Background

The Strengthening Women in Decision Making in the Middle East (LEAD) programme of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) aims to enhance political participation of women in local governance and civil society in selected communities in Palestine, Jordan and Lebanon. The programme is financed by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) through its “Special Initiative for Stabilization in North Africa and the Middle East” (SI MENA).

• The programme engages in three areas of action to support women’s political participation: 
• Empowering women in local politics and local government
• Promoting a gender-sensitive environment in local governance
• Establishing and strengthening gender platforms and networks that coordinate the      objectives and activities of concerned actors including civil society

JNCW has taken part in this project since Nov 2016 until to date to target women in the leading positions mainly in local governance positions. The overall objective of the project is to empower women taking roles in local governance councils (including three levels: Governorate,  Municipal and local Councils) and Public Administration in order to improve their local communities in Jordan. The project activities are designed to contribute achieving the above three main areas of LEAD program.  

In this phase of the project implementation, JNCW is searching for a consultancy service to coordinate and actively support the implementation of the Regional Mentoring Project addressing primarily selected female council members in Jordan, as well as exchange activities with participants from Lebanon  and Palestine. The consultant under this assignment will be in charge mainly for the Jordan mentoring project’s activities, while  partaking in an active role also in some regional activities. The project will bring together 12 current female councils (three levels) members as mentees and will match them with 12 mentors (women having more experience in politics or local administration) in order to strengthen their technical and leadership skills and to enhance their community and municipal roles.

Objectives of the assignment

The objective of this assignment is to provide consultancy services for JNCW under the Regional Mentoring Project running in Jordan, Palestine and Lebanon for female council members with regard to strategic, technical and operational matters. This includes giving conceptual inputs and analysis in terms of announcement and information of mentoring, active participants selection and their support, cooperation with stakeholders, support of mentoring trainings and setting up/implementing networking and related events.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE SCOPE OF WORK

The Consultant will be expected to undertake certain key tasks, described below, in order to meet the objectives outlined above. The Consultant will be expected to propose, in their Technical Proposal, a methodology for supporting the establishment of the regional project to be able to design a local framework and structure for the mentoring project adopted from other regional experiences and guidance of EAF and JNCW project team. This will include the following technical tasks:

• Review the previous work completed coincided during the consultancy assignment like the call for participation in the Regional Mentoring Project for JNCW, and review the advertisement for the programme (following GIZ’s communication guidelines and according to JNCW procurement processes).
• Identify and pre-select potential participants by (co-)assessing the received applications in coordination with JNCW project team.
• Matchmaking the mentor/mentee tandems through interviews and meetings; officially invite the selected pairs to participate in the mentoring project. And welling to offer mediation among the mentors/mentees when and where needed, in agreement with JNCW- Project team.
• Prepare short written participation terms for mentee/mentor and arrange the formal agreement (signing) before the start of activities. This will be done with guidance of (GIZ and EAF- based in Germany assigned to support the mentoring project) to be reviewed and adopted to Jordan context and JNCW’s mandate.
• Continuously monitor the Mentoring Project; identify (potential) disturbances or obstacles and inform JNCW-Project team about any developments that (may) influence the course of the project, its timing, budget, content, participants and impacts or that may have an impact on LEAD’s objectives.
• Networking to ensure continuous communication with and among the participants, support the group of tandems in identifying and planning activities throughout this assignment period, follow-up with them. JNCW will offer later (if your application is accepted) with a clear plan about these activities and the allocated budget as approved in JNCW project agreement. But meanwhile, it is agreed to hold three networking events in between the regional ones. (the table below include a clear breakdown)
• Communicate with the regional mentoring advisory company EAF and with GIZ LEAD project staff for coordination and follow up on all activities and deliverables. Provide technical detailed reports on the progress, process and the outcomes, this will be shared with all involved actors in the project.

The consultant needs to be aware that s/he needs to be fully engaged in following events and activities on local and regional levels as it is planned originally by GIZ-EAF and JNCW project team, for the regional participation; it will require full commitment and documentation the results properly in accordance to JNCW procedures, and for the local level; it will require preparing the content, facilitation. It is essential to pointed out that the consultant should be aware that s/he needs to ensure that participants and tandems have met each other before they go to any regional scheduled events in Jordan.

• The related events are the following (it is two level activities local and regional:
• Kick-off event bringing together the 12 mentors and 12 mentees in order to launch the process and to prepare them for the first regional activity that will take place in Jordan, together with the mentoring tandems from Palestine and Lebanon.
• A regional Mid-term event that will take place in Jordan, but prior to this event it is essential for the consultant to work with the groups setting up 2-3 local networking events aiming to review the mentoring process, empower the participants and their collaboration, organise skills upgrading workshops and to prepare them to the regional events.
• Final event (local- regional).

assignment’s timeframe

This consultancy will be implemented within the period starting the 1st of July 2018 until 30th of April 2019.

expected milestones for the implementation

Level of effort

The consultant is expected to accomplish the assignment within the designated timeframe and for an estimated time/effort input of up to 65 working days.

qualification and requirement

• Have actual experience in implementing similar type of projects in the past five years. This should be proofed within the technical proposal by including two previous references and contacts.
• Have the ability to contact and build relations with local council members based on mutual respect and should be flexible to be in touch with and supportive to all tandems, as well as to support the PR and external communication of LEAD regarding the Mentoring Programme.
• Excellent facilitation skills to work with tandems, lead working groups, organize workshops and support exchange activities
• Good mediation skills to work through bilateral or group conflicts
• Experience in setting up networking events (ability to bring in own ideas and suggestions what kind of meetings fit to the mentoring group; inputs will be given during a training, to build up on)
• Ability to elaborate and adapt materials (training content, adapt the mentoring project manual to Jordan context)
• Fluent in English
• Ability to regularly travel within Jordan governorates .
• The consultant needs to consider in the financial proposal the communication cost, Ad Hoc meetings logistics costs with tandems, transportation and stationery.

Application procedures and the Closing DAte

Any interested applicants can submit the application hard copies with the budget  (hand delivery) to JOHUD offices by 10^th  Jul 2018.

TERM OF REFERENCE

A Consultancy Service to support Jordanian National Commission for Women to establish and run  of the regional Mentoring Project under the Strengthening Women in decision Making in Jordan (LEAD)

Application procedures and the Closing DAte

Any interested applicants can submit the application hard copies with the budget  (hand delivery) to JOHUD offices by 10^th  Jul 2018.