JOB NUMBER
FAC01949
CONTRACT TYPE
Fixed Term Contract
POSTING END DATE
04-Jun-2024
LOCATION:
Stirling Campus
GRADE
Grade8 £45,585-£54,395 p.a.
FACULTY/SERVICE
Faculty of Social Sciences
Post Details
Full time
Fixed term until 31 December 2026
The closing date for applications is midnight on Tuesday 04 June 2024
Interviews are expected to take place on Friday 14 June 2024
There is an expectation that work will be undertaken in the UK.
For the purposes of sponsorship, this is a postdoctoral role under SOC code 2119.
The University of Stirling recognises that a diverse workforce benefits and enriches the work, learning and research experiences of the entire campus and greater community. We are committed to removing barriers and welcome applications from those who would contribute to further diversification of our staff and ensure that equality, diversity and inclusion is woven into the substance of the role. We strongly encourage applications from people from diverse backgrounds including gender, identity, race, age, class, and ethnicity.
The Post
The Partnership Project
Everywhere in the world people organize in relation to water. Its resources and assets provide essential ‘goods’ and ‘services’ and huge opportunities for the economy, society and communities. Harnessing these productively is a key route to optimising growth, value and community outcomes, as well as meeting important environmental goals.
This post is part of a £5m Local Policy Innovation Partnership (LPIP) project funded by UKRI (UK Research and Innovation) over 3 years to explore these issues in the Forth Water Basin in Scotland. The Partnership, called ‘FORTH2O’, involves six Universities and Institutes, as well as over eighty stakeholder partners (including Scottish Government, Scottish Water and SEPA). This is a hugely exciting opportunity to make a real difference for the health and wealth of our businesses, communities, and natural ecosystems. Through a range of innovative core research and data projects; challenge labs, innovation labs, and living labs; and a commissioning fund of £1.2m to support new activity, the partnership will play a vital role in ‘optimising outcomes’ from the water system.
The Role
We are seeking an experienced and highly motivated Research Fellow with a strong data and statistics background to support LPIP/FORTH2O in building a world-leading data and digital twinning capability around its goal of ‘optimising outcomes from water resources’. The Research Fellow will be centrally involved in all aspects of this work. The Project Data Lab will work on a proactive basis, ‘ingesting’ data from partner organisations, ‘digesting’ or processing it if it meets required standards and ‘egesting’ it if it does not. The Research Fellow will be supported in these tasks by a team of Data Quality Assessors. Note: the emphasis in this project is predominantly on geospatial data and analysis. No individual-level data will be used unless aggregated appropriately. Partners and teams from across the project will work with the Data Lab to use data to derive insights, assimilating and contextualising it to make those insights actionable, and again later egesting it if those insights prove to be inaccurate. The Lab will be supported by data and insights from partner organisations and others in the data environment. We are also establishing a panel of data experts embedded in partner organisations, with whom we are able to work more directly. The role will therefore include effective engagement with these partners, in conjunction with the wider Data Lab team. The above evidence will allow considerably more detailed, comprehensive and beneficial multi-disciplinary modelling. Here, the LPIP/FORTH2O Data Lab team, including a key role for the Research Fellow, will work alongside the established Forth-ERA team at the University of Stirling in producing a state-of the-art digital twinning capability, combining the best available multi-disciplinary data in a single platform application. Procurement of cloud-based data centre capacity for the Forth-ERA initiative has already been secured, and space has been allocated for LPIP/FORTH2O to provide further input to the considerable capability of this platform. In support of our shared objectives, access to the data held by the Data Lab will be closely controlled according to agreed protocols. This is a genuinely exciting, and globally ground-breaking opportunity to create a multi-disciplinary ‘super site’ for water observation and its impacts in optimising outcomes from water resources for the Forth Region and beyond.
