Research Lead

Research Lead 

Job Description | February 2023

My Client is an international insight and strategy consultancy. We use research and engagement techniques to provide our clients with the insight they need to make better decisions. 

Founded in 2010, we have grown to over 60 colleagues today. Across the corporate, public and third sectors, we use the full spectrum of primary research techniques to get closer to the people that matter most to our clients. We deliver a huge variety of projects to a really wide and exciting range of clients, but most of our work can be grouped under three broad headings: 

• Strategic insight: Research with public, stakeholder, opinion former and colleague audiences, to understand their experiences, views, feelings, and behaviours. We specialise in delivering insight to support corporate and public policy decisions and help navigate reputation and brand issues. 
• Communications & campaign development: From territory identification and narrative development to message and creative testing, we specialise in research to help our clients influence opinion, change behaviour and win the argument. 
• Engagement: We specialise in helping clients work with their most important audiences to navigate moments of challenge and change. Deliberative citizen dialogue and engagement; customer co-creation and innovation; Stakeholder, opinion-former and colleague engagement. 

Our success to date is rooted in a number of factors: 

• We understand the wider context: We are known for our grasp of the social, cultural and political context. Clients come to us with challenges where identifying the right strategy relies on that broader knowledge and experience.  
• We build lasting client relationships: We build strong partnerships with our clients. It is why our clients stay with us, take us when they move organisation, and recommend us to their peers. 
• We are brave, agile and innovative: We have a reputation for taking on the most complex challenges with tenacity and creativity and delivering to a standard that exceeds client expectations. 
• We do great work: Challenging ourselves (and often our clients) to get the best and the most out of every project. 

But most of all, our clients praise the fantastic people in our business. We are a talented team with a strong culture: Life at Thinks Insight & Strategy is fast paced, intellectually stretching and rewarding. We support one another and ensure everyone has opportunities to grow, pursue their talents and do work they are proud of. In December 2019, we became an Employee-Owned business, ensuring that we all share in the company’s future success.  

About the role 

Research Leads are great project managers and insight practitioners – winning the trust of the senior team and clients alike, owning the relationship with one or two ‘marks’ on the client side and keep everything on track. They are the keepers of the project plan and are responsible for securing the time of senior and junior colleagues alike.  

They have enough experience to read across from one project to another, and to make methodological and logistical decisions. RLs can contribute at every stage of the process from proposal writing to research design and client development. They conduct, analyse and report on large chunks of their projects, and lead brainstorms and theming sessions. The best RLs are able to identify the findings that have strategic importance for their clients (and those that are red herrings) and make suggestions for structuring our work and outputs to move the client’s thinking in the right direction. Where possible, RLs should have line management responsibility for at least one Research Executive. 

Key responsibilities 

Qualitative Fieldwork  

• Designs discussion guides/approaches to meet client objectives 
• Develops plan for data collection and analysis at design stage 
• Carries out face to face and telephone stakeholder interviews 
• Acts as lead facilitator at small workshops 
• Delivers the bulk of fieldwork on a project (online and face-to-face) 
• Moderates viewed groups  
• Manages data (e.g., audio recordings, worksheets etc.) 
• Reviews first edits of films 
• Provides table facilitation at workshops/delib. 
• Identifies suitable techniques and stimulus ideas 

Quantitative Fieldwork  

• Designs appropriate structure/ordering/question selection 
• Understands appropriate methodologies e.g., online/telephone etc. 
• Understands analytical implications of question types and statistical methodologies 
• Checks scripts 

Project Management  

• Manages smaller projects with limited senior input 
• Acts as point of contact for clients within project cycle 
• Convenes internal ‘vision’ meeting at the commencement of a project and plans ongoing team check ins 
• Plans out complex projects including timetabling and identifies roles/tasks/phasing 
• Manages budgets on projects 
• Maintains an oversight role of administrative tasks on project (has an understanding of what should be happening when and guiding SREs/REs to deliver) 
• Liaises and briefs freelancers 
• Provides moderator briefings for larger workshops / delib. 
• Organises project wash up session at close of projects and shares learnings with team 

Analysis, reporting and presenting  

• Identifies emerging themes 
• Maps out structure for debriefs 
• Develops visual approach to displaying findings 
• Leads the brainstorm 
• Leads on write up 
• Presents large segments of debrief 
• Leads on film development 

Marketing and New Business Development  

• Leads on / works with senior members of staff in writing proposals / preparing presentations 
• Ensures all document/informational requirements in the brief are met 
• Builds relationships with current / lapsed clients and current/lapsed clients to events 
• Identifies and approaches potential new clients, bringing a Director into the conversation for the first formal contact 
• Leads in design and development of Thinks Insight & Strategy profile projects 
• Actively seeks out and attends events 
• Maintains a personal list of contacts/potential clients/lapsed clients 
• Keeps a continuous eye out for debates related to areas of Thinks Insight & Strategy’s work 
• Conducts fieldwork for internal Thinks Insight & Strategy profile raising projects 

Our Offer 

• Competitive salary dependent on experience 
• Pension: After a successful probation period of three months, we will commence pension contributions equivalent to 8% of your gross salary into the pension scheme
• Bonus scheme: We reward individual performance through salary increases and promotions. Bonuses are paid out to r