Research Development Manager

The Role and Department

Research and Innovation Services (RIS) provides guidance, expert advice and hands-on support for all aspects of research and research-related work, including securing funding, working with partners, undertaking knowledge exchange, demonstrating impact, commercialising outputs, ensuring good research practice and supporting professional development.

The Research Development Team is a unit of research funding specialists dedicated to supporting academic colleagues to develop their research from inception to application. Our team covers all four Faculties across the breadth of mainstream funding remits and we are active in providing funder intelligence and working with academic colleagues to keep abreast of future trends in the funding landscape. We focus on the ideas-formation and relationship building end of the spectrum and work with individuals and groups to explore ideas with a view to developing these into strong research funding applications.

Durham has ambitious plans to grow our institutional research income and are therefore investing in a new post to help support our academic community. Reporting to a Senior Research Development Manager, the Research Development Managers will increase the quality and value of funding applications at Durham University, embedding good practice in the identification of opportunities and development of successful proposals. You’ll work closely with the Director of Research, Senior Research Administrator and the wider academic community, as well as with colleagues from the Research Operations team and other professional service units in the university. To succeed in this role, it will be necessary to assimilate a very wide brief and to rapidly gain an understanding of a broad spectrum of academic knowledge. Specifically this role is aligned to support the growth of the Department of Engineering which has seen a significant expansion in the ! number of staff it employees in recent years. This investment of university finances is accompanied with an annual target to see the Departments Research activities increase to £10m. Applicants will be expected to be physically present and visible within the Department on a near weekly basis in order to develop and maintain good positive network of relationships.

We believe this role presents an excellent opportunity for candidates to begin a career in research development. We welcome applications from individuals with strong transferable skills and experience from different careers and sectors. You may have worked in research management for a number of years and be looking for another opportunity. You may have recently finished a PhD and wish to explore an alternative career path to academia. You may work outside of HE but have experience of proposal development and fundraising. We welcome applications from individuals who feel they meet the below essential criteria, regardless of background or experience. Training and support will be provided if successful in being appointed.

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