Disaster Risk Management Analyst, Washington-JOBS

• Organization: World Bank
• Country: United States
• City: Washington, United States
• Office: World Bank in Washington
• Follow @UNjobs

 

Closing date: Thursday, 14 December 2017

• Grade
• Location Washington, DC
• Recruitment Type Local Hire
• Language Requirement English [Essential]
• Closing Date 14-Dec-2017

Background / General description
THE WORLD BANK GROUP
Established in 1944, the WBG is one of the world's largest sources of funding and knowledge for development solutions. In fiscal year 2014, the WBG committed $65.6 billion in loans, grants, equity investments and guarantees to its members and private businesses, of which $22.2 billion was concessional finance to its poorest members. It is governed by 188 member countries and delivers services out of 120 offices with nearly 15,000 staff located globally. The WBG consists of five specialized institutions: the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), the International Development Association (IDA), the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA), and the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID). IBRD and IDA are commonly known as the World Bank, which is organized into six client-facing Regional Vice-Presidencies, several corporate functions, and fourteen Global Practices (GPs) as well as five Cross-Cutting Solution Areas (CCSAs) to bring best-in-class knowledge and solutions to regional and country clients.
GLOBAL PRACTICES & CROSS-CUTTING SOLUTIONS AREAS
The 14 GPs are: Agriculture; Education; Energy and Extractives; Environment and Natural Resources; Finance, Competitiveness and Innovation; Governance; Health, Nutrition and Population; Macroeconomics, Trade and Investment; Poverty; Social Protection and Labor; Social, Urban, Rural and Resilience; Transport and ICT; and Water. The 5 CCSAs are: Climate Change; Fragility, Conflict and Violence; Gender; Jobs; and Public-Private Partnerships. The Global Practices and CCSA's work together with regional management, IFC and MIGA to deliver the best of the World Bank Group to our clients, so that together we can achieve the twin goals of (1) ending extreme poverty by 2030, and (2) promote shared prosperity for the bottom 40% of the population in every developing country.
THE 'SOCIAL, URBAN, RURAL AND RESILIENCE' (SURR)
GLOBAL PRACTICE
Urbanization is occurring at an unprecedented pace. Cities generate 80% of global GDP and are key to job creation and the pursuit of shared prosperity. Yet one billion city residents live in slums today, and by 2030 one billion new migrants will arrive in cities. This concentration of people and assets will exacerbate risk exposure to adverse natural events and climate change, which affects the poor disproportionately. The absence of secure land tenure underpins deprivation and is a major source of conflict in the urban and rural space. One and a half billion people live in countries affected by repeated cycles of violence. In the absence of services, participative planning and responsive institutions, these trends will result in increased poverty, social exclusion, vulnerability and violence. Finally, avoiding a 4-degree warmer world requires drastically reducing the carbon footprint of cities.
The SURR GP brings together a wide range of important and interrelated development considerations, including: (i) developing green, inclusive and resilient cities; (ii) addressing the social inclusion of the poor, vulnerable and excluded groups through accountable institutions, and ensuring compliance with social safeguards; (iii) enhancing urban and rural development through supporting and managing the urban-rural transition, assisting local development through developing land tenure, management and information systems, and giving communities more say in the use of development resources; and (iv) assisting in disaster risk management through issues of risk assessment, risk reduction, disaster preparedness, risk financing, and resilient reconstruction. Another key responsibility of the SURR GP is to provide professional expertise and operational support to other GPs to implement the WBG social safeguard standards to deliver sustainable development results that ensure that any adverse impacts of WBG interventions are limited and mitigated. The SURR GP consists of practice management units representing social, urban, and disaster risk management concerns across all six geographic regions of the WBG, and three global units on land, partnerships, and global programs (GSUGL).
GP SURR GLOBAL UNIT
The GPSURR Global Programs Unit consists of a multi-disciplinary teams working to design and deliver innovative and high-quality development solutions to support clients in achieving goals including, among others: understanding better the opportunities of urbanization; enhancing the potential for inclusive growth, poverty reduction, shared prosperity, and livability of communities, cities, and territories; strengthening financial and service delivery capabilities of urban and sub-national governments, including through harnessing the potential of new technologies; improving the preparedness and resilience of cities and regions with respect to economic downturns and natural disasters; and helping urban and regional governments identify and implement the best approaches to mitigate and adapt to the effects of climate change.
