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. Placing women’s rights at the center of all its efforts, UN Women leads and coordinates the United Nations System efforts to ensure that commitments on gender equality and gender mainstreaming translate into action throughout the world. It provides strong and coherent leadership in support of Member States’ priorities and efforts, building effective partnerships with civil society and other relevant actors.

The Policy, Programme, and Intergovernmental Division (PPID) provides global support to UN Women offices in all locations to deliver results in support of UN Women’s Strategic Plan 2026-2029 and internationally agreed goals on gender equality and women’s rights and empowerment, including the Beijing Platform for Action and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The Division provides intellectual and strategic leadership on normative support and delivery of integrated policy and programming advice, including through policy analysis and gender mainstreaming. The Division leverages innovation, knowledge management, and cutting-edge technical expertise to support UN Women’s operational work to build the capacity of partners to deliver results at the country level and coordinate the contribution of the UN system to gender equality and rights and empowerment of women and girls.

Leadership and Decision-Making Section within PPID leads and coordinates one of UN Women’s four Strategic Plan Impact Areas. UN-Women leverage its triple mandate to elevate women’s voices, invest in their leadership, and promote their participation at all levels and in all walks of life. The Section is responsible for driving UN Women’s policy leadership and programmatic strategies that contribute towards women fully, equally and meaningfully participating in leadership and decision making for stronger public policy outcomes; and women and girls benefiting from gender responsive governance and access to rights. It will scale up efforts to strengthen women’s voices and institutional accountability, including by supporting aspiring women leaders and office holders, and financing women’s rights organizations and movements through broad-based partnerships, especially locally. Key priorities include promoting greater parity in decision making, increasing institutional safeguards that prevent and respond to violence against women in public life, strengthening capacity of Governments and stakeholders to track and deliver on commitments to women’s leadership, and increasing capacity and influence of diverse women’s rights organizations and networks, particularly those led by young women and those facing multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination.

The Chief of Leadership and Decision-Making Section reports to the Director, PPID and exercises significant delegated for ensuring technical excellence of UN Women’s policy and programmatic contributions in the thematic area, including through directing research and development of knowledge products. Working in close collaboration with Sections across PPID and other Divisions, the incumbent will contribute to inter-governmental, normative and UN system coordination work, establish and strengthen partnerships, and provide strategic advice to UN Women’s regional and country offices. The Chief also directs and manages the personnel of the Leadership and Decision-Making section, exercising substantial autonomy in decision-making within established strategic parameters and escalating to the D2 Director only matters with organization-wide implications or significant political, reputational, or financial risk.

Key Functions and Accountabilities:

1. Lead the development and implementation of UN Women’s strategy for Women’s Leadership and Decision-Making:

• Serve as a globally recognized thought leader on women’s leadership and decision-making and provide authoritative strategic advice to the UN Women leadership and the rest of the organization.
• Direct the development and implementation of a comprehensive UN Women strategy for women’s leadership and decision-making that reflects evidence-based policy approaches, taking advantage of the entity’s strengths, demonstrated niche and triple mandate to position the organization as an influential and relevant actor in ensuring women’s leadership across various sectors and contexts and the gender-responsive implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, exercising independent judgment on strategic priorities and resource allocation.
• Establish standards for and oversee the provision of high quality and timely policy support to Member States and other partners for the advancement of normative frameworks on women’s leadership and decision-making including through directing preparation of Secretary General reports.
• Provide authoritative policy guidance and advice to UN Women regional and country offices to develop and implement initiatives that promote political participation and leadership, determining appropriate technical approaches and intervention strategies.
• Drive innovation and cutting-edge practices, drawing on feminist leadership and governance policy and practice, to enhance the development of policies and programmes, shaping organizational approaches and methodologies.
• Convene leading feminist academics, development policy specialists and practitioners on gender equality and women’s leadership to advise on and guide UN Women’s Women’s leadership and decision-making strategy.

2. Oversee the development and implementation of the programmatic initiatives on women’s leadership and decision-making:

• Direct data collection, including relevant SDG indicators, and research on the linkages between global commitments on women’s equal participation in leadership and decision-making and their implementation at global, regional and national levels, establishing priorities and quality standards.
• Lead and ensure accountability for the roll-out and operationalization of UN Women’s global programming framework for women’s leadership and decision-making in country and regional Strategic Notes and projects.
• Direct the development of global projects that catalyze country and regional programming, support cross-regional collaboration and generation of global data and evidence for replication and impact at scale, exercising significant independent judgment on project design and partnership strategies.
• Spearhead the development, testing and roll out of tools and methodologies to enhance programming and results and incorporation of lessons learned.
• Lead and implement a policy research and practice agenda reflecting the linkages between global normative commitments on women’s leadership and decision-making and their implementation at global, regional and national levels.
• Direct results management efforts for the Impact Area to ensure that UN Women strategically plans, achieves and captures SP results, establishing performance metrics and accountability frameworks.
• Collaborate with other thematic sections to provide integrated po

• Serve as a globally recognized thought leader on women’s leadership and decision-making and provide authoritative strategic advice to the UN Women leadership and the rest of the organization.
• Direct the development and implementation of a comprehensive UN Women strategy for women’s leadership and decision-making that reflects evidence-based policy approaches, taking advantage of the entity’s strengths, demonstrated niche and triple mandate to position the organization as an influential and relevant actor in ensuring women’s leadership across various sectors and contexts and the gender-responsive implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, exercising independent judgment on strategic priorities and resource allocation.
• Establish standards for and oversee the provision of high quality and timely policy support to Member States and other partners for the advancement of normative frameworks on women’s leadership and decision-making including through directing preparation of Secretary General reports.
• Provide authoritative policy guidance and advice to UN Women regional and country offices to develop and implement initiatives that promote political participation and leadership, determining appropriate technical approaches and intervention strategies.
• Drive innovation and cutting-edge practices, drawing on feminist leadership and governance policy and practice, to enhance the development of policies and programmes, shaping organizational approaches and methodologies.
• Convene leading feminist academics, development policy specialists and practitioners on gender equality and women’s leadership to advise on and guide UN Women’s Women’s leadership and decision-making strategy.
• Direct data collection, including relevant SDG indicators, and research on the linkages between global commitments on women’s equal participation in leadership and decision-making and their implementation at global, regional and national levels, establishing priorities and quality standards.
• Lead and ensure accountability for the roll-out and operationalization of UN Women’s global programming framework for women’s leadership and decision-making in country and regional Strategic Notes and projects.
• Direct the development of global projects that catalyze country and regional programming, support cross-regional collaboration and generation of global data and evidence for replication and impact at scale, exercising significant independent judgment on project design and partnership strategies.
• Spearhead the development, testing and roll out of tools and methodologies to enhance programming and results and incorporation of lessons learned.
• Lead and implement a policy research and practice agenda reflecting the linkages between global normative commitments on women’s leadership and decision-making and their implementation at global, regional and national levels.
• Direct results management efforts for the Impact Area to ensure that UN Women strategically plans, achieves and captures SP results, establishing performance metrics and accountability frameworks.
• Collaborate with other thematic sections to provide integrated po