E T Consultant - Research Analyst

E T Consultant - Research Analyst

Description

Do you want to build a career that is truly worthwhile? The World Bank Group is a unique global partnership of five institutions driven by a bold vision to create a world free of poverty on a livable planet. As one of the largest sources of funding and knowledge for developing countries, we help solve the world’s greatest development challenges. When you join the World Bank Group, you become part of a dynamic, diverse organization with 189 member countries and more than 120 offices worldwide. We work with public and private sector partners, invest in groundbreaking projects, and use data, research, and technology to bring tangible and transformative changes around the globe. For more information, visit www.worldbank.org.

VPU Context: The Development Economics Vice Presidency (DEC) is the World Bank’s central reservoir of fresh insights into the most pressing challenges of development. It is led by the Chief Economist and Senior Vice President of the World Bank Group, who advises the President and senior managers, serves as the community leader for the WBG’s economists, and helps to keep the institution in the forefront of thinking about development policy. DEC constitutes one of the world’s largest teams of economists focused on policy solutions for developing economies.

Unit Context: A department of the World Bank's Development Economics Vice-Presidency, the Development Impact Department (DECDI)I’s purpose is to increase the use of impact evaluation (IE) in the design and implementation of public policy and to develop institutional capacity and motivation for evidence-based policy. DECDI’s work focuses on:
• Evaluating programs at scale to answer policy-relevant questions.
• Developing innovative data systems and data analytics tools for real-time decisions.
• Using causal inference analysis to identify mechanisms to improve results.
• Building capacity to strengthen country institutions for evidence-based policymaking. 

DECDI aims to overcome the challenge to identify true cause-and-effect relations in policy programs. By linking researchers to policymakers and feeding results back into policies, DECDI fosters systematic use of evidence, which informs adoption, mid-course corrections, and scale-up of policies. Through workshops and clinics with operational staff and government clients, joint research teams, active field coordination, as well as research products such as seminars, papers, and policy briefs, DECDI builds capacity while forming a wider community of practice. 

DECDI accompanies impact evaluations during their entire life-cycle. It starts with assessing demand, identifying research questions, as well as supporting project implementation, high quality data collection, analysis, and dissemination of results.

With a portfolio of more than 220 impact evaluations, DECDI operates across all sectors in about 60 countries spanning the globe. The IEs test a variety of interventions and mechanisms to understand why policy succeeds or fails and how to improve policy design and implementation to obtain better results. By working proactively in collaboration with clients, DECDI employs experimental methods to infer causality whenever possible (79% of the portfolio). 17% of DECDI IEs utilize non-experimental methods, while 4% use a combination of the two. DECDI is structured into 5 World Bank units: 
• DECPL: Planet Impact Lab.
• DECPE: People Impact Lab.
• DECPR: Prosperity Impact Lab.
• DECID: Infrastructure and Digital Impact Lab.
• DECMB: Behavior Science Lab.

More information can be found at https://www.worldbank.org/en/about/unit/unit-dec/impactevaluation.

Duties and accountabilities:  

DECPE is seeking to hire an experienced ET Consultant – Research Analyst to support the department’s engagement with the Partnership for Economic Inclusion (PEI) and the European Commission (EC). The Research Analyst will work closely with Economists, Research Officers, Impact Evaluation Field Coordinators, and Research Assistants across the team. The position is a combined role of a Senior Research Assistant and Data Manager.

First, the position will support DECDI’s engagement with the EC to advance the use of trial-and-adopt impact evaluations and data systems within EU Cohesion Policy programs, in collaboration with the Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion (DG EMPL) and the Directorate-General for Regional and Urban Policy (DG REGIO). The program focuses on piloting trial-and-adopt impact evaluations within selected EU-funded projects and strengthening data ecosystems to better track program outcomes and impacts. The initiative will contribute to broader efforts within the EC to promote policy innovation, strengthen administrative capacity, and foster a culture of continuous learning across Member States. The ET Consultant - Research Analyst will support the implementation of a joint program between DECDI and the EC aimed at supporting the design and implementation of trial-and-adopt impact evaluations within EU Cohesion Policy programs.

