Job Description

Background:

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security.

The global normative framework on women’s rights and gender equality—anchored in Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and reinforced by the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action—places clear obligations on States to establish institutional mechanisms that promote, protect, and fulfil women’s rights. In line with these commitments, many countries have strengthened national gender machineries to ensure effective policy coordination, oversight, and accountability for gender equality outcomes.

In Sri Lanka, this commitment has been further institutionalized through the Women Empowerment Act No. 37 of 2024, which provides the legal framework for advancing women’s rights and gender equality. The Act establishes and mandates the National Commission on Women as the key national body responsible for promoting women’s empowerment, advising on policy, monitoring implementation, and addressing systemic barriers to gender equality. The Commission plays a central role in coordinating stakeholders, strengthening accountability mechanisms, and ensuring that national policies and programmes are aligned with both domestic priorities and international obligations.

Against this background, UN Women seeks to engage a national consultant to provide technical support to the National Commission on Women in operationalizing its mandate under the Women Empowerment Act No. 37 of 2024. The consultant will support the Commission to translate its statutory mandate into practical institutional systems, including a Strategic Framework and Onboarding Plan, internal policies and procedures, committee documentation, and preliminary complaints, inquiry, referral, monitoring, and reporting mechanisms. The role will also provide gender-responsive and feminist technical inputs to support policy and legal review, research and thematic analysis, public inquiries, stakeholder engagement, institutional coordination, and public outreach. In addition, the consultant will support the development of tools, templates, protocols, analytical products, and consultation reports required by the Commission to support its functioning, and in line with feminist, rights-based, survivor-centred, and gender-responsive principles.

of Responsibilities/ Scope of Work

Under the supervision and guidance of the UN Women Sri Lanka Head of Office, the Consultant – Technical Analyst (NCW)is expected to support the National Commission on Women with the following:

1. Support development of the Commission’s operating model and institutional systems

• Support the development of the Commission’s Strategic Framework and Onboarding Plan, ensuring alignment with its statutory mandate, institutional priorities, and phased operationalization needs.
• Support the development of internal policies, guidelines, and institutional procedures in consultation with the Commissioners, including those required to guide the Commission’s technical, operational, and coordination functions.
• Support the development of documentation required for thematic and other committees of the Commission, including Terms of Reference, working modalities, reporting templates, and standard operating procedures.

2. Develop preliminary complaints, inquiry, and accountability systems

• Support the design of initial protocols for receiving, screening, recording, referring, and following up on complaints related to discrimination, gender-based violence, and infringement or imminent infringement of women’s rights
• Support the development of a results, reporting, and tracking framework for the Commission’s work, including tools to monitor complaints, inquiries, recommendations, policy submissions, stakeholder engagements, thematic meetings, and follow-up actions.

3. Support policy, legal review, research, and thematic analysis functions

• Review documents, materials, reports, and other outputs developed by the Commissioners through a gendered and feminist lens, providing technical feedback to strengthen analysis, coherence, and alignment with women’s rights standards.
• Develop supplementary feminist analysis on key and emerging issues affecting women in Sri Lanka to inform the Commission’s policy, advocacy, inquiry, research, and public engagement functions.
• Support the Commission to identify priority thematic, policy, legal, and research areas for gender analysis, public inquiries, policy engagement, and legal reform review, and develop a research and evidence agenda to guide the Commission’s work.
• Support the Commission to develop templates and formats for issuing briefs, thematic reports, consultation reports, policy briefs, legal review notes, recommendations to Government, and submissions to relevant authorities.

4. Support stakeholder engagement, partnerships, and institutional coordination

• Map key state institutions, complaint-handling bodies, rights-based institutions, independent commissions, civil society actors, service providers, women’s rights networks, parliamentary actors, and development partners relevant to the Commission’s mandate, including their respective roles, entry points, and areas for coordination.
• Support the Commission to initiate strategic partnerships and develop coordination modalities, referral pathways, cooperation protocols, standard operating procedures, reporting formats, confidentiality standards, and follow-up mechanisms for engagement with identified stakeholders and partners.
• Support the planning and execution of regional and thematic meetings, consultations, and engagements, including preparation of technical inputs, comprehensive reports, documentation of recommendations, and follow-up on agreed actions in consultation with the Commission.

5. Support public outreach and communications priorities

• Support the Commission to identify priority messages and audiences for public outreach and communication on women’s rights, complaint pathways, and the role and mandate of the Commission.
• Support the development of accessible, inclusive, multilingual, and context-sensitive communications approaches for women in different regions and circumstances.

Expected Results

The National Consultant will remain accountable for the timely submission of the completed tasks as per the timeline given below. All tasks should be finalized in line with the feedback given by UN Women.

# Expected Results Expected completion time (due day)
01

Provide the necessary technical support as specified under the tasks and responsibilities in the ToR.

Deliverable: 1-2-page report detailing the tasks undertaken for UN Women Sri Lanka Office per month.