Description of Duties
Managing data and the Data Lab:
- Management of the day-to-day operation of the Data Lab on behalf of the Partnership, taking a lead in the oversight and management of data in the cloud-based data centre
- Working with Data Lab and Partnership colleagues, access various datasets from a broad range of sources for ‘ingestion’ to the Data Centre
- In conjunction with the Project Principal Investigator and Work Package staff, help lead decision-making about the retention and use of datasets within the project, as appropriate
- Manage the secure storage of and access to data in compliance with appropriate regulations, data centre protocols and the Data Management Plan
- Manage a team of Data Quality Analysts to assess and prepare data in the Data Centre for use within the Data Lab
- When required, support Data Quality Analysts to assess and prepare data in the Data Centre for use within the Data Lab
- Further data management tasks as agreed with Work Package Leads or directed by the Project Principal Investigator
Quantitative analysis:
- Initiation and development of actionable insights from the available data, particularly in combination, including both supply-led insights (‘what the data tells us’) from the Data Lab and answers to demand-led questions (‘what does the data tell us?’) from the wider team and Partnership
- Lead on the statistical analysis of data held in the Data Centre
- Communicate statistical results to different audiences using tables and data visualizations
- Organise and participate in meetings, webinars and workshops to present and discuss findings from this analysis
- Working with Project Partners, contribute to the writing of briefing papers, research summaries and academic journal articles from the results
Communication and organisation:
- Support data aspects in the delivery of the Partnership’s core projects, ‘Policy Challenge Labs’ and ‘Innovation Teams’, and contribute to the development and delivery of the project’s urban, rural, coastal and regional ‘Living Labs’
- Create and maintain good lines of communication with researchers, research consultants, research partners and key stakeholders throughout the project
- Resolve problems of meeting research objectives and deadlines
- Maintain appropriate project records and assist in the writing of update reports to funders, and organise or attend meetings and events, as directed by the Project Principal Investigator and Work Package Leads
- Work closely with the Research Partnership Manager to ensure effective management of relevant aspects of the project budget
Assess, interpret and evaluate outputs:
- From the Data Lab, in accordance with the project’s Theory of Change and evaluation protocols
- In conjunction with the Research Partnership Manager, provide regular management reporting from the Data Lab to the Partnership Executive Group
- Employ data to provide decision support for various audiences, including those at a senior level
- Routinely communicate complex and conceptual ideas to those with limited knowledge and understanding as well as to peers using high-level skills and a range of media
- Disseminate research findings via conference presentations or using other appropriate media/online methods (such as webinars and short lay briefings), ensuring quality of evidence assessment and translation for practice
- Develop new concepts and ideas to extend intellectual understanding, and contribute to the production of high-quality journal publications
Please see the attached job description for full details of the role.
Essential Criteria
- Completed, or near-completion, PhD in a relevant discipline (such as social sciences, geography or applied statistics) or extensive experience to a demonstrated equivalent level
- Experience of assessing and working with data at different levels of scale and scope, including large datasets
- Comfortable assessing and working with datasets of different origins, formats and levels of data quality
- Be able to critically assess, interpret and evaluate the outcomes of data analysis.
- Experience of advanced statistical modelling (e.g. multilevel/mixed/hierarchical models; spatial models; econometric models)
- Have strong attention to detail, including excellent organisation and planning skills, and experience in prioritising multiple tasks and meeting significant deadlines
- Have excellent collaboration skills with a diverse range of research partners. Be comfortable talking to a wide range of other stakeholders
- Experience of effective visualisation and presentation of data to a range of audiences.
- Commitment to highest levels of data integrity and security in the handling and management of project datasets
- Experience of appropriate software tools such as R, Stata, SPSS, QGIS, ArcGIS or Python
Desirable Criteria
- Experience of delivering research projects with innovative impact and high-quality evaluation
- Production of original research and high-quality publications, including significant academic outputs of internationally excellent standing
- Experience of predictive modelling
- Experience of causal inference/estimation methods (e.g. do-calculus; G-computation and G-estimation; matching)
- Experience with the design and management of databases, and familiarity working in a cloud environment
- Experience in spatial data visualisation, including GIS mapping
- Experience of documenting analysis workflow (i.e. syntax files; data dictionaries; version control)
- Ability to communicate complex and conceptual ideas to different audiences, from senior decision-makers to those without specialist knowledge in the field
Behaviours and Competencies
The role holder will be required to evidence that they can meet the qualities associated with the following behavioural competencies, as detailed within the AUA Competency Framework.
