The Bank Reconciliation process enables the verification of entries on the bank statement by reconciling that information with external transactions and also system generated transactions in Payables, Receivables, Payroll and General Ledger. During the bank reconciliation process external transactions can be created for bank originated entries such as bank charges and interest.
Bank of America interface (BOA) applies if the disbursing bank account is part of the interface. BOA files are payment file formats generated only for bank accounts that are part of the Bank of America interface. These payment files are processed by the system and automatically transmitted to Bank of America. BOA, in turn, routes these payment instructions to the disbursing banks.
The Cash to General Ledger Reconciliation Report compares the GL cash account balance against the bank account balance. It displays the unreconciled GL cash account journal entries and unreconciled bank statement lines that help identify the discrepancies between the balances. This is done based on the specified range of periods.
The core governing principle in UNDP's procurement is to obtain the bet value for money. Best value for money should not be equated with the lowest price. It requires an integrated assessment of technical, organizational and pricing factors in light of their relative importance (i.e., reliability, quality, experience, reputation, past performance, cost/fee and reasonableness). Parameters can also include social, environmental and other strategic objectives defined in the procurement plan.
The Bi-annual Reassignment Exercise is a corporate mechanism for making staffing decisions, matching pre-qualified candidates with posts, so as to advance UNDP's talent needs and other organizational priorities.
Supports the unit or country office audit focal point for audit observations that require interpretation or clarifications from central bureau policy focal points, BMS Divisions etc. Supports the offices being audited with preparation of documentation prior to the audit.
Changes to a project budget affecting the outputs, completion date or total estimated project costs require a formal budget revision that is agreed by the signatories of the original project document, and may need the approval of the donor, UN pooled fund steering committee or vertical fund, if relevant. The UNDP programme manager alone may sign the revision provided the other signatories have no objection. This procedure may be applied, for example, when the purpose of the revision is only to re-phase activities among years.
Each office/unit must prepare and maintain a Business Continuity Plan (BCP), to ensure that the organization can carry out its functions, so far as is reasonably practicable, when faced with an emergency. The BCP must be reviewed annually. The BCP covers all UNDP-administered personnel, business functions at all levels, including those that have been subcontracted to external contractors and suppliers, where the overall legal responsibility remains with UNDP. The BCP does not cover third party resilience; however, subcontractors should be asked to provide evidence that they have considered potential resilience issues. Project offices are also encouraged to apply the principles of BCM. 16. The BCP follows International Best practices, ISO 22301 (Societal Security – Guidelines for Incident Preparedness and Operations Continuity Management).
The Business Impact Analysis (BIA) is conducted by each country office or bureau unit, and coordinated by the office of the Business Continuity Focal Point. They may request technical assistance from the Directorate, Bureau for Management Services (BMS). The BIA includes: a. Identification of the critical business functions, b. Assessment of the impacts from identified risks that may disrupt critical business functions; c. Specification of setting recovery times in the event of disruptions; d. Defining recovery strategies for critical business functions, including the allocation of appropriate resources.
The “Buyer” role refers to staff members who conduct procurement (including procurement of Individual Contractors) and/or arrange travel (if located outside of HQ). Buyers exercise their procurement role on behalf of project managers and other clients.
A UNDP knowledge product is “a branded published piece offering new insights and analysis that advances learning or increases understanding about a development issue and leads to improved development policies, programmes, practices, products, skills and competencies.” It is produced for the purpose of informing or influencing decision-makers, professionals or the interested public. Knowledge products may be classified under eight types: report, technical paper, guidance material, contributing paper, findings, dataset, brief, and think piece.
Quality assurance for UNDP knowledge products is a three step online process conducted by the Issuing Office. The Issuing Office appoints a Knowledge Product Focal Point who: a)Submits the planned knowledge product details (scope of work, budget, target audience etc.); b)Once the knowledge product is produced, assesses it against the quality standards, and c)Uploads the product for publishing on UNDP's public site. Two key decision points in the process certify the product meets the criteria. It is the role of the Approver, the authorizing officer within the issuing office, to: a) “Approve” is when the approver -the authorizing officer- certifies that the knowledge product has been adequately justified and its design details have been satisfactorily thought through to proceed with the production stage, and
b) “Clear” is when the approver certifies that the product fully meets UNDP’s quality standards and can be finalized and issued. At each step the authorizing officer signs off on the Online Quality Assurance process.
Following its publication, the issuing office is also able to track and monitor the impact and the performance of the published knowledge product.
All UNDP knowledge products must meet six quality standards: (1) the product is relevant to the organization’s or programme’s priorities; (2) the product demonstrates thought leadership; (3) the product is well-designed and internally consistent; (4) the product is assured of reaching its intended audience; (5) the intended impacts are clear and measurable; (6) an appropriate roll-out plan is included. To certify these standards are met, the approver/authorizing officer signs a Quality Standards Certification form through the online quality assurance process.
A set of nodes that run containerized applications. Containerizing applications packages an app with its dependences and some necessary services. They are more lightweight and flexible than virtual machines. In this way, Kubernetes clusters allow for applications to be more easily developed, moved, and managed. Kubernetes clusters allow containers to run across multiple machines and environments: virtual, physical, cloud-based, and on-premises. Kubernetes containers are not restricted to a specific operating system, unlike virtual machines. Instead, they can share operating systems and run anywhere.