Research Associate

About the role

This is an outstanding development opportunity for a talented individual who wishes to support excellent and innovative research on the care and support of children and young people with life limiting conditions and their families.

This Research Associate post will be working with our Chair of Palliative Care and Child Health, Lorna Fraser on an NIHR funded programme - Improving Care for children with life-limiting Conditions: developing, adapting, impLementing and Evaluating interventions (ICICLE).

For this new NIHR funded research programme we require an experienced Research Associate who will be responsible for management of day-to-day running of the ICICLE programme and delivery of key milestones and objectives. They will make a key contribution to the scientific excellence of the research activities, and coordinate work across studies and with external organisations. Essential to the success of this ICICLE programme will be communication, engagement and collaboration with clinicians, service providers and children and their parents. and the post holder will play a key role in this. The post holder will demonstrate excellent communication skills, attention to detail, and the ability to work alongside a range of colleagues including academic staff, policy makers, health and social care professionals, and children and family carers. This is an excellent opportunity to build skills in research programme management and work alongside internationally renowned research team at the Cicely Saunders Institute.

This is a full-time maternity leave cover post, and you will be offered a fixed term contract for 12 months or until the substantive postholder returns.

About You

To be successful in this role, we are looking for candidates to have the following skills and experience:

Essential criteria

• First Degree in relevant health or related discipline   
• PhD qualified in relevant subject area i.e. including but not restricted to health services research, palliative care, child health, psychology *
• Experience in undertaking high quality qualitative or mixed methods research 
• Ability to use initiative and work independently, with support from the wider team, and willingness to travel, if necessary, for interviews, conferences, and so on
• Experience contributing to formal processes of study development, such as writing the protocol, developing data collection materials, applying for ethical approval (or amendments), site set up and writing reports and academic papers
• Excellent presentation and communication skills (written & verbal) 
• Being self-motivated and willing to work independently, as well as part of a larger interdisciplinary team

* Please note that this is a PhD level role but candidates who have submitted their thesis and are awaiting award of their PhDs will be considered. In these circumstances the appointment will be made at Grade 5, spine point 30 with the title of Research Assistant. Upon confirmation of the award of the PhD, the job title will become Research Associate and the salary will increase to Grade 6. 

Desirable criteria

• Previous experience of working with parents and young people with life-limiting conditions 
• Engaging in multidisciplinary research projects 
• Strong publication record 

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