Consultancy: AI Advisor, Office of Innovation, 12 months (Remote, coordinated with the Stockholm office)

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, innovate…

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 that sits at the unique intersection of working on material global issues, start up thinking, technology and partnerships that can scale solutions. We look to form partnerships around frontier technologies (including AI, drones and UAVs, blockchain, wearables and sensors, and 3D-printing) that exist at the intersection of $100 billion markets and 1 billion person needs.

The Office of Innovation’s Venture Fund is a pooled funding vehicle specially designed to finance early stage, open-source technology that can benefit children. The core motivation of the Innovation Fund is to identify clusters or portfolios of initiatives around emerging technology – including AI - so that UNICEF can both shape markets and learn about and guide these technologies to benefit children. We invest in solutions that can impact the lives of the most vulnerable children.

How can you make a difference?

UNICEF’s Office of Innovation (OOI) is looking for an experienced AI Advisor to give technical support and guidance to the AI related work at the Office of Innovation and across UNICEF through engagements at HQ, Regional and Country level.

Sitting in the Ventures’ Emerging Tech team, this consultant will have a belief that AI enabled technologies can be a powerful tool to help UNICEF rapidly accelerate positive results for children. The successful consultant will have a strong desire to guide and inform early-stage AI projects developed for, and implemented in, UNICEF program countries. Experience and understanding the complexities between theory and practice and what it takes to make future ideas work in challenging contexts will be a characteristic of the consultant, as well as a conviction for pioneering and promoting responsible and ethical AI practices.

Your Main Responsibilities Will Be

• Providing AI technical guidance, support and expert mentorship to:
• Venture Fund supported team seed and growth cohort projects and companies.
• UNICEF’s Office of Innovation and other UNICEF teams, divisions, and offices.
• Supporting the technical exploration, development and rollout of early-stage AI initiatives, models and prototypes with an aim to accelerate results for children, including:
• Support execution of high priority use cases within the Office of Innovation, including coordination of related technical resources.
• Work with relevant stakeholders to support the adoption and scale of AI initiatives for internal process and programmes across UNICEF.
• Working with internal and external stakeholders to support the understanding, adoption and scale of AI initiatives across UNICEF, including:
• Facilitating knowledge management and the understanding of AI within UNICEF.
• Support the negotiation, advocacy and implementation of the newly developed AI strategy.

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

• An advanced university degree (master’s or higher) in Computer Science, Data Science/Machine Learning, or another relevant technical field.
• 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 five (5) years of relevant professional experience (e.g., AI, data science, ML, technical project management, product ownership etc.)
• Developing country work experience and/or familiarity with emergency is considered an asset.
• Practical experience with rapid prototyping and evaluation of user feedback
• Track record of delivery for cross-functional AI projects, including with technical teams of product managers, software developers and designers.
• Demonstrated experience in development and deployment of ethical and responsible AI practices, with examples in UNICEF program countries considered an asset.
• Demonstrated understanding of open source and open data principles and practices.
• Demonstrated experience working with non-technical teams in formulating their use cases, gathering business requirements, and involving non-technical stakeholders in the project delivery.
• Good writing and communication skills, including for advocacy purposes, and the aptitude to handle competing agendas and priorities with multiple audiences and at various levels of seniority are a must have.
• Fluency in English is required. Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, French, Russian or Spanish) or a local language is an asset.

For detailed description, please review the Terms of Reference: ToR SSA AI Advsior.pdf

Travel

• The consultant is expected to travel to Stockholm for onboarding, training and knowledge management facilitation purposes over a period of 10 working days. The exact dates to be confirmed.
• 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.

• Payment schedules as per outlined tasks are detailed in the ToR.

How To Apply

• Interested applicant is required to submit a financial proposal with an all-inclusive fee. Please see the financial proposal template. 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.

In case of any questions, contact us at swe-ooi-recruitments@unicef.org