Job Title: Consultant Mental Health and Psychosocial Support Minimum Services Package
Closing date: 9 October 2022
Duration: 10 months
Duty Station: Remote-based assignment, supporting the Humanitarian Office.
Purpose of consultancy:
UNFPA is the United Nations sexual and reproductive health agency. Our mission is to deliver a world
where every pregnancy is wanted, every childbirth is safe and every young person's potential is fulfilled
UNFPA’s new strategic plan (2022-2025), focuses on three transformative results:
● Ending unmet need for family planning
● Ending preventable maternal death
● Ending gender-based violence and harmful practices
Increased recognition of Mental Health and Psychosocial Support (MHPSS) needs in emergencies has led
to a proliferation of MHPSS activities across sectors. Lack of guidance on prioritization of activities can
lead to ill-coordinated, inequitable, and ineffective responses that fail to utilize potential synergies
between different sectors.
In response, UNFPA collaborated with WHO, UNICEF and UNHCR to develop a Mental Health and
Psychosocial Support Minimum Service Package (MHPSS MSP): a single multisectoral package of
minimum activities, prioritizing activities with the greatest impact and promoting effective use of limited
resources. The MSP will support humanitarian actors in designing and implementing a coordinated,
predictable, and evidence-informed MHPSS response across sectors such as health, community-based
protection, education, child protection, gender-based violence (GBV) and camp coordination & camp
management (CCCM). It promotes close alignment of activities between UN agencies and humanitarian
NGOs. Moreover, the MSP promotes the planning, rebuilding, and strengthening of sustainable
government and civil society systems of care from the beginning of an emergency and can be used to
attract further support for longer-term recovery, systems development, and peacebuilding.
A field test version of the MHPSS MSP was released in September 2021 (mhpssmsp.org), and
subsequently feedback was collected to inform the finalization of the MSP planned for the end of 2022.
In a new phase of the project, UNICEF, WHO, UNHCR and UNFPA will jointly support humanitarian
actors on the ground to scale up MSP implementation in humanitarian settings with high needs including
in recent emergencies and in refugee settings. The new phase of the project has the following goals:
• Provide remote technical support and organize knowledge sharing workshops for MHPSS
Technical Working Groups and implementing agencies to facilitate MSP roll-out across different
sectors.
• Provide in-country technical support and mentorship to MHPSS Technical Working Groups and
implementing agencies rolling out the MSP in four emergency contexts through field
deployments by MHPSS MSP technical specialists.
• Conduct dissemination events to share good practices and recommendations for MSP
implementation with humanitarian actors across sectors to inform, improve and further scale up
MSP implementation.
• Conduct field-level research documenting experiences implementing the MSP in different
sectors and contexts to identify good practices, barriers to implementation, and effective
implementation strategies (e.g. through interviews, focus groups, and analysis of data from the
MSP gap analysis tool).
• Work with MHPSS Technical Working Groups in humanitarian settings to collect and analyze
data on MSP coverage, implementation and barriers in at least five humanitarian emergencies
(e.g. using the MSP Gap Analysis Tool).
• Identify which operational tools are most critically needed to implement MSP activities safely and
effectively based on MSP expert consultations and field testing focusing on gender-based
violence, and sexual and reproductive health.
• Develop selected priority operational tools (e.g. templates for the dissemination of key MHPSS
Messages, training curricula for staff implementing particular MSP activities).
UNFPA’s contribution will focus on:
1) Supporting MSP introduction and implementation, with a primary focus on emergency response
in humanitarian and refugee settings;
2) Developing operational tools with a primary focus on tools that are most relevant for emergency
response in humanitarian and refugee settings focusing on gender-based violence and sexual
and reproductive health response.
3) Working with the global MSP team consisting of specialists of UNFPA, UNICEF, WHO and
UNHCR to support the implementation of the MSP and development of associated tools,
including supporting research on the use of the MSP through the collection and analysis of data
on MSP coverage, implementation, and barriers.
The project will be governed by the Partner group consisting of representatives of the four UN agencies
and the thematic sub-group on the MSP which is part of the IASC Reference Group for MHPSS in
Emergencies).
Scope of work:
The consultant will support the implementation of the MSP in humanitarian settings, by building capacity
and providing technical support, identifying good practices and implementation barriers, and developing
needed operational tools.
Given the mandate of UNFPA , two areas are important:
1) to ensure the applicability of the MSP, with a primary focus on gender-based violence (GBV) and sexual
and reproductive health (SRH) in emergency response operations or refugee operations,
2) to ensure that the MSP contains implementation support tools to inform MHPSS implementation, with a
primary focus on GBV and SRH in emergency response in humanitarian and refugee settings.
The consultant will therefore:
● Support the implementation of the MSP through remote and in-country technical support, with a
primary focus on refugee settings. With support from the UNFPA Senior MHPSS Officer, the
consultant will organize knowledge sharing workshops to facilitate MSP roll-out across different
sectors and provide in-country technical support and mentorship;
● Be deployed to provide implementation-support in at least two refugee operation and to identify good
practices and implementation barriers in these contexts;
● Develop selected priority specific operational tools, particularly in the field of protection; The outline of
specific operational tools to be developed will be defined in the early stages of the consultancy.
The consultant will work closely with the MSP team (consisting of other consultants and staff from
UNFPA, WHO, UNICEF and UNHCR)
Required Expertise and Qualifications:
Education
● University degree (minimum master’s degree) in a relevant field such as
psychiatry, psychology, or clinical social work.
Knowledge and experience
● At least 7 years of relevant work experience for applicants with post-graduate university degree including at least 3 years of working experience with persons in humanitarian contexts in the field;
● Good knowledge of Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Humanitarian Settings as demonstrated by successful completion of short courses in this field.
● Very good understanding and previous experience in programming around mental health and psychosocial support in humanitarian and/or displacement settings is essential;
● Experience in developing guidance and training materials;
● Previous experience in working in conjunction with UNFPA and other actors in the field on MHPSS programming is desirable;
● Organisational and planning skills, excellent writing/drafting skills, analytical thinking, monitoring skills are required.
● Stakeholder management, negotiation, networking skills are desirable
● Conversant with MS Word, SharePoint, PowerPoint, Excel (data visualisation skills an asset) and; can competently use platforms to hold online meetings
Languages
● Fluency in English. Knowledge of an additional UN language, such as Arabic, French and/or
Spanish is highly desirable.
How to Apply :
Please send your application and a short letter of motivation with "Enhancing response capacity with
the MHPSS Minimum Service Package Consultancy" in the subject line to ho-recruitment@unfpa.org
by 9 October 2022
Late applications will not be accepted.
Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advanced to the next stage of the selection process.
Disclaimer: UNFPA does not charge any application, processing, training, interviewing, testing or other fee in connection with the application or recruitment process. Fraudulent notices, letters or offers may be submitted to the UNFPA fraud hotline http://www.unfpa.org/help/hotline.cfm UNFPA provides a work environment that reflects the values of gender equality, teamwork, Embracing diversity in all its forms, integrity and a healthy balance of work and life. We are committed to maintaining our balanced gender distribution and therefore encourage women to apply. UNFPA promotes equal opportunities for all including persons with disabilities.
We are no longer accepting applications for this position.
