This publication provides a summary of the key statistics on the representation of women in the UN system, barriers to achieving gender parity, and recommended actions to assist UN entities to reach gender parity.

This report summarizes the Global Annual Gender Focal Point Meeting held on 18–20 October 2021. Gender Focal Points met to exchange good practices and were provided with capacity building and training, tools and knowledge exchange, and opportunities to learn from leaders and experts from the UN system, civil society, and academia on how to drive change across the UN system.

This report assesses the status of women in the UN system for the period from 1 January 2018 to 31 December 2019. It contains recommendations aimed at assisting entities in the UN system to achieve gender parity, including through rigorous implementation of policies and a range of coordinated actions.

In 2021, the Independent Evaluation Service conducted the corporate evaluation of UN Women’s UN system coordination and broader convening role in ending violence against women (EVAW) as part of its Corporate Evaluation Plan. The evaluation provides an overall assessment of UN Women’s UN system coordination and broader convening role in the area of EVAW and includes a forward-looking analysis with a view to informing UN Women’s Strategic Plan 2022–2025.

UN Women introduced the flagship programme initiatives (FPIs) as a means of consolidating and scaling-up the entity’s programming modalities to be fitter for purpose in the context of the Sustainable Development Goals and United Nations reform. In 2020, the Independent Evaluation Service, in collaboration with the Internal Audit Service, assessed the relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, and coherence of the FPIs and their integration as thematic priorities of the Strategic Plan 2018–2021.

UN Women leads and coordinates a United Nations system–wide network of more than 300 gender focal points. The Global Annual Meeting of Gender Focal Points and Focal Points for Women in the United Nations brings the network together in person and supports the gender focal points in their ongoing work to enhance gender parity and an enabling environment in their respective entities. This report provides a summary of the 2020 global annual meeting, key conclusions and best practices from the sessions.

This meta-synthesis brings together evidence from evaluations of UN Women’s organizational effectiveness and efficiency outputs. In addition to highlighting progress, the synthesis captures commonly identified drivers of change in the form of good practices and innovation, as well as impediments.

This document sets out the evaluation policy of the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women). The policy governs the independent evaluation function of UN Women and applies to all initiatives supported and funds administered by the Entity.

This report provides a summary of the 2019 Global Annual Meeting of Gender Focal Points and Focal Points for Women in the United Nations, organized in September 2019. It includes conclusions from the sessions and action points for accelerating gender parity efforts and implementing an enabling environment across the UN system. The report concludes with remarks by the UN Women Executive Director and recognition of good examples of implementing the “Enabling environment guidelines”.

Issue 15 of TRANSFORM focuses on governance and national planning (GNP), an area of work that has contributed to UN Women’s identity and for which it is recognized and valued. The evaluation of UN Women’s GNP portfolio from 2011 to 2017 assessed the relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, and extent to which human rights approach and gender equality principles were integrated adequately in UN Women’s approach to GNP.

In this report, the UN Secretary-General assesses the status of women in the United Nations system for the period from 1 January 2016 to 31 December 2017. Since the previous report, the representation of women in the Professional and higher categories in the United Nations system has increased from 42.8 per cent to 44.2 per cent. The largest increases were registered at the highest levels (Under-Secretary-General and Assistant Secretary-General), which is a direct result of the efforts of the Secretary-General in line with his commitment to reach parity at the highest levels by 2021.

Governance and national planning (GNP) is an area of work that has contributed to UN Women’s identity and for which it is recognized and valued. The evaluation of UN Women's GNP portfolio from 2011 to 2017 assessed the relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, and extent to which human rights approach and gender equality principles were integrated adequately in UN Women’s approach to GNP.

This report provides a summary of the Global Annual Meeting of Gender Focal Points and Focal Points for Women in the United Nations, held in October 2018.

This guide brings together innovative systemic evaluation practice with intersectional analysis of three of the cross-cutting dimensions of the SDG era. It provides an introduction to the Inclusive Systemic Evaluation for Gender equality, Environments and Marginalized voices (ISE4GEMs) approach. It includes a summary of the key theoretical concepts, as well as practical guidance and tools to support evaluators to apply it in practice.

This report provides a summary of the Global Annual Meeting of Gender Focal Points and Focal Points for Women in the UN, organized in November 2017 in Geneva.

This report (A/72/220) provides information on the status of women in the United Nations system during the reporting period from 1 January 2014 to 31 December 2015, including on progress made and obstacles encountered in achieving gender balance and up-to-date statistics and recommendations for accelerating progress.

Issue no. 11 of TRANSFORM presents the fourth meta-analysis of decentralized evaluations managed by UN Women in 2016. The aggregation and synthesis of evidence from multiple evaluations proved to be a potent approach to better understand what kinds of programmatic approaches and interventions are working best across the range of countries UN Women serves.

UN Women continuously seeks ways to accelerate its development results through improved programming and organizational effectiveness. To further facilitate the review of evaluative evidence and transform it into accessible knowledge, the UN Women Independent Evaluation Office annually produces a meta-analysis report. This year's meta-analysis synthesizes insights and drivers of change from multiple evaluations.

Issue no. 10 focuses on the strategic partnerships of UN Women. Partnerships are an essential aspect of our work but are often overlooked when we evaluate the results of our work. The skill set, time and resources necessary for ensuring truly effective strategic partnerships are often underestimated.

In 2015–2016, the UN Women Independent Evaluation Office undertook a corporate evaluation of UN Women’s strategic partnerships for gender equality and women’s empowerment. The evaluation is intended to enhance UN Women’s approach to strategic partnerships with the aim of ensuring that gender equality is reached by 2030. It was also expected to contribute to an understanding of how UN Women’s strategic partnerships can facilitate a strong position for gender equality and women’s empowerment within the current global development context and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.