Permanent: Available on a part-time basis or full-time basis (39 hours)

Flexible working options include flexible start and finish times, home working and compressed hours

Based in Central London (Westminster) or Manchester but we are all currently working from our homes in the UK in line with government guidance

Are you looking for a new challenge and want to join a successful and rapidly growing organisation? Do you have a passion for exploring new ways to change people's lives at a national scale through government policy? If so, we want to hear from you. We are looking for 4 new researchers to help us!

• Research Advisor - Equality, Diversity and Inclusion - Based in London

• Research Advisor - Consumers & Business - Based in London

• Research Advisor - Local Places & Communities - Based in London or Manchester

• Associate Research Advisor - Energy & Sustainability - Based in London

What does a researcher at BIT do?

You will have a home in a policy team where the majority of your work will be based. Questions you may answer as part of your role include: 

• Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: What drives an organisation’s pay gap, including for gender, race & ethnicity, disability, LGBTQ+ and other characteristics? What does the data tell us are the top three opportunities for areas to improve equality in an organisation, given the size of the problem and change over time?

• Consumers & Business: What data may inform decisions about how the gambling market may be re-designed to ensure harm to consumers is minimised, and how would one go about collecting these?  How can we help small businesses overcome barriers to adoption of productive technologies?

• Local Places & Communities: How can behavioural science improve social care and reduce homelessness? How can you demonstrate impact using non-RCT methods? How can local councils assess the impact of interventions to help their area recover from the impact of COVID-19?

• Energy & Sustainability: How can we use behavioural science to encourage reduced household water consumption? How can we reduce the demand for illegal wildlife products using behavioural insights?

A Research Advisor at BIT will be involved in things like:

• Working with your team to identify the most appropriate evaluation technique for a particular project. This might include using randomised controlled trials, quasi-experimental research designs, pilots, mixed method evaluations and implementation and process evaluations;

• Acting as the research lead on projects, sometimes in a client-facing role;

• Supporting and guiding Associate Research Advisors;

• Running power calculations to identify the required sample sizes;

• Cleaning and analysing data using R or Stata;

• Experience working in a real-world implementation environment (e.g. where implementation does not always go to plan and creative solutions are required to complete an evaluation); and

• Looking at the available data and working with the policy team to identify the most practical way to answer the research question with the information available

• Working on several projects at one time and to deliver to a high standard on deadline;

• Working collaboratively, with a range of stakeholders in delivery, policy and academic fields; and

• Communicating techniques and results with non-technical and policy audiences.

The role in our Local Places and Communities team is slightly different, so in addition to the above you’ll also be doing things like:

• Designing and implementing mixed method evaluations, pilot evaluations and implementation and process evaluations; and

• Integrating and analysing of quantitative and qualitative data.

The role in our Energy and Sustainability team is at Associate Research Advisor level. This means that you will have support from other researchers on projects and may not be an expert in R or Stata....yet! This may be your first time in this type of role but you will still be doing plenty of interesting research work on a variety of different projects.

If you want to answer these questions and get involved in the things described above, why not apply for this role?

What makes a great researcher at BIT?

We are looking for people who understand what we do, share our values and are keen to learn and develop their expertise. We are looking for candidates with the skills listed below. We expect to provide training and development support in some of the areas.

• Excellent quantitative skills. You have a Master’s degree or PhD in a relevant quantitative subject (such as economics, econometrics, statistics or psychology), or relevant work experience that demonstrates a similar level of understanding. Associate Research Advisors will have basic R or Stata skills while Research Advisors will be advanced users. This will be tested as part of the selection process.

• Designing, implementing, analysing and reporting on Randomised Controlled Trials. You understand why we run RCTs and how this helps us credibly identify the effect of our interventions. You can provide sound opinions on the best way to design and implement RCTs to estimate these effects. You can manage the collection, cleaning and analysing of trial data, and write clear analysis reports.

• Demonstrable knowledge of theory and practice of statistical concepts. You can explain linear and logistic regressions, hypothesis testing, clustered standard errors, statistical power calculations and stratification. You understand the conceptual basis behind power calculations and the factors that affect power.

• A solid understanding of ‘causality’ and statistical reasoning. You can design experiments which will provide a causal estimate of the effectiveness of a particular intervention and you can assess whether existing research produces causal estimates or not.

• Ability to manage workloads from multiple projects simultaneously. You can manage a workload of several projects and deliver to a high standard on a tight deadline. 

