Associate Director (Political/Social) Research London

At Focaldata we are on a mission to close the knowledge gap on public opinion. Our superstar research team is the cornerstone of achieving this. We are now looking for an Associate Director to help grow our Political and Social team, capabilities and client base.

You will be helping lead a world-class team of researchers as they help some of the most important companies, government departments, charities, and campaign groups navigate a year of elections, regulatory changes, and policy challenges. You'll be working with cutting-edge market research tools and analytical techniques, and helping solve some of the hardest problems in public opinion analysis.

We are looking for someone who can help run this team, support their colleagues to deliver excellent and impactful research, and who can work with the broader company and the 15+ engineers and data scientists who power Focaldata's platform and tech products.

What you'll be doing

You will have the opportunity to own research projects from start to finish and to manage some of our largest client accounts.

You will also take a role in supporting the growth and delivery of the whole research team, including setting standards for the delivery of client projects and outputs and setting team processes. To achieve this the successful candidate will:

• Be responsible for the end-to-end delivery of projects and leading client accounts - including being responsible for delivering client outputs, leading on client communications, and deepening client relationships.
• Demonstrate leadership by supporting the Head of Political and Social to manage the team, support the development of researchers, and deepen Focaldata's capabilities.
• Excel at the fundamentals, delivering core market research outputs including questionnaires, and surveys, managing fieldwork, and ensuring our research is focused on meeting the client's needs.
• Provide decision-grade insight using data and analytical tools to identify the core issues our clients face, and how Focaldata's research can help solve them.
• Set the standard by driving work to improve Focaldata's research output, whether improving our processes for the delivery of research, guaranteeing the quality of our outputs, or finding new ways for our teams to work better and deliver
• Lead by example on the creation of client deliverables such as presentation decks, written reports, blogposts, and presentations.
• Show commercial drive, whether through identifying other opportunities for research with clear commercial impact, or contributing to ideas to boost Focaldata's brand.

Who you are: skills and experience

You will be an experienced researcher who is ready to step up into a leadership role, who is used to working with complex datasets and analytical tools, who has a deep and broad interest in political and social issues, and who knows how to communicate their findings clearly and compellingly.

The ideal candidate would have the following experience and skills:

• 5-8 years as a researcher in the quantitative market research industry
• Market analysis fundamentals such as survey writing, scripting, and a variety of analytical tools.
• Client account management
• Line management experience
• Experience in creating and presenting client outputs (memos, decks) for senior stakeholders
• Strong commercial awareness
• A deep and abiding interest in political and social affairs.

Bonus points

• Experience with analytical tools such as clustering or regression analysis in R or Python

Who you are: mindset

We're looking for people who are exceptionally intellectually confident, and passionate about research and finding out what people think. Someone who is relentless and restless to improve standards and help others, and wishes to work for a research firm with explosive financial and personnel growth that uses cutting-edge technology and doesn't want to do polling the normal way. Just as important is curiosity in how to innovate and a desire to use our tools, software and analytics specialist to provide different cutting-edge findings to clients - whose work really matters. We are looking for people who are outcomes-focused - whatever it takes to get the job done. Someone who is resilient and pragmatic and cool in stressful or difficult situations like during the heat of campaigns.

About Focaldata

At Focaldata, we're building a new kind of tech-enabled research agency - that offers clients deep insight at the speed of software. You'll get the opportunity to work alongside a highly collaborative team of researchers, client leads, engineers, data scientists and product specialists. We do impactful work with leading organisations, from brands like New Balance to campaign groups like Hope not Hate and non-profits like the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Join us.

Focaldata is proud to be an equal opportunities employer. We believe in the value of a diverse and inclusive workforce for our business, team and customers. We encourage all applications regardless of age, disability, gender, marriage, pregnancy, maternity, race or nationality, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation.