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, hope

Background:
Evaluation is a fundamental pillar of UNICEF’s commitment to accountability, learning, and evidence-based decision-making. As outlined in the Revised Evaluation Policy of UNICEF, evaluations help ensure that programmes and policies effectively contribute to advancing children’s rights and well-being.

UNICEF upholds the principles of independence, credibility, and utility in evaluation, ensuring that findings are impartial, high-quality, and used to inform strategic decisions. The organization emphasizes country-led evaluation and capacity development while fostering a culture of evidence use at all levels.

Specifically, the evaluation function at UNICEF serves several critical purposes:

• Accountability: Demonstrating how programmes align with UNICEF’s mandate and contribute to measurable results for children.
• Learning and Improvement: Identifying lessons learned and best practices to refine strategies and interventions.
• Evidence-Based Decision-Making: Providing reliable data to inform policies, programmes design, and resource allocation.
• Transparency and Stakeholder Engagement: Strengthening partnerships with governments, donors, and civil society through accessible evaluation findings.

Over the past few years, UNICEF West and Central Africa (WCA) Regional and Country Offices conducted various types of evaluations, including strategic evaluations of major initiatives, policies, country programmes, programme components, projects or thematic areas, tailored to specific contexts, with support for evaluation national systems.

In the coming years, more than ever, the WCA Regional Office is committed to enhancing evaluation function, by conducting high-quality evaluations, strengthening the use of evaluation findings as well as the capacity of national evaluation systems across the region, and ensuring that countries can generate and apply evidence to improve outcomes for children.

How can you make a difference? 

Purpose of Activity/Assignment:

UNICEF WCA Regional Office is seeking to establish a roster of national and international consultants to support its evaluation capacity building interventions in the region. This call is for qualified professional evaluators, including team leader evaluators, senior evaluators, and mid-level evaluators. In recognition of the importance of contextual relevance, candidates with demonstrated experience in West and Central Africa will be particularly considered during the evaluation process. This call is open to external consultants (non-UNICEF staff) who are available to conduct evaluations at regional and country levels.

Selected candidates will be included in the roster, initially valid for a period of 24 months, with the possibility of a 12-month extension, and may be invited to undertake specific assignments based on their suitability and availability. However, placement on the roster does not guarantee any future contractual engagements with UNICEF, as contracts will be issued based on specific Terms of Reference for each evaluation.

Scope of Work:

UNICEF’s work in West and Central Africa (WCA) is dedicated to improving the lives of children and women across the region, addressing key challenges in health, education, child protection, and emergency response. Covering 24 countries, UNICEF collaborates with governments, local communities, and partners to drive lasting change.

One of UNICEF’s top priorities is ensuring children survive and thrive. Through immunization campaigns, maternal and child healthcare programs, and malnutrition treatment initiatives, UNICEF works to reduce child mortality and improve nutrition.

Access to clean water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) is another critical focus. UNICEF leads efforts to build sustainable water systems, promote hygiene practices, and improve sanitation facilities in schools, health centers, and communities.

Education is at the heart of UNICEF’s mission in West and Central Africa. Millions of children, especially girls, still lack access to quality schooling. UNICEF works to improve learning opportunities by supporting early childhood education, training teachers, and advocating for policies that ensure children, regardless of gender, disability, or displacement, can go to school and succeed.

Protecting children from violence, exploitation, and abuse is another key area of intervention. UNICEF supports birth registration efforts to ensure every child has a legal identity, works to prevent child marriage and harmful practices, and provides care for children affected by armed conflict. Special programmes focus on reintegrating former child soldiers and supporting children in crisis situations.

UNICEF also plays a crucial role in humanitarian response across the region. Whether responding to disease outbreaks, providing lifesaving assistance during natural disasters, or supporting displaced families in conflict zones such as the Sahel and Lake Chad Basin, UNICEF ensures children receive the care and protection they need during emergencies.

Recognizing that long-term change requires economic and social stability, UNICEF engages in social policy and protection efforts, including cash transfer programmes for vulnerable families and advocacy for child-focused policies.

The organization works to eliminate gender-based violence, promote girls’ education, and address the barriers that prevent women and girls from accessing essential services.

In addition, UNICEF is increasingly focusing on the impact of climate change on children and communities across West and Central Africa, one of the region’s most vulnerable to climate shocks..

