Advisor – Productivity Team (Education, Skills, Consumers, Sustainability and Economic Growth)

Permanent: 39 hours per week

Salary range: £30,000 - £45,000 per annum, plus benefits

Based in Central London

Multiple roles available

The Behavioural Insights Team (BIT) is looking for exceptional candidates to join us as Advisors working in our Productivity Team (covering Education, Skills, Consumers, Sustainability and Economic Growth). The successful applicant will work on a range of projects applying behavioural insights to solve policy problems.

You will be based in one of the policy areas, for example Skills, but are likely to also work on projects across the other policy areas. Previous work in the Productivity, Education, Skills, Consumers and Sustainability Team has included applying behavioural insights to increasing adult numeracy and literacy rates, uptake of the government’s growth vouchers programme as well as exploring how behavioural insights can be applied in regulated consumer markets.

The Behavioural Insights Team

The Prime Minister created BIT in 2010 to apply behavioural science to public policy in the UK. In February 2014 we became a social purpose company, owned by the Cabinet Office, Nesta (an innovation charity) and our employees.

The Behavioural Insights Team works with governments around the world in almost every area of Government policy. Whilst the subject and output of our projects varies considerably, there are common threads: we try to understand the contexts in which people make decisions; we notice small details; we come up with innovative ideas for solving policy problems and we measure everything we do as robustly as we can.

BIT selects staff on the basis of cultural fit: all our staff believe passionately in our company values: always prioritising social impact; empiricism and humility; fresh thinking, collaboration; and public service.

Roles and Responsibilities

As an Advisor you will underpin a wide range of projects, providing expert advice and project management. You will likely lead aspects of projects working to a Senior or Principal Advisor, and will also undertake discrete pieces of work (such as literature reviews or scoping out various aspects of projects).

You will get regular exposure to a range of senior stakeholders and be expected to actively contribute to company development. Most of our Advisors have a Masters degree in a relevant subject (economics, psychology or similar) and prior work experience in either a policy or consultancy role.

Essential

• An understanding of the behavioural science literature and how it can be applied to help solve complex policy problems;

• Good project management skills;

• Ability to support the design and implementation of rigorous evaluations, including but not limited to randomised controlled trials;

• Excellent written and verbal communication (for example ability to write short, to-the-point policy papers for Government Ministers or senior officials);

• Strategic thinking and creative problem solving;

• Strong teamwork skills ¬ - as a part of a small team you will need to be reliable and willing to take responsibility for the small details of projects, meetings and daily routines; and

• Experience developing or delivering government policy (for example, having worked in government or in public sector consulting).

Desirable

• Masters in a relevant subject area (including, but not limited to behavioural economics, psychology, evaluation methods).

• Experience of working in one or more of the following policy areas: Productivity and Economic Growth, Educations and Skills, Consumers, Energy and Sustainability.