15 July 2026

15 August 2026

15 September 2026

15 October 2026

15 November 2026

15 December 2026

Consultant’s Workplace and Official Travel

The consultancy is expected to work full-time starting from 15 June 2026 and continue until 15 December 2026. The consultant is expected to primarily work at the National Commission on Women’s Office in Colombo, Sri Lanka and undertake travel to field locations along with the Commission as required. The consultant is expected to visit the UN Women Sri Lanka Office located at 202-204 Bauddaloka Mawatha, Colombo 07 when requested. As part of the official duty of this consultancy, if the consultant is expected to travel, this will be processed by UN Women, following the duty travel policy.

Payments

Payments for this consultancy will be based on the completion of each task and certification that each task has been satisfactorily completed. Payments will be made upon submission of tasks completion report with the approval of the Head of Office of UN Women Sri Lanka. Mobile and internet bills, printing, stationery and travel cost may be reimbursed based on prior approval from UN Women, and will be processed separately, following the relevant policy.

Intellectual Property

All information pertaining to this assignment (data, analysis, reports, documentary, digital, cyber, project documents, etc.) belonging to UN Women, which the consultant may come into contact within the performance of their duties under this assignment, shall remain the property of UN Women who shall have exclusive rights over their use. Except for purposes of this assignment, the information shall not be disclosed to the public nor used in whatever form, without the written permission of UN Women, in line with the national and International Copyright Laws applicable.

Competencies :

Core Values:

• Integrity;
• Professionalism;
• Respect for Diversity.

Core Competencies:

• Awareness and Sensitivity Regarding Gender Issues;
• Accountability;
• Creative Problem Solving;
• Effective Communication;
• Inclusive Collaboration;
• Stakeholder Engagement;
• Leading by Example.

Please visit this link for more information on UN Women’s Values and Competencies Framework:

Functional Competencies:

• Ability to manage data/schedule, documents, correspondence, reports, and maintain protocol and information flow;
• Knowledge of administrative rules and regulations;
• Ability to perform work of confidential nature;
• Ability to create, edit, and present information in clear format, using appropriate IT functionality;
• Ability to administer administrative processes and transactions.
• Ability to coordinate and liaise with multiple stakeholders.
• Timely adherence to deadlines.
• Excellent communication skills in English and Sinhala and/or Tamil.
• Ability and willingness to travel to project locations.

Required Qualifications

Education and Certification:

• Master’s degree in law, Public Policy, Gender Studies, Social Science, or similar fields is required.
• A first-level university degree in combination with two additional years of qualifying experience may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.

Experience:

• Minimum 2 years of progressively responsible experience in policy and/ or legal advocacy and research in gender equality, women’s rights, human rights, governance, public policy, institutional development, or related technical areas.
• Experience supporting the development of strategic frameworks, institutional plans, policies, guidelines, standard operating procedures, or similar institutional documents is required.
• Experience in gender analysis, feminist policy analysis, legal or policy review, research, or preparation of analytical briefs, reports, and recommendations on issues affecting women and girls.
• Experience supporting stakeholder engagement, consultations, coordination mechanisms, or partnerships with government, civil society, UN agencies, development partners, or rights-based institutions is required.
• Experience preparing high-quality reports, meeting records, policy briefs, thematic notes, consultation reports, and follow-up documentation is required.
• Experience in the use of Microsoft Office and web-based management, communication, and documentation systems is required.
• Demonstrated experience providing technical support to government institutions, independent commissions, statutory bodies, or public-sector mechanisms, preferably in Sri Lanka is an asset.

Languages:

• Proficiency in English and a local language is required (Sinhala and/or Tamil).

How to Apply

Interested candidates are encouraged to submit an electronic application through UN Women website and complete all questions with below required documents below to upload to the system.

• A cover letter (maximum length: 1 page)
• P11 form to be filled online.

Statements :

In July 2010, the United Nations General Assembly created UN Women, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. The creation of UN Women came about as part of the UN reform agenda, bringing together resources and mandates for greater impact. It merges and builds on the important work of four previously distinct parts of the UN system (DAW, OSAGI, INSTRAW and UNIFEM), which focused exclusively on gender equality and women's empowerment.

Diversity and inclusion:

At UN Women, we are committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment of mutual respect. UN Women recruits, employs, trains, compensates, and promotes regardless of race, religion, color, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, ability, national origin, or any other basis covered by appropriate law. All employment is decided on the basis of qualifications, competence, integrity and organizational need.

If you need any reasonable accommodation to support your participation in the recruitment and selection process, please include this information in your application.

UN Women has a zero-tolerance policy on conduct that is incompatible with the aims and objectives of the United Nations and UN Women, including sexual exploitation and abuse, sexual harassment, abuse of authority and discrimination. All selected candidates will be expected to adhere to UN Women’s policies and procedures and the standards of conduct expected of UN Women personnel 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.)

Note: Applicants must ensure that all sections of the application form, including the sections on education and employment history, are completed. If all sections are not completed the application may be disqualified from the recruitment and selection process