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Child Trends seeks a Vice President for Research Operations to direct a research staff of approximately 60 professionals from a variety of disciplines. This is an exciting opportunity to play a leadership role in shaping and guiding the work of a highly regarded research organization devoted to improving the lives of children and youth. Child Trends has experienced impressive growth in the last 6-8 years in revenue, size and diversity of staff, and scope of work; this growth is expected to continue.

The Vice President for Research Operations is a new position, reporting to the President. He or she is responsible for ensuring the effective management, strategic growth, and quality of research at Child Trends. This includes direct supervision of approximately nine senior researchers who oversee large research programs across the organization. It also entails maintaining and overseeing an appropriate research infrastructure, including processes for ensuring quality control, successful proposal development, data security, and IRB and other human subjects’ protections.

The Vice President for Research Operations is a member of Child Trends’ senior management team, working closely and collaboratively with the President, Vice President for Finance and Administration, and Vice President for Public Policy to address a range of organizational responsibilities including strategic planning, budgeting, staff recruiting and retention, and internal and external communications. He or she also interacts with Child Trends’ Board of Directors.

This is a management position. While the Vice President of Research Operations will advise and review research projects at Child Trends, he or she is not expected to build and maintain his/her own research portfolio.

This is an extraordinary opportunity for an individual with extensive research management experience to help lead a growing research organization with a compelling mission and a stellar reputation. The successful candidate will partner with the President and work collaboratively with a high-performing management team.

Specific requirements include: Advanced degree or equivalent experience. 10+ years of management experience in a relevant field. Strong, experience-based understanding of the research process, including different research methodologies and analytic strategies. Strong understanding of child, youth, and family issues; knowledge of the field and key players in it. Track record of effectively leading in an organization or agency (public or private) with a complex array of programs and the ability to leverage strengths across programs. Strong commitment to effective communication of research to policy and programmatic audiences. Effective administrator – extremely strong people skills and highly organized. Analytic and decisive decision maker with the ability to prioritize and communicate to staff key objectives and tactics necessary to achieve organizational goals. Able to develop and manage high-performance teams, develop and implement program strategies, and coach staff to do the same. Excellent project management skills and experience in program budgeting and fiscal management.