INSIDE VIEW
Throughout our lives as modern women, we wear multiple identities. Every day, maybe even every hour, we switch between the various roles we play: woman, professional, mother. I’m a wife, a mother of three and a professional woman with career ambitions. I’m a strong...
Inspired by the call of the United Nations Secretary-General for global engagement to understand and address the way racism and discrimination manifest themselves in the work environment, some colleagues from the Mine Action Service, within the Office of Rule of Law...
Translators can be strange people. Usually they are happy to stay in the background, quietly working the magic that can transform an incomprehensible mess into a serviceable working document. However, if you make an ill-advised comment showing that you have not...
National Competitive examination (NCE) and Young Professional Programe (YPP) staff members, having passed through highly competitive and rigorous written and oral examinations, which are mandated by the General Assembly to improve the geographic representation of the...
WINS 1) Introduces neutral terminology and recognises range of impact from a single act of misconduct. The Policy uses “targeted individual”, “affected individual”, “impacted individual” separately, and explicitly addresses “non-staff personnel”. It recognizes...
Some used lockdown to cook, bake or assemble their Peleton. Rob Skidmore and Ardian Mollabeciri from ITC started a podcast. Tradesplaining has listeners from around the world and plenty of irreverent humour. Rob, from Wisconsin, and Ardian, from New York and with...
The United Nations (UN) first introduced internships in the 1950s with the objective of providing opportunities to better understand the principles, purposes, and activities of the UN; in short, these internship opportunities were meant to be educational. Over sixty...
Is there a way to define, measure, and evaluate “success” on social media? Are there some fixed indicators to do this? Can social media performance of different actors be ranked? The Geneva Engage Awards does exactly that. This joint initiative of the Geneva Internet...
You are in charge of vaccinating UN staff. How many vaccines have you procured, which are they and when will they be made available? Are you making use of Russia’s kind offer to donate vaccinations to staff? The United Nations has thus far purchased sufficient...
INSIDE VIEW
Being authentic, sharing freely who you are, whom you love and who you can be at work can be extremely challenging for colleagues who are LGBTIQ+. Fear of rejection, isolation, harassment, discrimination, the list goes on. Gurchaten (Nanoo), who started his UN career...
One of the most persistent staffing problems in the United Nations system has been the search for gender parity. While the General Assembly has regularly emphasized their desire to see gender parity achieved, progress has been slow. For example, according to the...
Covid-19 calls for a paradigm shift to solve the problems of interns In 2019, Diana Baron interned at the ILO for five months, during which she was privileged enough to receive a monthly stipend that supported her stay in Geneva. Long before COVID-19 turned everything...
Since gender is attached to the noun in many languages, some non-native speakers of English presume that English is similar Or they simply may be unaware of the importance of gender neutrality, especially in today's world. Thus, they may write: When a student enrols...
This opinion piece was first published by IPS on 23 February 2021.The following is an analysis marking International Mother Language Day, which was commemorated on February 21, on “How Technology Can Promote Multilingualism While Being Realistic -- & How it...
Last month, the UN Pension Fund launched a new app for annual recertification of pension eligibility.[1] This app is an alternative to the current paper recertification process, allowing retirees to use electronic facial recognition technology (FRT) for biometric...
In spite of the unprecedented challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, the UNOG Staff coordinating Council (SCC) has worked tirelessly to assist staff. Liquidity crisis In March, the Organization was hit with a major liquidity crisis affecting its regular budget,...
What is like to lose your job after 20 years on a permanent contract? A colleague, who wishes to remain anonymous, tells us his journey. I had a permanent position in one of the most respected UN specialized scientific organizations. After an internal restructuring...
The portfolio of adjectives becomes immense when referring to talented individuals – and sometimes you just cannot find the right one. This is what happened when I had the opportunity to talk to Vilmos. Sorry, to Guillermo. Sorry, to Alberto. Apologies, to all three....
People working in the international organizations are often caught between two different worlds; a formal diplomatic one and a more informal collegial one. Do you write UNese style? Many tell me that when they joined the United Nations, they came from the private...
