Global Cancer Research Associate

Job Summary

Reports To:

Global Cancer Lead / Principal Investigator

Works in close coordination with the PI?s Kenya-based team, who lead in-country field operations. This role is based at the University of Michigan and focuses on strategic, cross-portfolio work that directly supports the Program Lead. The global cancer portfolio is facilitated by a Principal Investigator who directs a growing, multi-grant research portfolio (currently four active awards) spanning international partnerships, digital health research, and working-group/community facilitation.

This role exists to increase the PI?s capacity by owning the operational, financial, analytical, and relationship-management work behind partnership development, grant strategy, and scholarly output ? allowing the Lead to focus on scientific direction, high-level negotiation, and publishing.

This is not a purely administrative role. The ideal candidate holds a Master of Public Health (MPH) and will operate as a junior investigator and strategic partner to the Program Lead.

• Partnership & Collaboration Development

• Prepare briefing packets ahead of partnership meetings ? partner background, prior touchpoints, and clear meeting objectives ? so the Lead walks in fully prepared.
• Maintain a partnership tracking system (active and prospective collaborators, key contacts, last touchpoints, and follow-up actions).
• Conduct rapid needs assessments or situational analyses ahead of new partnership discussions to ensure proposed collaborations are equitable and aligned with local priorities.
• Draft follow-up correspondence and partnership summaries for the Lead's review and signature.

• Grant Strategy & New Funding Mechanisms

• Monitor NIH, Fogarty International Center, foundation, and other funder portals for new grant mechanisms relevant to the program's global cancer priorities; flag opportunities with fit assessments for the Lead's review.
• Maintain a rolling funding pipeline and calendar so renewal and resubmission cycles are anticipated well ahead of deadlines.
• Co-develop Specific Aims, logic models, and conceptual frameworks in collaboration with the Lead for new proposals.
• Independently draft non-scientific proposal components: biosketches, facilities/resources descriptions, data management plans, human subjects sections, community engagement frameworks, and budget justifications.
• Manage internal U-M eResearch Proposal Management (eRPM) routing timelines.

• Research & Scholarly Productivity Support

• Conduct systematic and rapid literature reviews; synthesize findings and draft literature review sections for grants and manuscripts.
• Clean, manage, and run preliminary/descriptive analyses on research datasets (e.g., in R, Stata, or Python), preparing tables and figures for the Lead's review.
• Draft methods and results sections, and take first-author or co-author roles on secondary manuscripts, methods papers, or systematic reviews as appropriate.
• Organize reference libraries (End Note/Zotero), verify citation accuracy, and manage journal submission and peer-review tracking.

• Program & Team Integration

• Co-facilitate global cancer working group sessions; synthesize technical discussions into actionable deliverables and policy briefs.
• Coordinate directly with the Kenya-based team on cross-site deliverables, data flow, and timelines, without requiring the Lead to broker every handoff.
• Apply program evaluation methods to assess community and partnership impact; produce annual impact summaries for leadership and funders.
• Manage shared team communications ? mailing lists, shared work spaces, and cross-time-zone meeting logistics.

• Financial Stewardship, Data Governance & Compliance

• Monitor spending and burn rate across all active grants and subawards, including funds disbursed to the Kenya-based team; flag discrepancies before they become audit issues.
• Support effort reporting and certification processes to ensure alignment between funded effort and actual work.
• Track IRB protocol amendments, continuing reviews, and safety reporting with U-M IRB (IRBMED/eResearch) and Kenyan ethics boards (e.g., NACOSTI, local IRBs).

• Program Continuity & Institutional Knowledge

• Build the documentation backbone that lets the program scale and survive staff transitions.
• Develop and maintain Standard Operating Procedures for both field operations and this role itself, so institutional knowledge doesn't leave with any one team member.
• Document partnership history and grant strategy rationale (why mechanisms were pursued or passed on) to support future decision-making.
• Help establish and maintain a written authorship and data-sharing policy across sites, ensuring clarity on credit and data ownership before disputes arise.

• Master of Public Health (MPH) or equivalent advanced degree in a related field.
• Demonstrated experience in global health programming, research coordination, or partnership/stakeholder management.
• Strong scientific writing skills, with familiarity in literature synthesis…