TENDER NO: JO01 – RFP – PR108667 Social Behavior Change Analysis and Strategy – Firms

About Mercy Corps:

Mercy Corps (MC) is a leading global organization powered by the belief that a better world is possible. In disaster, in hardship, in more than 40 countries around the world, we partner to put bold solutions into action — helping people triumph over adversity and build stronger communities from within now, and for the future.

Mercy Corps has worked in Jordan since 2003 to implement a variety of programs funded by global public institutions, as well as private donors to meet the urgent needs of vulnerable populations, build cohesive and civically engaged communities, and increase inclusive economic opportunities. MC’s current portfolio in Jordan focuses on three domains: resilient individuals, strong communities and governance, and environmentally sustainable and inclusive economic growth. MC integrates cross-cutting themes of youth, gender equality and empowerment, governance, natural resource management, and technology.

About PVLW Program:

Promoting the Voice and Leadership (PVLW) is a five-year USAID activity. The project started in June 2022 and will continue until June 2027. The Activity is implemented in Jordan and managed by a consortium of five organizations. Mercy Corps Jordan is the prime implementer with partners Al Jidara, Solidarity is Global Institute (SIGI), Plan International (Plan), and Arab Renaissance for Democracy and Development (ARDD). PVLW’s approach to advancing women’s rights and empowerment is led by Jordanian voices and built on principles and methods from Human-Centered Design (HCD) and behavioral science to positively shift social norms.

The Jordanian National Commission for Women (JNCW), Inter-Ministerial Committee for Women Empowerment (IMC-W), USAID, and a network of women’s programs have worked for decades to generate momentum to advance gender equality and women’s empowerment and strengthen capacities of civil society organizations (CSOs), community-based organizations (CBOs), and activists that promote women’s rights, leadership, economic empowerment, and participation in public and political life in Jordan. PVLW will build on these national efforts, as well as progress made in amending laws, to mobilize networks at all levels to grow capabilities, shared ownership, and accountability for gender equality and equity.

In 2023, PVLW will conduct several assessments to gain insights and inform planning for the coming years of the Activity. PVLW will conduct an in-depth Gender Equality and Social Inclusion (GESI) analysis to examine barriers to gender equality and women’s empowerment. The GESI analysis will collect data using an array of methodologies (e.g., literature review, qualitative, and quantitative tools, etc.) and will result in an action plan to inform other PVLW activities. The GESI analysis will identify the ways in which gender and social norms impact Jordanian women and girls’ agency and voice, including but not limited to the differences among men, women, boys, and girls in relation to their position in their communities, distribution of resources, access to opportunities, and power dynamics.

Building on the GESI analysis, PVLW seeks to contract a firm to develop and execute a Social and Behavior Change (SBC) analysis, and design a national Social and Behavior Change Communications (SBCC) strategy – as described in the below Scope of Work section. The SBCC Strategy is a national strategy that will be implemented by PVLW along with national stakeholders, such as JNCW and IMC-W. The SBCC strategy is expected to include activities and interventions that PVLW will implement during the period between June 2023 to March 2027 while JNCW, IMC-W, and other stakeholders will implement other components. Throughout the lifetime of PVLW and on an annual basis, PVLW with partners and stakeholders will revise and assess the strategy and amend as required.

Moreover, PVLW’s approach targets different population segments at an institutional, community, and household level. In the first year of implementing the national SBCC strategy, PVLW and other stakeholders will implement activities that target audiences at the community and household levels. In the coming years, implementers will extend their outreach to include senior representatives and decision makers from institutions such as Jordan government ministries and other public bureaus.

Tender Description:

The Program is seeking a service provider (whether national (Jordanian) or international company) to perform the following:

A. SBC Analysis:

The GESI Analysis conducted by PVLW will identify imbalanced power dynamics, and barriers that prevent women from achieving leadership, agency, and voice at the institutional, community, and household level. The SBC Analysis will take these identified areas and provide tools to dig deeper into the behaviors and norms contributing to power imbalances to find out how different segments of the population perceive the power dynamics, what an ideal behavior might look like, and the mechanisms driving norms in the first place.

Based on preliminary findings from PVLW’s GESI analysis and review of existing literature, PVLW and its national stakeholders (like JNCW and IMC-W) will identify the priority barriers and social norms that should be further explored to identify their drivers. It is expected that the analysis will not only review perceptions and norms around women, but also take into consideration issues of masculinity and how those impact women’s voice and agency and accordingly should be tackled in an SBCC strategy. The selected contractor is required to provide in its proposal to PVLW a research methodology: a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods, research tools, and a sample size representative of the Jordanian adult population (segmented to include women, men, youth, adolescents, people with disabilities, and other marginalized groups).