The Global Programs Unit supports knowledge generation and exchange across the global practice through research, global advocacy, and knowledge sharing and is closely aligned with 9 Global Solutions Groups (GSGs) housed within the GP. The 9 GSGs are mapped to the under four thematic sectors of the GP: Social Development, Land Administration and Geospatial, Urban Development and Disaster Risk Management. Focusing on the need to 'put people first' in development processes, Social Development looks to empower people through the creation of more inclusive, cohesive, accountable and resilient institutions and societies to help address vulnerability, exclusion and isolation, unaccountable institutions, exposure to violence, and powerlessness. The key thematic lines of work for the Social Development GSGs are: (a) social inclusion, (b) fragility, conflict and violence; (c) community-driven development; (d) social accountability, and (e) social sustainability and safeguards, including issues related to Involuntary Resettlement and Indigenous Peoples. The Land and Geospatial GSG focuses on generating operational knowledge, research, data and partnerships on land and geospatial issues ranging from land tenure, land administration and management, land-use planning, technological innovation in addressing land issues and building a spatial lens into land and urban analysis. Under Urban Development, the work of the Sustainable City Infrastructure and Services GSG focuses on strengthening leadership and innovation on the cities and climate change mitigation agenda, and enhancing the quality of the GPSURR's operational portfolio. The Territorial and Spatial Development GSG leads a Bank-wide effort to develop spatial analytics, methodologies and resources with the view to providing WBG clients with comprehensive solutions for poverty reduction and economic development within and across regions.
The Municipal Governance GSG is exploring financing to scale in collaboration with the Resilience and Disaster Risk Management GSG, which is leading a multi-sectoral urban resilience - the City Resilience Program.
CITY RESILIENCE PROGRAM
The City Resilience Program (CRP) is an effort to assist city governments to build greater resilience to climate and disaster risks. For many major cities in the world, strengthening urban resilience is a multibillion dollar agenda that requires strong partnerships and new sources of capital. Cities are often held back from pursuing the necessary investments because they lack the technical expertise and/or the access to capital to finance them. The CRP tries to fill that gap by leveraging the WBG's broad set of sectoral expertise in designing urban resilience projects, and better connecting cities to the necessary financing. The aim of CRP is to catalyze a transparent pipeline of well-prepared and bankable investment opportunities and to improve access for private and institutional investors to crowd into new markets. It is in this sense that CRP seeks to act as the bankers of the city, and to facilitate strategic investments that address the vulnerabilities and risks that cities face in a holistic way.
To realize these objectives, CRP delivers services to World Bank client cities around three key programmatic pillars, including: (i) operational - engaging with World Bank task teams to support city level operations; (ii) technical - convening and curating technical working groups to strengthen and expand the suite of services offered; and (iii) financial - delivering a structured approach for capital mobilization to expand financing options for cities to execute their resilience agenda. The Disaster Risk Management Analyst being recruited will be based in the GP SURR Global Unit in Washington DC, and the selected candidate will work directly with and receive guidance from the CRP Team Leader. The selected candidate will also work with other staff members that constitute the core team of the CRP and the Disaster Risk Management GSG and a broad network of specialists across the Bank. The World Bank Group is committed to achieving diversity in terms of gender, nationality, culture and educational background. Individuals with disabilities are encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated in the strictest confidence.
Note: If the selected candidate is a current Bank Group staff member with a Regular or Open-Ended appointment, s/he will retain his/her Regular or Open-Ended appointment. All others will be offered a 3 year term appointment.
Duties and Accountabilities: The selected candidate will provide support to the further core development of CRP and various activities within the operational, technical and financial pillars of the program.
The key tasks include
Operational

