Senior Researcher/Researcher - Quantitative - [Archived Advertisement]

SENIOR RESEARCHER/RESEARCHER - QUANTITATIVE

Overview and purpose of position

The Law and Justice Foundation of NSW is an independent, not-for-profit organisation with a 50-year history of improving access to justice for the people of NSW. We do this through:

• conducting high quality research and analysis to identify legal and access to justice needs and  what works to address these needs, to inform policy development and service delivery,
• supporting community initiated projects that improve access to justice via our grants program and promoting the use of understandable legal information.

The Foundation works actively with all parts of the legal/access to justice sector across NSW (and nationally), and actively engages with policy makers, service providers, courts and tribunals, local authorities and services, and related non-legal services to inform policy and practically relevant research and programs.

The Foundation’s research program involves innovative empirical research and currently has a number of key themes:

• Measuring and monitoring legal need and access to justice, including the use of courts and tribunals for civil dispute resolution
• Identifying triggers and pathways to legal help seeking and problem solving
• Exploring how legal services can best collaborate with each other and connect with other human services to best reach priority clients
• Assessing how services can best identify, measure and take account of client capability in their service provision
• Monitoring and evaluating services to assess how they can most cost-effectively meet the needs of disadvantaged clients in various geographic, socio-economic and service environments.

The research team work on a range of projects depending on the Foundation’s priorities.  Most research is published in the Foundation’s report series, and on the Foundation’s website.

The Foundation now wishes to recruit a Quantitative Senior Researcher or Researcher to support the small but dynamic and well respected research team. 

Working arrangement: Full time or part time. Flexible working arrangements available.
Salary:  Dependent on qualifications and experience.
Responsible to:  A Principal Researcher or Senior Researcher.

Role

The exact nature of the role will vary depending on the seniority of the researcher and research projects underway but may include leading or contributing to:

• the design, conduct and management of innovative empirical research and evaluation projects
• primary data collection, including the design and application of data collection instruments and interviewing
• processing of complex administrative data provided by external organisations for research and statistics purposes (including data cleaning, documentation and analysis)
• descriptive and multivariate statistical analysis
• the write-up of research in an appropriate style for the intended audience
• the communication of research findings via oral presentations as required
• ad-hoc advice on evaluation design, research findings and data analysis to stakeholder organisations
• the fostering of positive relations with the legal assistance sector, academia and other research/analysis organisations
• keeping up to date with relevant issues and research techniques and actively sharing relevant information with other staff members
• other tasks to assist in the operation of the Foundation as required.

Skills/Selection Criteria

All Senior Researcher and Researcher roles require a tertiary qualification in the social sciences, statistics or other relevant discipline and demonstrated experience in undertaking social research and analysis, such as in an academic, public-sector or not-for-profit organisation.

The Core Competencies required of Research Grades are provided in the attached document and can also be found on the Foundation’s website under employment (www.lawfoundation.net.au). Your application should include a Curriculum Vitae (CV) and MUST specify how you meet the competencies required of the role you are applying for. Applicants for a Senior Researcher position should have at least 5 years relevant experience. Applicants for a Researcher position should have at least 2 years relevant experience. Please state which researcher grade you wish to be considered for.

Please also provide examples of your experience using software packages – including Excel, Word, SPSS or other statistical packages, and Endnote.

Other than your CV, your application should be no more than 4 sides of A4 (Times Roman or equivalent, 12-point font).

Short-listed candidates will be invited to the Foundation to undertake a short task in Excel and Word.

Please send your applications to: Richard Wood at hr@lawfoundation.net.au

Applications close at 5pm on Friday 28 April 2017 but will be considered upon receipt.