The selected contractor is required to submit a proposed SBC Analysis work plan aligned with the Deliverables Timetable below. The work plan should include the data collection timeline to enable PVLW, JNCW, or IMC-W in attending any sessions or interviews to ensure quality control of data collection. In addition, PVLW will work with the contractor in developing the research tools and will revise them before they are final. PVLW will support the contractor in providing a sample of respondents to pre-test the research tools before the actual data collection starts.

The SBC Analysis report should include an executive summary, applied research methodologies, sample information and demographics, findings, recommendations on drivers of social norms the SBCC Strategy should address, and any applicable research limitations. The SBC Analysis should also include a section on respondents’ media habits and exposure to sources of information exploring what are their most followed/viewed/listened-to communication channels, what is considered to be trusted sources for information, and where, what, from whom do they seek advice and information. The SBC Analysis report drafts should be submitted in English, and the final report after PVLW’s approval should be submitted in both Arabic and English.

Following receipt of the report draft, PVLW and stakeholders will provide the contractor with comments and questions. The contractor is expected to make appropriate amendments before finalizing the report for PVLW approval.

B. SBCC Strategy:

In coordination with the national stakeholders, PVLW will use the findings of the GESI and SBC Analyses to determine the focus of the SBCC strategy, campaigns and activities. Selection criteria will include the extent to which certain behavioral barriers and social norms are preventing women’s access to voice and leadership opportunities, those that serve as protective measures against gender-based violence, as well as those which are likely to be the most feasible to shift using communications methodologies. The SBCC strategy will also include indicators and benchmarks against which to measure progress and assess impact.

After PVLW and its stakeholders receive and approve the SBC Analysis findings, the contractor will start drafting the national SBCC Strategy. The strategy aims to engage target audiences at the institutional, community, and household levels to promote the adoption of equitable norms and practices to increase the agency and voice of women. This includes stimulating community dialogue, engagement, and action. The SBCC strategy will be re-visited every year by PVLW, its stakeholders, and the contractor to decide on work priorities. This initial draft should include the proposed strategy, messages, and communication tools.

PVLW is keen to develop a national SBCC strategy in a participatory approach through a series of workshops at the national, governorate, community, and household levels. The main objectives of the workshops are to present the draft SBCC strategy approach to relevant stakeholders and collect feedback and recommendations from the participants. PVLW anticipates the contractor to have had previous experience in designing similar activities. The contractor should be prepared to identify additional objectives for the workshops, such as pre-testing and adapting visual identity, tone of voice, and other creative elements as required. The draft strategy should be submitted in English, and the final version should be submitted in both Arabic and English.

The anticipated initial workshops include:

1) Community/Governorate Level – PVLW will organize participatory workshops with partners and stakeholders in at least three governorates (at least one workshop per governorate). Governorates will be selected based on the GESI analysis results. PVLW will invite CSOs, CBOs, community leaders, activists, and members of informal groups in each selected governorate.

2) National Level – PVLW will organize two workshops in Amman with select GoJ gender technical teams. Anticipated attendees include representatives of the JNCW, IMC-W, Gender Focal Points in public entities, and other institutional representatives as required.

The contractor is responsible for developing a discussion guide for each workshop, facilitating the sessions in collaboration with PVLW, and reporting on findings from each session. The report from each session should include lists of participants, main impressions on the proposed SBCC strategic approach, recommendations, opportunities, and threats.

After completing the initial workshops and submitting the workshop reports, the contractor is required to revise the draft of the SBCC strategy. Following the contractor’s revision of the SBCC strategy, PVLW will organize two additional workshops to validate the SBCC strategy. PVLW and the contractor will use the findings and recommendations from the validation workshops to finalize the strategy.

The final SBCC Strategy should be tailored to foster inclusion of people with disabilities, various socioeconomic and geographic backgrounds, youth, adolescents, and adults. It should include the following sections:

1. Brief Summary: Based on the GESI analysis, SBC analysis (including media habits and exposure analysis), and desk review the contractor should develop a problem statement and summarize the SBCC approaches they recommend for tackling these barriers and encouraging target audiences to adopt inclusive social norms.

2. Target Audience Segmentation: The SBCC strategy must consider the differences among the target audiences from men, women, girls and boys at the institutional, community, and household levels. The target audience segmentation should also include persons from various socioeconomic and geographic backgrounds, as well as people with disabilities. The strategy should also consider breaking down audiences into primary and secondary groups and influencers (those who can influence the primary and secondary audience). The strategy should also identify their socio-economic demographics, psychographics, barriers that prevent them from practicing the desired inclusive social norms, and effective communication tools and channels for each group of audience.