• Provide cross-support to regional task teams in the preparation and supervision of CRP technical assistance and associated lending programs, including drafting and processing of project concept notes, project appraisal documents and Board packages, operations manuals, fiduciary arrangements, and participation on missions;
• Capture good practices across the range of CRP engagements and support the dissemination of these materials to other task teams;

Technical

• Contribute to the further development and mainstreaming of the broad suite of finance tools offered by CRP, focusing particularly on public-private partnerships, land value capture, and municipal finance;
• Support the further consolidation, systemization and scaling of the range of technical working groups;

Financial

• Contribute to the overall development of the capital raising program of CRP;
• Support the planning and coordination for the Bangkok financial conference series;
• Support dialogue and engagement across financial advisors and various types of investors;
• Work across various WBG units to build partnerships for engagement in order to efficiently deliver financial products to Bank clients; Program Development
• Support the development of program materials that articulate a compelling narrative around the value and rationale for CRP engagements aimed at multiple audiences, including: a) city clients; b) investors and financial advisories; and, c) internal World Bank and donors;
• Support knowledge management activities, with a focus on how best to scale good practices;
• Support the building of cross-GP partnerships aimed at increasing resilience across the World Bank portfolio. This includes, inter alia, Transport, Water, Social Protection, Finance & Markets, in the establishment and formalization of communities of practice; and,
• Perform other duties and functions as assigned by the Team Lead.

Selection Criteria

• Minimum of 2 years of relevant work experience, preferably in real estate, finance, or related areas.
• Minimum of a master's degree or equivalent in Finance, Business, Economics, Public Policy, or related discipline.
• Ability to develop, and communicate complex ideas effectively through visuals - strong PowerPoint, Prezi and Illustrator skills are an advantage.
• Ability to work effectively in high stress environments.
• Solid understanding of capital raising across the range of potential financial instruments.
• Proven ability to share best practice, trends, knowledge and lessons learned across units and with clients and partners.
• Strong oral and written skills in English and ability to articulate ideas, verbally and in writing, in a clear and compelling way across different audiences. Written and spoken fluency in other languages highly desirable.
• Demonstrated ability to contribute to high-level analytical work and investment operations.
• Ability to play a key role in implementing the strategic direction of the work program; Ability to collaborate effectively with a broad team.
• Strong business judgment and analytical decision making - analyzes facts and data to support sound logical decision-making regarding own and others' work.

Competencies

• Integrative Skills - Understands relevant cross-practice areas how they are interrelated; able to undertake cross-practice work in lending and non-lending operations.
• Knowledge and Experience in Development Arena - Translates technical and cross-country knowledge into practical applications and contributions to country and practice strategies; interacts with clients at the policy level.
• Policy Dialogue Skills - Anticipates needs and requests in the field and conducts independent policy discussions with representatives of the government and non-government partners.
• Lead and Innovate - Develops innovative solutions with others.
• Deliver Results for Clients - Achieves results and identifies mission-driven solutions for the client.
• Collaborate Within Teams and Across Boundaries - Initiates collaboration across boundaries and broadly across WBG, and brings differing ideas into the forefront.
• Create, Apply and Share Knowledge - Creates, applies and shares knowledge from across and outside WBG to strengthen internal and/or external client solutions.
• Business Judgment and Analytical Decision Making - Gathers inputs, assesses risk, considers impact and articulates benefits of decisions for internal and external stakeholders over the long term.
• High degree of motivation, initiative, flexibility, reliability, and responsiveness to changing demands.
• Capacity for effective multi-tasking, with demonstrated ability of being an independent starter with minimal supervision, and a high capacity to persevere for results.