- Managing self and personal skills
Being aware of your own behaviour and mindful of how it impacts on others, enhancing personal skills to adapt professional practice accordingly. - Delivering excellent service
Providing the best quality service to external and internal clients. Building genuine and open long-term relationships in order to drive up service standards. - Finding solutions
Taking a holistic view and working enthusiastically to analyse problems and to develop workable solutions. Identifying opportunities for innovation. - Embracing change
Being open to and engaging with new ideas and ways of working. Adjusting to unfamiliar situations, shifting demands and changing roles. - Using resources effectively
Identifying and making the most productive use of resources including people, time, information, networks and budgets. - Engaging with the wider context
Enhancing your contribution to the organisation through an understanding of the bigger picture and showing commitment to organisational values. - Developing self and others
Showing commitment to own ongoing professional development. Supporting and encouraging others to develop their professional knowledge, skills and behaviours to enable them to reach their full potential. - Working together
Working collaboratively with others in order to achieve objectives. Recognising and valuing the different contributions people bring to this process. - Achieving Results
Consistently meeting agreed objectives and success criteria. Taking personal responsibility for getting things done.
About Us
The Faculty of Social Sciences (FSS) encompasses an interdisciplinary team of academic and professional support staff with research and teaching interests in Sociology, Social Policy and Criminology; Education; Housing Studies; Social Work; and Dementia and Ageing.
Teaching
We deliver globally-recognised courses that facilitate opportunities to gain widespread practical experience, promote postgraduate research, and allow our students to achieve their ambitions. We’re proud of our diverse portfolio of courses, at undergraduate and postgraduate level, as well as the professional development opportunities we offer. We deliver these by working collaboratively with students, staff and stakeholders, through our interdisciplinary links within the University and beyond. A high-number of our courses hold prestigious rankings and accreditations, including:
Research
Our research has a significant and positive impact on people’s lives. From international research on dementia to contributions to teaching and social work practice, our work makes a difference.
The 2014 Research Excellence Framework shows our record, with 80% of our research classed as internationally excellent or world leading in the two areas of Social Work and Social Policy and Education. We also offer a vibrant, supportive environment for postgraduate researchers in social sciences. Our research is organised though Centres and Groups as follows:
- Centre for Child Well-being and Protection
- Centre for Environment, Dementia and Ageing Research
- Dementia Services Development Centre
- Education Practice/Theory
- Public Services and Governance Research Group
- Salvation Army Centre for Addictions Services and Research
- Scottish Centre for Crime and Justice Research
- Social Surveys and Social Statistics Research Group
We hold significant external research funding, and during the academic year 2020-21 to date have been awarded over £7m in new grants. Our work is interdisciplinary, and we take a team approach, which includes particular support for early career researchers. We collaborate with all other Faculties in the University in research, and have multiple external partners, nationally and internationally. Details of our work, including projects and publications, can be found on our web pages at stir.ac.uk/5ul
The University
The University of Stirling is committed to providing education with a purpose and carrying out research which has a positive impact on communities across the globe – addressing real issues, providing solutions, and helping to shape society. Stirling is 4th in Scotland and 43rd in the UK for research impact, with 87% of its research having an outstanding or very considerable impact on society – and more than 80% rated either world leading or internationally excellent (Research Excellence Framework 2021).
The University of Stirling is ranked among the top 30 UK universities for student satisfaction (National Student Survey) and top 30 in the UK for postgraduate student experience (Postgraduate Taught Experience Survey), and has an overall five-star rating in the QS Stars University Ratings.
More than 17,000 students study with the University of Stirling globally, with over 140 nationalities represented on its scenic central Scotland campus alone. The University – also home to 1,700 staff – is ranked first in the UK and top three in the world for its campus environment (International Student Barometer 2022, wave two). Ranked first in the UK and top five in the world for its sports facilities (International Student Barometer 2022, wave two), Stirling is Scotland’s University for Sporting Excellence. Its world-class facilities provide the perfect training environment for the University’s sports scholars – many of whom compete at the highest level, including at the Olympics and Commonwealth Games – and for students, staff, and the wider community.
The University has twice been recognised with a Queen’s Anniversary Prize – the first for its Institute for Social Marketing and Health (2014) and the second for its Institute of Aquaculture (2019).
The University is a signatory to the £214 million Stirling and Clackmannanshire City Region Deal and a central partner of the Forth Valley University College Health Partnership.
www.stir.ac.uk @stiruni