3. SBC Approach/Theory: The contractor should highlight which SBC approach or theory will guide their strategy. PVLW recognizes there are multiple SBC theories and models, noting that the Socio-ecological model (SME) and Capability Opportunity Motivation Behavior model (COM-B) are the most commonly used in SBC programs. However, PVLW welcomes proposing other SBC approaches that are adaptable to the Jordanian context, effective and result-oriented, and feasible in implementation.

4. Communication Objectives: The objectives should answer the question of “What do we want the target audience in Jordan to know/do?”. The communication objectives should be specific to each target audience (as per the segmentation discussed above), and according to each group’s key barriers and desired social norm to practice or desired change in behavior.

5. Communication Materials, Tools, and Messages: The SBCC strategy should include proposed materials, tools, interventions, and messages to achieve the strategy’s communication objectives. PVLW encourages the use of digital and social media interventions based on the findings of the media habits and exposure section in the SBC analysis. PVLW also encourages the use of community mobilization and engagement activities that may be used in community and household activities by field facilitators or community members as well as engagements with decision-makers and drivers of change (enablers and inhibitors). The proposed communication items should include a summary on the selected visual identities, positioning, and branding. Through the consultations that PVLW will organize, the contractor will be able to validate the proposed communication items ahead of the final draft.

6. SBC Governorate-based Pilot Campaign: The SBCC strategy should include a proposal for SBC governorate-based pilot campaigns. PVLW will decide on three governorates to pilot interventions based on the GESI analysis and national consultations, and will inform the contractor in which governorates the pilot campaigns will be held. The contractor should include an implementation and monitoring and evaluation plan for the campaigns. Before finalizing the SBCC strategy, PVLW may request the contractor to pilot SBCC activities and interventions in governorate-based campaigns.

7. SBC National Campaign: With consultations with PVLW and its national stakeholders, the contractor is expected to propose a national campaign that focuses on the most prevailing social norm(s) across the Kingdom as per the findings from the SBC Analysis and priority area for PVLW, partners, and stakeholders. The national SBCC strategy should propose a plan to gradually address discriminatory social norms over multiple years. PVLW encourages the contractor to refer to innovative methods and channels to implement the national campaign. The main aim of the campaign is to drive the targeted population into considering a shift to adopt equitable social norms. The national campaign should inform the targeted population and assist them to realize what are the advantages and benefits of increasing and promoting the voice and leadership of women on an institutional, community, and household level. Every year PVLW and stakeholders will contribute to the national campaign and will decide on its topic according to the assessment of the previous campaign.

8. Advocacy Campaign Tools: PVLW is reviewing existing legislative mapping reports to identify discriminatory legislations and policies, including bylaws, procedures, and practices, as well as poor enforcement of laws that serve as a barrier for women to exercise their voice and agency. The results of this legislative mapping is a legislative agenda, a living document, prioritizing legal barriers for PVLW to address for the entirety of the Activity, and will inform advocacy campaigns to be designed and implemented by civil society organizations (CSO). PVLW will develop an advocacy guide and expects the contractor to propose SBC based advocacy tools and interventions that can be implemented by community members.

9. Monitoring Framework: In collaboration with PVLW, the contractor should propose in the strategy a monitoring framework and tools to measure impact of the proposed SBC tools and interventions. The proposed tools should be simple and effective that can be implemented on multiple national and local and household activities to collate and aggregate results contributing to the overall goals of the SBCC strategy. The monitoring framework should also include process evaluation tools to measure the strengths and weaknesses of the field activities and inform future amendments by the PVLW team and its partners.

10. Campaign Budget: PVLW requests the contractor to include the cost of production of communication materials, interventions, production specifications, and a production plan. The cost should be estimated for one unit of each material and tool, and a cost per minimum quantity of each of them. The cost of production should also include the cost of traditional media broadcast, social media and digital campaigns, and dissemination of print materials if applicable. PVLW expects the contractor to present a broadcast, social media, and digital plans for the national campaigns if proposed.

Applicant Eligibility:

PVLW encourages firms (both Jordanian and non-Jordanian) with the below qualifications to apply, and encourages Jordanian firms to lead partnerships with regional or international firms that are specialized in SBCC;

• Valid legal local business registration.
• Valid local tax registration certificate.
• Minimum of three years of experience in designing, developing, and implementing campaigns in humanitarian or development fields.
• Previous experience in the design, development, and implementation of SBCC strategies and campaigns.
• Previous experience in developing and managing research projects utilizing both qualitative and quantitative research methods.
• Preferably have an understanding of women empowerment context in Jordan, gender relations, GBV, and data analysis.