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 (OoI) works to catalyse UNICEF’s and all its partners’ expertise and resources against key children-outcomes bottlenecks, with a view to continuously ideate and scale the most effective solutions with transformational potential at scale to achieve the child related SDGs. The office is doing this by continuously exploring new ways of accelerating results for children, investing across a range of early-stage solutions, and harnessing internal and external expertise towards continuously iterating and finetuning the most promising solutions for children through a systematic portfolio management approach, and leveraging all stakeholders’ innovation energy, knowhow and resources from intergovernmental, multilateral, private sector and non-governmental organizations. This takes place across 160 country offices.

How can you make a difference?

UNICEF’s Office of Innovation seeks a consultant to develop innovation ToCs – an innovation ToC, and a ToC for the Office of Innovation as a nested ToC to the first one. To articulate the OoI ToC, some teams may need support in developing or updating their team ToCs. This work will be undertaken under the supervision of the Innovation Manager (Monitoring, Evaluation, Evidence, Learning and Research), and in collaboration with the OOI Strategic Planning team.
OOI is seeking the development of a logically consistent set of nested ToCs delivered as both narrative and graphically represented outputs to achieve the following purposes:
⁃ #1 An organizational ToC articulating how innovation as an organization-wide change strategy is understood to lead to specific change that delivers value to UNICEF’s results. This should draw on sources such as UNICEF’s Global Innovation Strategy, causal analysis and evidence already undertaken by UNICEF programmes and data (such as for the UNICEF Mid-Term Review, Strategic Plan input), and should also take into account the UN 2.0. agenda. Incorporating systems innovation and how innovation contributes to systemic changes is critical.
⁃ #2 The composite ToC for the Office of Innovation itself will explain the development challenges the OOI aims to change (#1 above) through sets of interventions (i.e. the collective work across OOI teams) making key assumptions explicit on how the proposed
strategy is expected to yield results.
⁃ #3 Contributory ToCs for identified OOI teams that articulate how the specific team’s activities and outputs deliver outcomes that are causally linked to contributing to the delivery of part of #2 the OOI office value and outcome and align to the stated impact to be
achieved by the OOI. Approximately half of the substantive OOI teams have existing ToCs, some are yet to be developed. The work on OOI team ToCs require i) developing ToCs for identified teams for which one is required and ii) light review and, if necessary, refining the existing ToCs to ensure consistency in graphic representation and narrative articulation across all the ToCs, such that the ToCs can be used individually as well as a set.
With a new Strategic Plan for UNICEF being developed, a ToC can help the Office of Innovation in several ways:
• Vision and Strategy: a ToC articulates a clear and shared understanding of the desired long-term outcomes. It also helps in designing effective strategies and interventions by mapping out the steps needed to achieve the goals.
• Communication: a ToC provides a clear framework for communicating the initiative’s purpose and process to stakeholders.
• Measurement and Learning: a ToC establishes a basis for monitoring progress and evaluating success by defining specific, measurable indicators. It also promotes a learning culture by identifying what works, what doesn’t, and why, enabling continuous improvement.
• Partnerships: a ToC provides a means for developing and managing partnerships and partnership strategies.

Through a participatory process of building a theory of change, the ToC process will help align diverse stakeholders around a common understanding and shared objectives, fostering collaboration.

Your main responsibilities will be:
The selected consultant will produce the following deliverables:
A. [Innovation ToC] develop an UNICEF Innovation ToC
B. [OOI ToC] develop an Office of Innovation ToC, nested in deliverable A
C. [Team ToCs] develop, refine 4 team ToCs
D. [indicators] develop a set of indicators to measure the progress of innovation ToC/OOI ToC
E. Final set of ToCs

The full ToC deliverables include theories of change both graphically visualized and articulated in narratives.

Deliverable A will be based on a wider consultation beyond the Office of Innovation to articulate innovation as a change strategy in UNICEF’s work. This will involve reviewing existing documents articulating innovation work, drafting a ToC based on the review, and leading participatory consultations across various stakeholders. This would require five three-hour participatory sessions with various groups.

Deliverable B will be linked to Deliverable C and nested within Deliverable A. This would require OOI-wide consultations divided in various groups as well as with the entire OOI colleagues. This would require five three-hour participatory sessions.

For Deliverable C the consultant will help develop or refine four team-level ToCs. A ToC will involve on average three three-hour participatory sessions for each team.

Deliverable D will be a set of indicators to measure the progress of
• #1 the UNICEF innovation ToC bearing in mind existing Strategic Plan KPIs and how this might be improved in future in 2026-30 timeframe; #1 would be 3-5 KPIs with methodology notes (1-2 pages per indicator) developed.
• #2 the OOI ToC bearing in mind existing OOI Office Management Plan (OMP) results framework and how this might be improved in the 2026-2030 time frame.
• #3 for the OOI Teams ToC bearing in mind existing Annual Management Plan KPIs and how these might immediate be improved in 2024 and going forward, and the relevant OOI OMP result framework.

Deliverable E will be a final set of ToCs based on any update/progress made with the OOI Strategic Plan preparation, as well as any early findings of the corporate Evaluation of Innovation across UNICEF’s work.

Please see here the complete ToR attached.  ToR Innovation theoryofchange.pdf

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

• An advanced university degree (Master’s or higher) in Design, Social Sciences, Development Studies, Management, or other relevant 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.
  • At least 8 years of experience in program planning, monitoring and evaluation, or strategic planning in development or humanitarian contexts.
  • Demonstrated experience in designing, facilitating, and synthesizing Theory of Change processes for international organizations, NGOs, or government agencies.
  • Strong skills in facilitating workshops and group processes, including the ability to engage diverse stakeholders and manage group dynamics effectively.
  • Demonstrated experiences with ToC frameworks and methodologies for systems change measurement and systems innovations.
  • Experience with conceptualizing non-linear ToCs is an asset.
  • Demonstrated experience working with ToCs in analogous sectors such as innovation, technology, R&D, an asset.
  • Strong design capacity to visualize theories of change effectively.
• In-depth knowledge of the specific sectors relevant to UN’s work (e.g., Learning, Health, Mental Health and Psychosocial Wellbeing, WASH, Humanitarian, Gender Equality, Child protection, Nutrition).
  • Ability to critically analyze complex problems and develop comprehensive and coherent theories of change.
  • Excellent verbal and written communication skills in English.
  • Project Management: Strong project management skills, including the ability to manage timelines, deliverables, and resources effectively.
  • Flexibility to adapt facilitation approaches based on feedback and the evolving needs of the project.
  • Strong interpersonal skills and the ability to build and maintain relationships with various stakeholders.
• 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:
• No travel expected.

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.

How to apply:

• Interested applicants are required to submit a technical proposal shorter than 3 pages. Please include your approach to ToC development. Please also include any ToC work you did as a sample; this does not count towards the page limit.
• Interested applicants are required to submit a financial proposal with all-inclusive fee. Please see the financial proposal template. Consultancy Financial Offer template.docx
  Applications without a financial proposal will not be considered.

UNICEF is committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages all candidates, irrespective of gender, nationality, religious and ethnic backgrounds, including persons living with disabilities, to apply to become a part of the organization.
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, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks, and will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles.

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.