Join our Good Problems Team to identify pressing global problems and design impactful funding programmes to solve them. 🌏

• 3-6 month contract, with the possibility to extend
• £28k - £40k pro rata
• Family-friendly and flexible working arrangements
• Great workspace, 5 minutes walk from Old Street Underground

About us

Our Good Problems Team at Science Practice works with science and innovation funders to identify pressing global challenges and design programmes to act on them. We have designed over 40 innovation programmes including the £10M Longitude Prize and our clients include Wellcome, the Humanitarian Innovation Fund and Nesta.

We are a dedicated team of four with skills ranging from design and research to social entrepreneurship, programming and radio. Our ambition is to maximise the impact of existing resources by helping funders make informed and transparent strategic decisions.

We work across a diverse range of domains, from mental health and urban transport to nutrition and gender-based violence (GBV). Right now, we’re scoping opportunities for public engagement in biomedical and health science and designing a series of innovation challenges for the humanitarian water, sanitation, and hygiene (WASH) sector.

The role

We are looking for someone with diverse research experience to support us with the development and design of innovation funding programmes in the humanitarian space. Recent similar projects include the development of the Menstrual Hygiene Management Challenge and the WASH Evidence Challenge for the Humanitarian Innovation Fund.

We are open to interviewing both early-career and experienced researchers with a diverse range of research experience including, but not limited to, exploratory research, action research, policy-oriented research or human-centred research.

We are looking for someone available to start in January 2020.

The role will involve:

• Conducting desk research and interviews with diverse stakeholders to better understand problems in humanitarian WASH and GBV sectors. This will involve identifying key materials on the topics, understanding the underlying causes of the problems, seeing who is impacted and to what extent, and finding out who is working on solutions and what are their limitations.
• Synthesising research insights into compelling and engaging materials for senior decision-makers to support the prioritisation of problems.  
• Developing strategic recommendations for funders on how to respond to the identified problems.
• Co-designing innovation programmes (eg, funding programmes, prizes, accelerators) to address the identified problems. Testing the proposed programmes through interviews and workshops.
• Facilitating workshops to gather feedback on priority problems or programme designs.

We’re looking for someone who:

• Has excellent research skills and enjoys exploring new topics through a range of research methods including desk research and interviewing diverse actors such as academics, policy-makers, representatives from NGOs, industry, and civil society.
• Writes well and communicates complex subject matter in simple, engaging language.
• Has a good understanding of the humanitarian sector, as well as its key challenges and actors (this understanding can be gained through either academic and/or work experience).
• Cares about pressing global problems and is motivated by the opportunity to play an active part in addressing them.
• Can rapidly gain an understanding of new topics in unfamiliar domains and make judgements based on complex evidence.
• Is excited about engaging with domain experts, other organisations and the general public through talks, workshops, events and social media.

Optional

• Is familiar with or has experience of working in the innovation funding sector.

Right to work

In order to apply for this job, you should have the right to work in the UK.

What we are offering

• A competitive salary and matched pension contributions.
• Family-friendly and flexible working arrangements.
• The opportunity to grow your skills and professional interests as part of a curious, supportive and dedicated team.
• Weekly team catch-ups on Mondays to plan the week and on Fridays to reflect.
• Quarterly sessions to set team and personal goals.
• A smooth work setup built on Slack, Google Drive and Airtable.
• We share our studio with our sister company, Ctrl Group, who develop digital health products and Eclipse Experience, a human-centred design agency. We often run show’n’tells to share our work.
• A desk full of Swiss Cheese plants and a cupboard full of snacks. 🍏

How to apply

We value diversity at our company. This is core to our work as developing a robust understanding of problems requires a diversity of thought, experience and perspectives. We welcome applications from people of all backgrounds and ages.

To apply, please submit your details via this form.

The deadline for applications is 9am on Monday, 13th January 2020.

We will be in touch to arrange a convenient time for an interview by Wednesday, 15th January 2020.

We will start interviewing eligible applicants the w/c 13 January 2020.

We look forward to hearing from you! 🙌

No agencies, please.