Senior Financial Officer -World Bank- Washington

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

 

Closing date: Monday, 18 December 2017

• Grade
• Location Washington, DC
• Recruitment Type International Hire
• Language Requirement English [Essential]; French [Desired]; Spanish [Desired]
• Closing Date 18-Dec-2017

Background / General description
The World Bank Treasury ('Treasury') is the Vice Presidency performing treasury functions for the IBRD and for other members of the World Bank Group. Its activities are organized and grouped along three segments: asset management, banking and debt management, and capital markets services. Treasury has been a large and significant player in the international financial markets for more than fifty years and has achieved a global reputation as a prudent and innovative borrower, investor and risk manager.
Treasury is responsible for: (i) managing more than $185 billion in assets for the World Bank and other official-sector investors; (ii) leading the World Bank's financing program in international and domestic bond and derivatives markets; (iii) conducting asset and liability management for the World Bank's balance sheet; (iv) overseeing the development and outreach related to the financing and hedging products the World Bank provides for its developing-country clients; and (v) collaborating with official sector institutions of member countries to help build their capacity in asset and public debt management. Treasury's staff regularly interacts and collaborates with the other departments across the World Bank Group.
The Financial Advisory and Banking Department (FAB) is Treasury's client-facing hub with lead responsibility for coordinating Treasury's advisory services on asset, debt, and risk management to sovereign and sub-sovereign governments, central banks and official sector institutions, as well as development organizations. The department also designs and customizes IBRD's financial and risk management products to help clients finance development projects and mitigate financial risks. FAB is further responsible for undertaking outreach activities and learning events to build the capacity of clients to use IBRD products and market-based solutions.
The asset management capacity building team (FABRP) within FAB is responsible for delivering capacity building and training to central banks, sovereign wealth funds, national pension funds and supranational organizations under the umbrella of the Reserves Advisory and Management Program (RAMP), grounded in internationally-recognized sound practices.
Four teams comprising 30 staff support RAMP activities for FABRP: i) Engagement Managers: A team of senior staff responsible for maintaining client relationships at the highest decision making levels; understanding clients' governance frameworks and investment objectives; assessing their governance structure and their investment management infrastructure to meet such objectives; agreeing on project plans to address gaps; and coordinating with other units of Treasury the delivery of the agreed technical assistance program via on-site visits, internships, multi-country workshops and third-party financial training programs. ii) Client Services: This team is responsible for communications with clients, investment reporting, processing of legal documentation, record keeping and invoices. iii) Conference and Workshop Team: Responsible for the organization of over 25 workshops, forums and RAMP's flagship annual Executive Forum for Senior Officials and Policy makers. iv) Technology Team: Responsible for developing and maintaining tools and software provided by the World Bank Treasury to support RAMP's capacity building efforts. FABRP collaborates with business partners within the World Bank Treasury to provide RAMP services to clients. These partners include the Investment Management (IMD); Quantitative Solutions, Strategic Asset Allocation and Analytics (QSA); Pensions (PEN); and the Treasury Operations (TRO) departments.
In order to deliver technical assistance, the FABRP team leverages over 60 years of World Bank Treasury's asset management expertise and forges partnerships with leading official sector asset management institutions around the world to deliver practitioner-led, high quality capacity building programs. It also closely collaborates with other departments in the World Bank Group and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to ensure that official sector asset management activities are well grounded in sound fiscal, monetary and macroeconomic practices. FABRP also maintains open dialogue and cooperates with the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), multilateral standard setting-bodies, university research centers and the private sector on various aspects of reserves, pension and sovereign wealth fund management practices and principles.
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 World Bank is looking to fill the position of Senior Financial Officer, Financial Advisory and Banking - Reserves Advisory and Management Program (FABRP). The position will be based in Washington, DC and report to the Manager, FABRP. The Senior Financial Officer will function as an Engagement Manager with a select group of the institutional clients which participate in the Reserves Advisory and Management Program (RAMP). Roles and Responsibilities The Engagement Manager will work under the direction of the RAMP Manager and guidance from Lead Engagement Managers.
Primary responsibilities will include the following activities

• Lead and facilitate client institutions to identify a set of annual capacity-building initiatives (each of which maps back to a generally-defined set of key performance indicators) designed to support the continuous improvement of the reserves management staff capabilities, policies and practices. However, the scope and range of topics can be quite broad. To advance the individual initiatives at the client institutions, the Engagement Manager must champion progress, albeit with sensitivity to the norms and corporate-culture of the clients. Significant international travel required.
• Design the modalities of knowledge transfer, coordinate human resources from the Treasury, the Bank Group, and external third parties, and manage the delivery of the knowledge transfer in the most cost and time efficient way, while ensuring quality.
• Advise RAMP clients on the design and development of the investment policy, strategic asset allocation, and portfolio construction for various fixed-income and/or multi-asset class portfolios, based on applicable investment objectives and risk tolerance considerations.
• Actively participate in professional collaboration, advisory engagements and workshops for Treasury clients including central banks, other official sector investment managers such as public pension funds and sovereign wealth funds. This includes preparing and delivering presentations and case studies for technical workshops and conferences; training client staff and providing technical briefings to the investment committee of client intuitions on topics relating to governance, investment policy, strategic asset allocation, and risk management; and liaising with colleagues in the Treasury and other World Bank units to facilitate the delivery of technical assistance to clients.
• Represent the Bank and RAMP, and cultivate collaborative relationships with the most senior-level representatives of the client institutions as well as asset management practitioners, opinion leaders and external service providers.
• Contribute to the continuous improvement of RAMP at the programmatic level. The scope of subject matter or curriculum of RAMP is continuously expanding to meet client demand; therefore internal expertise and material content must be continuously refreshed. The modalities of knowledge transfer involve, among other others, participating in the design of workshops, writing policy notes and papers, and delivering presentations.
• Enhance knowledge management and thought leadership of RAMP by conducting analysis (including cross country) and research on RAMP related issues, such as for example, governance, strategic asset allocation, and investment asset management of official institutions and summarize the results in working papers.

Selection Criteria
The successful candidate should have the following qualifications
1. Holds advanced degree(s) in relevant field of study (e.g., Economics; Finance; Mathematics, Financial Economics or Engineering);
2. Has preferably 8 years of relevant experience in a senior position at an official sector asset management entity or an international development organization, preferably with experience and responsibilities in the area of investment management and central bank operations;
3. Possesses substantial knowledge and experience across a wide array of business, policy and operational topics associated with investment management and ancillary areas;
4. Possesses solid understanding of the macroeconomic, fiscal and monetary underpinnings of asset management at the sovereign level;
5. Has a firm understanding of finance and portfolio theory, as well as a practitioner's unique grasp of the key dimensions of front, middle, and back office aspects of a well-functioning asset management organization;
6. Has curiosity, and proven interest and ability to perform research in areas of RAMP's expertise. Publications in the broad areas of official asset management are a plus;
7. Has proven ability to manage multiple tasks and lead multiple projects simultaneously;
8. Complies with highest ethical standards;
9. Displays a high degree of self-motivation, a positive attitude, and the ability and drive to lead and collaborate in a team-based, multi-cultural work environment; and
10. Has excellent and proven writing skills in English, as well as the verbal skills to communicate complex and technical issues in simple terms. Fluency in English is essential; fluency in Spanish is highly desirable; fluency in French is desirable.