Mobile Money Analyst (IPSA9)

Background

UNDP is committed to achieving workforce diversity in terms of gender, nationality and culture. Individuals from minority groups, indigenous groups and persons with disabilities are equally encouraged to apply. All applications will be treated with the strictest confidence.

UNDP does not tolerate sexual exploitation and abuse, any kind of harassment, including sexual harassment, and discrimination. All selected candidates will, therefore, undergo rigorous reference and background checks.

Solomon Islands is a group of islands with dispersed geographical territory containing limited physical or digital enabling infrastructure, limiting inter-country movements for most of the population. The existing regulated financial service providers (FSPs) largely focus their activities on the capital Honiara, with up to 70% of the retail financial services infrastructure focused there. Financial inclusion (defined as the proportion of adults with a formal financial account) in the Solomon Islands is low. Only 25.6% of the population has a formal bank account, and another 8.2% use other formal financial services, such as insurance, superannuation funds (including SINPF), credit unions or microfinance services. Solomon Islands has only 14 bank branches, concentrated in five mainly urban locations. The remaining two-thirds of the population in rural areas relies exclusively on informal financial services (34.8%) or is excluded from financial services entirely (31.4%). There are currently no mobile money (wallet) services available at significant scale in the country, providing a great opportunity to deepen access to financial services via mobile; a channel that is already available to many Solomon islanders.

The recently launched NFIS 3 (2021-2025) is designed to drive wider adoption of financial services. In line with this, UNCDF is supporting the mobile network operator Our Telekom (OT) to develop and launch a mobile money solution to offer appropriate and affordable financial services at a national scale. An extensive feasibility study and recommendations for implementation have already been developed. The mobile money service will offer multiple banking and payment services like fund transfer, saving deposits, utility bill payments and ticketing. These products will be structured as mass market products.

UNCDF/ UNDP is seeking a full-time Mobile Money Expert to provide support to Our Telekom with the successful implementation and scaling of mobile money services in the country. UNCDF/ UNDP will support and facilitate the consultant as required.

Duties and Responsibilities

The expert will work in close collaboration with the Our Telekom team. Despite current strict travel restrictions to Solomon Islands, every effort will be made for an on-site assignment for effective support to the Our Telekom team. Virtual engagements will be acceptable in the meantime.

The main objectives are to support the Our Telekom team with:

Strategy: Building on the feasibility study and best practices in the industry, finalize, implement and monitor the most critical strategies and plans for the launch of mobile money services in the country, considering accessibility, awareness-raising, and the promotion of regular use of the service. These include channel strategy, agent strategy, B2B & Payments strategies, and customer acquisition strategy, to finalize the business model (in phases)
Technical integration: Guide the leadership team of Our Telekom for finalizing the business model for the mobile money offering - so as to firm up the technology platform requirements and the selection of a the appropriate vendor for these requirements. This will include the development of the Business/Functional Requirements documents (BRD) - that will be used to develop the Request for Application (RFA) for the technology platform as the first priority for Our Telekom; ensure the partnership with platform provider and technical integration of the mobile money platform is effectively managed and well-performing, including application delivery and release, issue resolution, quality control, system stability, testing and change request monitoring.
Rolling out business processes and building in-house team capacity, including:
Agent/Retail Support processes: Recruitment/registration, profile, liquidity & limit management, Recon, life cycle management, etc.
System support processes: Security management, Vendor/SLA management, BCM, etc.
Customer processes: Customer loyalty, registration, profile & limit management, Resets, life cycle management, etc.
Back-office processes: Liquidations, Bulk payments, Revenue recognition, reporting, etc.
Development of strategic partnerships: for both core business and value added business e.g. partnerships with high cash flow businesses for liquidity management in the provinces (as super agents) ; ecommerce partnerships for promoting the use of mobile money; G2P payments
Product Development processes: 3rd party integrations, Marketing planning, Risk management, etc.
Assist the client in creating an organization and recruiting and training against job profiles and responsibilities; an effective mobile money team by driving efficiency in the teams and eliminating duplication, including the incorporation of the Mobile Money business as a separate entity/subsidiary company
Outreach and Sensitization: raising awareness about mobile money services with relevant stakeholders, including but not limited to development partners, utility providers, regulators, financial institutions, and agents, with the objective of encouraging integration, uptake and adoption. Work with key stakeholders and articulate technical concepts in a customer-friendly and understandable way.
Market Entry: continuously support the team in setting the correct pricing for the mobile money services; reviewing available payment technologies for strategic positioning or partnership opportunities; supporting the transition in the market from available options like cash to the adoption of mobile, migrating existing work around solutions associated with collection and saving to a scalable, nimble mobile money platform that offers streamlined reporting and documenting lessons learnt and best practices.

Competencies

Core competencies:

Achieve Results: LEVEL 2: Scale up solutions and simplifies processes, balances speed and accuracy in doing work
Think Innovatively: LEVEL 2: Offer new ideas/open to new approaches, demonstrate systemic/integrated thinking
Learn Continuously: LEVEL 2: Go outside comfort zone, learn from others and support their learning
Adapt with Agility: LEVEL 2: Adapt processes/approaches to new situations, involve others in change process
Act with Determination: LEVEL 2: Able to persevere and deal with multiple sources of pressure simultaneously
Engage and Partner: LEVEL 2: Is facilitator/integrator, bring people together, build/maintain coalitions/partnerships
Enable Diversity and Inclusion: LEVEL 2: Facilitate conversations to bridge differences, considers in decision making

UNDP People Management Competencies can be found in the dedicated site.

Cross-Functional & Technical competencies

Business Management: Change Management :Ability to prepare support and help individuals and teams in designing and implementing organizational change
Business Management: Operations Management: Ability to effectively plan, organize, and oversee the organizations business processes in order to convert its assets into the best results in the most efficient manner
HR - Learning and development: L&D planning : Ability to identify organizational learning priorities aligned with the business strategy using key stakeholder involvement to ensure appropriate learning and optimal return-on-investment
Digital & Innovation: Experimentation: Ability to design, run and manage tests to evaluate ideas, solutions, or interventions to address development challenges, observe and learn about (system-wide) effects and implications.
External Relations & Advocacy (Communications): Mobile design and development: Ability to design, code, develop and create effective digital experiences for mobile users
External Relations & Advocacy (Partnership Management): Strategic Engagement Ability to capture and sustain attention, interest and agreement of high-level, influential policy and decision makers and secure their buy-in of high-level vision and objectives
2030 Agenda: Partnerships: SDG Finance: Financial Inclusion

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

Masters OR bachelor’s degree in engineering (Information Technology), Computer Science, Business administration or any other related field with an additional 2 years of relevant work experience

Experience:

At least 2 years of experience working in the payments and technology space with relevant work experience in business management and strategic planning.
OR a Bachelors with 4 years of working in the payments and technology space with relevant work experience in business management and strategic planning.
The candidate must be highly knowledgeable of current payment systems in emerging markets (experience in the Pacific is preferred), familiar with development programs and adept at developing and using quantitative and qualitative measurement and evaluation tools.
Working experience with financial institutions and/or telecommunications sector.
Candidate that have at least 10+ years of experience working in the payments and technology space with relevant work experience in business management and strategic planning will have an added advantage.
Strong background in change management and new technology adoption is desirable
Proven ability to design, implement and document effective business processes. Strong background in quality management, training, and operations, ensuring proper documentation & handover is desirable
Experience in organizing and managing multi-stakeholder and outreach events is desirable

Language:

Excellent spoken and written command of English.