Second, the position will contribute to DECDI’s Impact Collaborative with the Partnership for Economic Inclusion (PEI), which supports a portfolio of large-scale impact evaluations of government-led economic inclusion programs across six countries. These studies rely on a common measurement framework and standardized data collection tools to generate comparable evidence on program impacts, implementation quality, and cost-effectiveness. A central objective of the Collaborative is to conduct pooled and meta-analytical work to inform policy-relevant learning and scale-up decisions.

The E T Consultant - Research Analyst will work on several key areas including but not limited to:
• Coordinate and contribute to DECDI programmatic engagements on cohesion policy effectiveness with the EC and on the Partnership for Economic Inclusion’s Impact Collaborative, including by liaising closely with country research teams on measurement, data quality and data analysis.
• Contribute to the implementation of trial-and-adopt impact evaluation research projects and related data analysis.
• Participate in official missions and deliver training and capacity building of clients on IE and DECDI-supported projects.
• Support delivery of the Programmatic ASA activity on “Trial-and-Adopt Impact Evaluations and Data Ecosystems Pilots to Enhance EU Cohesion Policy Effectiveness”, including by conducting data analysis and supporting data ecosystems in collaboration with other team members and liaising with the CMU as needed.  
• Serve as a Senior RA and Data Manager for the PEI Impact Collaborative by leading the coordination, harmonization, and documentation of survey, costing, and implementation data across six impact evaluations to drive the preparation of cleaned, analysis-ready datasets for pooled analysis.
• Ensure effective communication and coordination between the DECDI team, partner researchers, World Bank policy teams, European Commission counterparts, the Partnership for Economic Inclusion, and country representatives.
• Draft and provide inputs for the dissemination of DECDI’s outputs to various internal (TTLs, CMU) and external (EC, PEI, government, donors, etc.) audiences including briefs, blogs, presentations, policy reports, and press releases.
• Coordinate the supervision of junior staff and STCs supporting the portfolio, and mentor them closely on interaction with the government, data collection, monitoring of implementation, preparation of detailed work plans, and data analysis.

Selection Criteria

The candidate will have a strong track record of designing and executing research projects and related data analysis in the context of complex impact evaluations. Moreover, the ideal candidate will come with substantial experience related to impact evaluation research and econometrics, data management and coordination, demonstrating solid experience in project management or coordination, as well as on survey collection preparation and supervision in multi-country studies. Strong technical skills in design and analysis of prospective impact evaluation and micro-econometrics are required, and the interest and ability to explain and communicate technical programming methodologies in an organized and systematic way. 

As part of the selection process, candidates may be invited to take a coding test.

The successful candidates will have:
•Master’s degree in economics, public policy, or a related field with a minimum of 2 years of relevant professional experience in impact evaluation, empirical research including experiments and quasi-experiments, data management, and development policy and program design. 
•Analytical skills and relevant experience with a track record of delivering impact evaluation-related products. Demonstrated ability to develop, implement, data collection, data management analysis, and support dissemination for impact evaluation research.
•Ability to work across teams and countries to produce data with consistent indicators, transparent workflows, and reproducible analysis.
•Ability to contribute to strategy, analysis, and policy formulation and to support clients in these areas.
•Commitment to teamwork, knowledge-sharing, and working across sectoral and organizational boundaries.
•Experience mentoring, coaching, and supervising consultants. 
•Ability to work flexibly, creatively, and to multitask as the need arises. High degree of self-motivation, positive attitude, commitment, and drive.
•Willingness and ability to travel within EU member states and Africa region specifically, and to other regions if and when needed.
•Advanced proficiency with Stata and/or R is preferred. Proficiency with Python and geospatial tools is an advantage.
•Experience in survey design and implementation in different countries.
•Experience analyzing complex surveys in developing countries.
•Experience harmonizing large, complex datasets and conducting pooled analyses.
•Knowledge of additional languages (French desired).

WBG Culture Attributes:

1. Sense of urgency: Anticipate and quickly respond to the needs of internal and external stakeholders.
2. Thoughtful risk-taking: Challenge the status quo and push boundaries to achieve greater impact.
3. Empowerment and accountability: Empower yourself and others to act and hold each other accountable for results.

World Bank Group Core Competencies

As per WBG policy, an Extended Term (ET) appointment is subject to a lifetime maximum of three (3) years. Former and current ET staff who have completed or are in the process of completing their third-year ET appointment are not eligible for future ET appointments.

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