Community-Based Protection Associate

Organizational Context

The Community-Based Protection Associate is part of the Protection Unit, reporting to a senior protection staff member. This role works directly with communities of concern to identify risks and leverage their capacities for self-protection. A significant portion of the work involves direct engagement with communities to build relationships and enhance protection planning and programming.

Job Purpose

The Community-Based Protection Associate's primary purpose is to work directly with communities of concern to identify the risks they face and to leverage their capacities to protect themselves, their families, and communities. This involves spending a substantial amount of time outside the office, building and maintaining networks within these communities. The role is crucial for developing and maintaining constructive relationships that measurably impact and enhance protection planning, programming, and results. The Associate also supports the design of a community-based protection strategy through consultation with the communities, ensuring their perspectives are integrated into UNHCR's operational procedures and overall protection strategy.

Responsibilities

The Community-Based Protection Associate assists functional units and senior management in integrating participatory and community-based approaches into the protection strategy and operational procedures. They stay informed about developments impacting the protection environment by maintaining relationships with communities and partners, advising the protection team on the perspectives, capacities, needs, and resources of the communities, with a focus on specific needs of vulnerable groups. The Associate works with host communities and partners to foster national civil society involvement and develop community-owned activities addressing social, educational, psycho-social, cultural, health, organizational, and livelihood concerns, including child protection and GBV prevention. They support participatory assessments and ongoing consultations with communities, assist in planning and monitoring programs with an Age, Gender, and Diversity (AGD) perspective, and build office capacity through training on community mobilization. The role involves supporting community representation structures, ensuring community understanding of UNHCR's accountability commitments, and acting as an interpreter for routine information exchange. They contribute to AGD-sensitive analysis and interventions, identify individuals for counseling, and intervene with authorities on protection matters. Compliance of implementing partners with protection policies is enforced, and payments to individual cases are prepared. Risk management and opportunity identification within their area of responsibility are also key duties.

Work Experience

3 years of relevant experience with a High School Diploma, or 2 years of relevant work experience with a Bachelor's degree or higher.

Skills

Community-based Protection Principles and Methodologies Multi-stakeholder Communications with Partners, Government & Community Stakeholder management and coordination with Implementing Partners (Gov/NGO/Corporate) Capacity Building Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Computer Literacy UN/UNHCR Administrative Rules, Regulations and Procedures

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