Social Protection Officer at UNICEF

Purpose of the Assignment:

• Under the general supervision of the Social Protection Specialist in Abuja, the Social Protection officer is accountable for providing technical support and assistance in the implementation of the Joint program. The position located in Sokoto field office, will support social protection programming and related advocacy to deliver concrete and sustainable results across the four states (Abia, Benue, Oyo and Sokoto). This includes programmes aimed at (a) strengthening functional State Social Register including expansion to integrate more poor and vulnerable people; (b) improving capacity of staff and policy makers on social protection; (c) strengthen state social protection policy and legal framework with the development of a social protection policy and bill, aimed at realizing the rights to social protection for consideration by the National and State Assembly; (c) enhance Social Protection Management Information System that is interoperable at the vertical, horizontal level and across social sector with focus on health and education. This position encompasses both direct programme work with government and civil society partners as well as linkages and support to teams working on social protection.

MAJOR RESPONSIBILITIES:

Strengthening social protection coverage and impact for children

• Supports strengthening of integrated social protection systems, providing technical support to partners to improve expansion of social registry and design of child grants and improve linkages with social services health insurance, public works, and social care services.
• Supports the development of social protection policies, legislation, and programmes with attention to increasing coverage of and impact on children, with special attention the most marginalized.  Identifies, generates and presents evidence to support this goal in collaboration with partners.
• Supports improved monitoring and research around social protection impact on child outcomes, and use of data and research findings for strengthening programme results.

Improving use of public financial resources for social protection for children:

• Supports the identification of policy options for improved domestic financing of child-sensitive social protection interventions.
• Undertakes social protection budget analysis to inform UNICEF’s advocacy and technical assistance to Ministries of Finance, planning commissions and social sector ministries to improve equitable allocations for essential services for children.   

 Strengthening capacity of local governments to plan, budget, consult on and monitor child-focused social services.

• Where national decentralization processes are taking place, collaborates with central and local authorities to improve planning, budgeting, implementation, consultation and social protection accountability processes so that decisions and child-focused service delivery more closely respond to the needs of local communities.
• Collaborates with the central and local authorities to strengthen capacity on quality data collection, analysis, planning, implementation, coordination, monitoring of social protection services, with emphasis on community participation and accountability.

UNICEF Programme Management:

• Helps manage and coordinate technical support around social protection, public finance and governance ensuring it is well planned, monitored, and implemented in a timely fashion so as to adequately support scale-up and delivery. Ensures risk analysis and risk mitigation are embedded into overall management of the support, in close consultation with UNICEF programme sections, Cooperating Partners, and governments.
• contributes to effective and efficient planning, management, coordination, monitoring and evaluation of the country programme. Ensures that the social protection project enhances policy dialogue, planning, supervision, technical advice, management, training, research and support; and that the monitoring and evaluation component strengthens monitoring and evaluation of the social sectors and provides support to sectoral and decentralized information systems.

Monitoring and Reporting:

• Provide technical support and guidance to UNICEF teams and government counterparts on data management best practices.
• Regularly monitor program consistency and data quality to ensure compliance with project management standards.
• Prepare and present data-driven reports to support project reporting
• Provide timely and accurate data insights to inform the design, implementation, and evaluation of social protection initiatives.

Minimum requirements:

Education: 

• An advanced university degree (master’s or higher) in Social Sciences, Administration, Public Policy, or a related field.

Experience: 

• A minimum of 5 years of professional experience in design, program management, system strengthening, data management and analysis, and capacity building within social protection or related fields, preferably with experience in a humanitarian context. Experience working on social protection is considered as a strong asset.

 Technical Skills:

• Proficiency in social protection system design and programme implementation
• Experience with data management and analysis for social protection
• Capacity building skills related to social protection
• Knowledge of the social protection landscape in Nigeria is highly desirable.