Types of evaluations to be covered:
Evaluation is at the heart of UNICEF’s mission to improve the lives of children worldwide. As a knowledge-driven organization, UNICEF relies on evaluations to ensure that its programmes and policies deliver tangible, lasting results. Evaluations at UNICEF take various forms, each serving a unique purpose.
Applicants for this roster should have demonstrated familiarity with at least the specific evaluation type described below.

• Country Programme Evaluations (CPEs): At the country level, UNICEF supports CPEs to assess the effectiveness and relevance of its work in a specific nation. These evaluations provide a comprehensive review of UNICEF’s contributions to national development goals and child rights agenda. By examining how well UNICEF’s strategies align with government policies and priorities, CPEs offer critical insights that shape future programme planning. CPEs help UNICEF understand what works, what doesn’t, and why, ensuring that country offices continuously improve their approaches to addressing challenges related to child mortality, education gaps, child protection, gender equality, equity and social protection.
• Thematic Evaluations (TEs): UNICEF also supports thematic evaluations, which focus on specific sectors, themes, or cross-cutting issues across multiple programmes. These evaluations generate evidence on priority areas. By analyzing multiple interventions under a single theme, UNICEF gains a broader understanding of systemic challenges and best practices. Thematic evaluations often influence global policies and drive strategic investments in key areas affecting children’s well-being.
• Impact Evaluations (IEs): While many evaluations focus on immediate results, impact evaluations go a step further by assessing long-term effects and sustainability. Using rigorous methodologies, such as randomized controlled trials or quasi-experimental designs, these evaluations determine whether UNICEF’s interventions have led to meaningful, lasting change.
• Evaluability Assessments (EAs): UNICEF often conducts evaluability assessments to determine whether a programme is ready for evaluation. These assessments examine whether clear objectives, data availability, and implementation conditions allow for a meaningful evaluation. Evaluability assessments help UNICEF identify gaps in programme design, data collection, or monitoring systems before conducting a formal evaluation.
• Real-Time Evaluations (RTEs): Real-Time Evaluations (RTEs) are a critical component of UNICEF’s evaluation function, particularly in the context of humanitarian action and rapidly evolving situations. Designed to provide timely, actionable insights during the implementation phase of an emergency or high-risk intervention, RTEs support immediate decision-making and adaptive management.
• Multi-Country and Regional Evaluations (MC/REs): Managed at the regional office level, these evaluations play a strategic role in UNICEF’s decentralized evaluation architecture by enabling cross-border learning, identifying systemic trends, and informing region-wide strategies. These evaluations focus on themes that cut across multiple countries.
• Evaluation Syntheses / Meta-evaluations (ESs/MEs): To maximize the value of its evaluations, UNICEF conducts evaluation syntheses, which systematically analyze findings from multiple evaluations. These syntheses provide broader lessons and trends across programmes, helping UNICEF and its partners draw evidence-based conclusions about what works best for children.
• Humanitarian evaluations (HEs): UNICEF humanitarian evaluations assess performance in achieving coverage and quality in complex humanitarian settings, aiming to improve humanitarian action. These evaluations enable UNICEF to understand the effectiveness of its programmes, identify areas for improvement, and guide practical solutions to enhance the coverage and quality of assistance provided during crises.

Under the supervision of the evaluation manager, the assigned consultant to an evaluation will be responsible for producing high-quality deliverables while ensuring timely completion of tasks and providing regular progress updates during the whole evaluation process. He/She will be encouraged to utilize innovative approaches and methodologies including child-Focused and utilisation-fused approach, Outcome Harvesting, the most significant changes, Artificial Intelligence and incorporation of big data sources. The consultant could be involved in the dissemination of evaluation results. Each evaluation may include additional tasks which will be outlined in detail in the ToR. Deliverables for each evaluation will be detailed in the respective ToR. However, the typical evaluation process follows three key phases:

Evaluation Governance:
Evaluation governance within UNICEF ensures the credibility, independence, and quality of evaluation processes through clearly defined roles, responsibilities, and oversight mechanisms. Once consultants are selected and rostered, their engagement in a specific evaluation will be governed by Terms of Reference managed by designated Evaluation Managers - either the Regional Evaluation Adviser / the Multi-Country Evaluation Specialist for regional-level evaluations or Evaluation Specialists / Planning Monitoring & Evaluation - Monitoring & Evaluation Specialists for evaluations commissioned by Country Offices. The managers must ensure compliance with UNICEF/UNEG standards and norms as well as compliance with quality standards .

