Management
The review of management and administration policies and related practices throughout the United Nations system is an important function of the Unit. The Unit's authority to look at management issues is encapsulated in Article 5 of the JIU Statute, which states that the Unit shall provide an independent view through inspection and evaluation aimed at improving management and methods and at achieving greater coordination between organizations.
The Unit's strategic framework foresees the periodic analyses of the management and administration of its participating organizations. While the scope and available resources may limit the ability to compile these reports, JIU is working to ensure full coverage of all organizations over time. The timeline on this page indicates the management and administration reviews (MARs) carried out to date.
Even though the United Nations system organizations have developed their own internal oversight framework over the years, the JIU management and administration reviews are recognized by their executive heads and their governing bodies as useful, independent practices. In 2014, following the release of the World Intellectual Property Organization’s MAR report, the WIPO Programme and Budget Committee noted that it “recognized the important role of JIU in undertaking management and administration reviews of UN agencies and welcomed the JIU practice to undertake these at regular intervals.” Of the recommendations JIU provided and WIPO accepted, 87 % were implemented. In 2016, the ITU Secretary-General accepted the formal and informal recommendations made by JIU and addressed to the ITU secretariat, and considered that they would contribute to the process of continuous improvement and to further strengthening of ITUs administrative and management processes. In 2017, the UNIDO Industrial Development Board expressed its appreciation to JIU for its report which served to contribute to the ongoing work of the Secretariat in further improving its administrative and management processes (IDB.45/Dec.10).
These reviews of management and administration are useful not only for the organizations; they help to enhance the Unit's knowledge as well. This allows JIU to fulfil one of the major components of its mission: to identify and disseminate best practices across the system.