision-making process.
Support pipeline management ensuring efficient monitoring, to prevent and address pipeline breaks and maximize operational effectiveness. - Contribute to the improvement of internal processes, enhancement of corporate systems, and design of tools, to facilitate the overall planning, expenditure forecasting, and budget management and monitoring of resource utilization.
- Enter project budget plans and revisions in the corporate systems, to ensure data is timely and accurately captured enabling easy access to information and supporting planning and decision-making.
- Review, compile, and analyze data, maintain accurate records and files, and prepare periodic and ad hoc reports, to support the accuracy and efficiency of information presented to internal and external stakeholders.
- Maintain communication with some stakeholders regarding project funds management matters and related processes, to clarify any discrepancies and optimize use of funds.
- Guide other support staff and contribute to their learning and development in budget planning, fund management, and operational planning, to facilitate continued development and consistency in services delivered.
- Follow standard emergency preparedness practices, to ensure WFP can quickly respond and deploy needed resources to affected areas at the onset of the crisis.
- Perform other related duties as required.
DESIRED EXPERIENCES FOR ENTRY INTO THE ROLE
• Has supported the preparation and management of budgets.
• Has assisted with the monitoring of budgets/resource plans/pipelines/supply chains.
• Has assisted with budget/allotment related issues within the WFP budget system.
STANDARD MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS
Education: University Degree in Accounting/Finance, Business Administration,
Management, or other related fields corresponding to the advertisement.
Experience: A minimum of six (6) years of progressive experience in/managing Strategic
Outcomes, and their related budgets or other related fields as advertised.
Language: Fluency in both oral and written communication in English language.
4Ps CORE ORGANISATIONAL CAPABILITIES
Purpose
- Understand and communicate the Strategic Objectives: Coaches team in the most effective ways to communicate WFP’s Strategic Objectives to WFP team and partners in the field.
- Be a force for positive change: Implements new methods or tools to improve team’s work processes and productivity.
- Make the mission inspiring to our team: Maps team’s activities and tasks to specific successes in beneficiary communities to showcase positive impact.
- Make our mission visible in everyday actions: Explains to teammates how each unit contributes to the overall WFP mission.
People
- Look for ways to strengthen people’s skills: Identifies skill development opportunities such as training modules or on-the-job experiences for self, colleagues and direct reports.
- Create an inclusive culture: Facilitates team building activities to build rapport in own unit.
Be a coach & provide constructive feedback: Facilitates the pairing of junior colleagues with coaches within own team. - Create an “I will”/”We will” spirit: Proactively anticipates potential challenges and develops mitigation plans to ensure that team meets goals and targets.
Performance
- Encourage innovation & creative solutions: Identifies opportunities to be creative in own work and to help team be more innovative and accurate in their respective tasks and areas of work.
- Focus on getting results: Monitors team’s deliverables and provides feedback to ensure outcomes are delivered consistently and accurately.
- Make commitments and make good on commitments: Provides accurate guidance to team on expected responsibilities and tasks, whilst also upholding own commitment to the team.
- Be Decisive: Sets an example and provides guidance to junior team members on when to escalate issues when faced with challenging issues in the workplace or in the field.
Partnership
- Connect and share across WFP units: Facilitates partnerships with other WFP units to accomplish missions in the field.
- Build strong external partnerships: Sets an example and provides guidance to team on how to build relationships with external partners.
- Be politically agile & adaptable: Articulates to colleagues or direct reports the value of contributing to other WFP teams and agency partnerships in fulfilling WFP’s goals and objectives.
- Be clear about the value WFP brings to partnerships: Organizes, monitors, and prioritizes own and team’s efforts to ensure that they will fulfill the needs of internal and external partners.
FUNCTIONAL CAPABILITIES
Internal Controls & Compliance
Utilizes understanding of risk management approaches and internal controls to monitor projects and programmes to confirm regulatory compliance and ensure data integrity.
Performance Budgeting, Analysis & Reporting
Analyzes budgets and forecasts to support the development of recommendations for senior leadership on financial and business planning matters in accordance with Value for Money principles.
Resource Management
Monitors trends in staffing and resource usage to anticipate and escalate potential issues to programme leaders.
Performance Management
Displays sufficient understanding of WFP performance management system to gather relevant and accurate information from internal and external sources for inputs to monitoring and/or evaluation processes.
Supply Chain and Operations Knowledge
Demonstrates basic understanding of WFP programme, implementation, and supply chain principles (including project modalities & structures).
TERMS AND CONDITIONS
APPLICABLE TO ZAMBIAN NATIONALS ONLY!!
DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS
Applications must be submitted no later than 12th June 2024 23:59hrs Zambian time.
Qualified Persons with Disabilities and Female candidates are especially encouraged to apply!
WFP has a zero-tolerance approach to conduct such as fraud, sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to WFP’s standards of conduct and will therefore undergo rigorous background verification internally or through third parties. Selected candidates will also be required to provide additional information as part of the verification exercise. Misrepresentation of information provided during the recruitment process may lead to disqualification or termination of employment
WFP will not request payment at any stage of the recruitment process including at the offer stage. Any requests for payment should be refused and reported to local law enforcement authorities for appropriate action.