Research Centre of Excellence Lead, Birmingham

Cambridge Healthcare Research; Birmingham; Hybrid; GBP 40,000 - 80,000; Full time

Job description

Are you an experienced life sciences research professional who is passionate about leading and growing teams? Are you someone who can inspire the next generation of talent?

If so, we have a fantastic opportunity to join us to lead our new research centre of excellence launching in the heart of Birmingham in May 2025.

Who we are

Solici is the strategic competitive intelligence division of Cambridge Healthcare Research. Founded in 2013 and having grown to over 130 staff today, CHR gives healthcare decision makers the power of knowing by providing critical insights, analysis and interpretation that informs pivotal decisions that advance healthcare.

Our vision at Solici is to help the brightest ideas reach patients. We achieve this by combining research excellence with deep subject matter expertise in a range of therapy areas and a passion for enabling our clients to deliver innovative products and services to those who need them.

Our values enable us to embed considered and curious teams at the heart of any client challenge:

1. Collaboration – We build strong connections to achieve more together
2. Excellence – We aim for greatness in everything we do
3. Community – We deliver beyond work for our people, our clients, and wider society
4. Courage – We embrace challenges as opportunities for growth
5. Integrity – We always do the right thing

We are now looking for a Research Centre of Excellence Lead to join our team and be part of our ambition, to continue to deliver the excellence our clients deserve.

The Opportunity
As Research Centre of Excellence Lead, you will lead a team of 15-20 Research Analysts that has been created to enhance our service delivery model, forming a new centre of excellence for research and insights. You will be responsible for creating and embedding a framework to provide high quality desk-based secondary research to support consulting team colleagues to develop insightful content for clients.

You will report to the Chief Commercial Officer and partner with consulting team leaders and the Programme Management Office [PMO] to support the research team’s integration into business operations, ensuring research analysts understand and meet the needs of the consulting team and wider business. As a member of the Solici Leadership team, you will be instrumental in ensuring the effective integration of the team into the Solici delivery model.

Your team of Research Analysts will be part of a wider project team, delivering industry, market and product level research and data to support the development of client reports and other deliverables by client facing teams. You will be responsible for anticipating and proactively responding to future developments by leveraging opportunities to maintain and enhance our commercial success and reputation.

What You Will Bring To CHR
Qualifications and experience:

1. Life sciences background gained either through education and qualifications or professional experience
2. Experience in successfully growing and leading a large team [e.g. in excess of 15]
3. Experience conducting secondary research in a scientific environment
4. Experience of capacity and resource management in a professional services environment

Knowledge:

1. Secondary research sources for life sciences [e.g. websites, databases etc.]
2. The drug development cycle

Skills:

1. IT skills across the Microsoft suite [especially Excel and PowerPoint] and in using databases
2. Planning, organising, prioritisation and negotiation skills to successfully allocate resource capacity effectively and balance competing demands
3. People leadership skills to develop and motivate others in both individual and team settings
4. Commercial astuteness to make decisions that serve CHR’s strategic and financial goals
5. Research and analytical skills to understand and demonstrate consulting team research requirements
6. Written and verbal communication skills to collaborate effectively with colleagues across the business
7. Attention to detail to ensure team output is accurate and demonstrates required quality standards to others

What You Will be Doing

1. People leadership – You will be a visible leader for your team and in the wider business with responsibility for recruiting, onboarding, training and leading analysts to ensure they are suitably equipped to effectively partner with consulting team colleagues in producing high quality research outputs.
2. Partnering commercial teams and leaders – Partnering leaders and colleagues in the consulting and PMO teams to understand their needs, align on and manage service level agreements and KPIs by investing in relationships and collaborating effectively to iterate and optimise the delivery model to meet client and business needs.
3. Resource allocation – Partnering Business Unit Leads in the consulting team and the PMO to ensure research team capacity is efficiently planned and allocated across all project teams, negotiating creative solutions to address challenges.
4. Growing the business – Understanding the contribution of the research team to the wider commercial success of the Solici and CHR business to anticipate and respond to future client and business needs.
5. Continuous improvement – Keeping abreast of developments to leverage existing and explore new data sources [e.g. databases], research methodologies and tools, making commercially and financially viable recommendations to enhance the quality of research outputs and services provided to our consulting teams.

Who will thrive here?

We are looking for a Research Centre of Excellence Lead who can demonstrate and apply the following knowledge, skills and behaviours:

1. A passion for embedding a sense of purpose and building community within your team by creating a healthy high performing team environment
2. Growth mindset with an openness to accepting and acting on constructive feedback to improve one’s own capabilities
3. An inclusive, empathetic and encouraging attitude to getting the best out of each team member
4. A collaborative attitude to achieve success as part of a team and with other teams
5. Critical thinking to use appropriate judgement in a variety of situations, including managing competing priorities and challenging stakeholders
6. Proactivity and using initiative to anticipate future change and deliver beyond expectations
7. Motivation to develop specialist expertise required to understand research requirements [e.g. therapeutic areas, data sources etc.]
8. Personal alignment with and commitment to upholding and embedding CHR’s values

In addition, you must be:

1. Based in the UK and able to commute to our office in Birmingham city centre at least 3 days a week to provide visible leadership to this newly established team.
2. Able to travel to our London office on occasion, as business needs require.
3. Able to provide evidence of having the permanent right to work in the UK. Please note that we are unable to provide visa sponsorship for this role.

CHR's head office is in Shoreditch, London and provides the opportunity to work within our hybrid working model. We offer a flexible and supportive atmosphere as well as a competitive salary and benefits package that includes:

1. Competitive base salary
2. Annual bonus
3. Private Healthcare and Life Assurance
4. Contributory Pension Scheme
5. Cycle to work scheme
6. Personal fitness allowance
7. A collaborative and stimulating leadership environment
8. An opportunity to make and influence decisions that will drive CHR forward

Equity, Diversity and Inclusion
We are an Equal Opportunity Employer and make all employment decisions without regard to age, national origin, race, ethnicity, religion, creed, gender, sexual orientation, disability, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law.