• Clear and convincing communication. You can explain complex topics in simple terms. You can lead parts of a workshop or presentation and write clearly and concisely. You can write analysis reports in a way that can be easily interpreted by a non-technical audience, while making sure the findings are correctly interpreted and any caveats are understood. 

• Managing and developing yourself at work. You demonstrate high self-awareness and regularly self-reflect. You are aware of the impact that your actions and words have on those around you. You are resilient and accept responsibility for decisions whether they achieve the desired outcome or not.

• Behavioural Science. An interest in the academic literature around behavioural science and a basic understanding of key concepts. You are keen to learn more if it helps you in your role.

Who are we and what can we offer you?

The Behavioural Insights Team is the world leader in applying behavioural science to public policy challenges in order to strengthen communities and improve lives. 

We design and rigorously test new ideas across a range of areas such as health, crime and education, to establish what works and what doesn’t. We have helped Tuberculosis patients take their medicine; reduced police susceptibility to cyberattacks; and helped organisations close their gender pay gap.

BIT is a great place to work:

• You will work alongside a friendly, talented and driven team with diverse expertise - from economics to anthropology, psychology and neuroscience - and a wide variety of personal and professional backgrounds. What unites us is the goal to have positive social impact through our work.

• Employees have part ownership of the company through membership of the Employee Benefits Trust.

• We have regular team lunches with a diverse range of expert guest speakers. 

• We encourage flexible working and have a culture which enables this; for example flexible start and finish times and an IT set-up which allows for easy working from home options

• We’re a social bunch and have a variety of interest groups including Film Club, BIT Kids for our parents & 5-a-side team to name a few. We have even kept most of our activities going virtually!

• We have a flexible benefits programme which currently includes things like gym memberships, cycle to work schemes and the ability to buy extra annual leave at the start of the year.

• We have a great office in Westminster (which we aren’t using too much at the moment), but it has an amazing coffee machine and fridges stocked full of soft drinks!

• You have the opportunity to work on a variety of projects with real impact and we’ll provide the support for you to be able to thrive at BIT.

How to apply

We use a great platform called Applied to reduce bias in the recruitment process. You will be asked some admin questions first, including whether you have a role preference, and then you’ll answer a few work-based questions which will be anonymously marked by members of our team. Our selection is based on performance in these questions, rather than looking at your CV. 

Candidates with the top scoring answers will be asked to complete a task which aims to test your proficiency in Stata or R. You will need to use one of these programmes to complete the task. If don't have access, feel free to get in contact (hr@bi.team) and we can work out a solution together. if You will also need to prepare a short presentation linked to the task that you’ll present at your interview.

In your structured interview, you have an opportunity to meet some of the team. You will present your task and then be asked a set of questions that reflect the role. It’s at this stage we see your CV for the first time. We always give all applicants feedback, no matter what stage your application reaches.

Start your BIT journey here and apply now!

Key dates

• Role opens: Friday 9th April

• Role closes: Monday 26th April at noon BST (midday)

• Tasks to be completed: Friday 30th April - Sunday 9th May

• Interviews: Week commencing Monday 10th May

• If required, second interviews will be: Week commencing Monday 17th May

All dates are subject to change (but we'll try our best to not change them!)

Starting salaries

• Research Advisor - London - £33,915 per annum, plus benefits

• Research Advisor - Manchester - £30,524 per annum, plus benefits

• Associate Research Advisor - London - £29,285 per annum, plus benefits

Please note:

You will need to have the right to work in the UK in order to be able to undertake this role. We will ask all applicants short-listed for an interview to provide evidence of their right to work during the recruitment process. If you do not have the right to work for BIT but are the most suitable person for the role we will explore with you whether sponsorship may be an option. However, this may not be possible for all roles.

Some of the personal data you provide to Applied when you apply for a role with The Behavioural Insights Team will be passed on to The Behavioural Insights Team for the purposes of (a) reviewing your application; (b) inviting you for interview; and/or (c) offering you a job and getting you set up as an employee/contractor. For full details on how BIT collects and uses your personal data please visit our website - https://www.bi.team/bit-global-recruitment-privacy-notice/ 

If your application is not successful, any personal data provided to us by Applied (including any personal data relating to equal opportunities monitoring as set out above) will be retained by The Behavioural Insights Team for no longer than 6 months after the application deadline has passed (other than in exceptional circumstances where we may need to retain your personal data for longer), at which point your personal data will be securely deleted. We only keep your information for that period in order to allow us to comply with relevant legal obligations.