Contract duration and arrangements:
The roster will be established for an initially valid period of 24 months, with the possibility of a 12-month extension upon satisfactory performance.. All contracts will need to be raised within this period and will be valid until their specified expiry date. The precise planning of these activities (starting date and delivery dates) will be agreed between the consultant, WCARO evaluation section and the evaluation commissioning CO. Contracts will be issued based on needs and funding availability.
This is a fully remote consultancy role, with the possibility of travel for fieldwork if required. Travel will only be undertaken when essential for data collection or stakeholder engagement and will either be outlined in the ToR or agreed upon during the inception phase of the evaluation. While consultants are expected to manage their own operational needs, such as workspace, internet connectivity, communication tools, and necessary technology, UNICEF will cover all authorized travel expenses associated with the assignment.

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

Minimum requirements:

Education: An advanced university degree in evaluation, research, social sciences, economics, statistics, demography, public policy, law, management, or a related discipline relevant to evaluation.

Work experience: 

• A minimum of seven years of professional experience in programme or project evaluation and/or applied research at the national or international level is required. Experience in the West and Central Africa (WCA) region will be considered a distinct advantage.
• In-depth knowledge of the WCA region, including its socio-political and development context.
• Proven expertise in conducting desk reviews and synthesizing secondary data.
• Expertise in employing innovative evaluation approaches and methods, including artificial intelligence and child-focused methods, within evaluation methodologies.
• Demonstrated proficiency in quantitative and qualitative evaluation and research methodologies, with the ability to apply equity, human rights, and gender-sensitive approaches.
• Conducted at least 3 high-quality evaluations (UNEG/UNICEF GEROS), preferably with UN.
• Experience conducting evaluations in low and middle-income countries and humanitarian situations.
• Familiarity with evaluation ethics and safeguarding principles, especially in contexts involving vulnerable populations.

Skills:

• Strong capacity to analyze and synthesize complex data into clear, actionable findings and recommendations.
• Demonstrated ability to conduct evaluations in a francophone, anglophone, or lusophone context
• Excellent stakeholder engagement skills, with the ability to work effectively across diverse cultural and institutional settings.
  Exceptional analytical, writing, communication, and interpersonal skills in English and/or French.
• Proven ability to work independently while contributing to collaborative team efforts.
• Willingness and availability to travel, including to remote or hard-to-reach areas, as required for fieldwork.
• Solid understanding of and commitment to UNEG norms and standards, as well as UNICEF’s evaluation principles and ethical guidelines .

Language requirements:

• Fluency in English and French are required. Knowledge of another official UN language (Arabic, Chinese, Russian or Spanish) or a local language is an asset. 

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 committed to diversity and inclusion within its workforce, and encourages all candidates, irrespective of gender, nationality, religious or ethnic background, and persons with disabilities, to apply to become a part of the organization. To create a more inclusive workplace, UNICEF offers paid parental leave, breastfeeding breaks, and reasonable accommodation for persons with disabilities. UNICEF strongly encourages the use of flexible working arrangements. Click here to learn more about flexible work arrangements, well-being, and benefits.

According to the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), persons with disabilities include those who have long-term physical, mental, intellectual, or sensory impairments which, in interaction with various barriers, may hinder their full and effective participation in society on an equal basis with others. In its Disability Inclusion Policy and Strategy 2022-2030, UNICEF has committed to increase the number of employees with disabilities by 2030. At UNICEF, we provide reasonable accommodation for work-related support requirements of candidates and employees with disabilities. Also, UNICEF has launched a Global Accessibility Helpdesk to strengthen physical and digital accessibility. If you are an applicant with a disability who needs digital accessibility support in completing the online application, please submit your request through the accessibility email button on the UNICEF Careers webpage Accessibility | UNICEF.

UNICEF does not hire candidates who are married to children (persons under 18). 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 based on gender, nationality, age, race, sexual orientation, religious or ethnic background or disabilities. UNICEF is committed to promote the protection and safeguarding of all children. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks, and will be expected to adhere to these standards and principles. 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, and selected candidates with disabilities may be requested to submit supporting documentation in relation to their disability confidentially.

Remarks:  

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted and advance to the next stage of the selection process. 

Individuals engaged under a consultancy 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. Consultants 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 consultant 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 consultant 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. The vaccine mandate, 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.

UNICEF offers reasonable accommodation for consultants 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.