Director of Research Analytics

Job

Location:

Evanston, Illinois

Department: Research Analytics

Salary/Grade: EXS/13

This Director of Research Analytics reports to the Assistant Vice President for Research, Finance and Business Operations and leads the Research Analytics unit. The Director works closely with the AVP to build and share analytics expertise, to promote a data‑driven culture, and to help the Vice President for Research team to derive meaningful insight into research performance against internal goals and external benchmarks.

The Director also partners with the Provost Office Information and Analytics unit and the University Libraries on strategic issues related to acquiring and interpreting research data.

The Director collaborates with leaders of OR administrative units to develop and implement projects that enhance the performance of their units and support the OR strategic plan. The Research Analytics office should provide metrics guidance, identify patterns to find risks and opportunities about performance and other outcomes for all OR and its subunits. The Director, in collaboration with Research IT and other campus partners, will develop requirements for data storage and downstream analysis and implement new solutions as necessary.

This includes, but is not limited to, data for research, financial operations, HR, and facilities.

The Director maintains knowledge of the research enterprise at Northwestern, assesses research trends in higher education, and cultivates relationships with peer schools to identify best in industry practices that can be applied to or enhance the research analytics progress.

The Director of Research Analytics will support the OR mission and values of understanding empathy, modeling accountability, ensuring fairness, embracing community, and valuing creativity.

* Note:

Not all aspects of the job are covered by this job description.

• Work in collaboration with leadership across OR to understand needs, propose solutions, and prioritize projects. Manage projects by setting realistic deliverables and timelines, ensuring they are met, and transparently communicating progress. Stay abreast of current technologies and leverage campus resources to complete projects accurately and efficiently, seeking to benefit the broader community whenever feasible. Develop and maintain database of projects completed by the Research Analytics unit and make tools broadly available to those who might benefit.
• Manage the Research Analytics unit in a manner that serves the community and promotes individual growth. The team is responsible for developing effective analyses and visualizations to convey meaning inferred from various datasets. Ensure automated, repeatable, documented results. Empower team to identify novel opportunities for data-driven excellence within OR.
• Enhance OR and University-wide data sources, in collaboration with Research IT and other campus partners by developing modern mechanisms for data storage, retrieval and analysis. Infrastructure should draw from a wide range of OR, NU, and external systems (e.g. finance, HR, IRB, IACUC, CERES, HERD, Libraries, etc.) and connect separated sources into a common framework for reporting and analysis. The resulting system should be available and easily used by OR directors for their metric needs, ideally through a chat-based interface.
• Partner with the Provost Office Information and Analytics unit and Northwestern Libraries on strategic issues related to research data.
• Formulate and present findings in a clear and understandable format, appropriate to the audience, for a wide range of users at all levels of the organization. Write analytical reports, develop presentations, and create data visualization, including tables and charts, to be presented to University Officers, Deans, Directors, and project work groups.
• Manage the process of coordinating and assembling information pertinent to the Office for Research annual strategic plan, impact report, and general presentations highlighting Northwestern research and its impact.
• Research and assess research trends in higher education and other areas; keep current with the knowledge through literature, best practices and techniques in data science, business intelligence, and management communities. Cultivate relationships with peer schools to identify best in industry practices that can be applied to or enhance the research data analytics progress.
• Serve on related university committees and task forces.

• Identify the minimum qualifications required to successfully perform the job. Qualifications include education, experience, specialized knowledge, professional certification.
• Master's degree from an accredited institution in a field such as statistics or educational research; or appropriate combination of education and data analytics experience.
• 6–8 years data management experience, preferably in higher education, or other major…