Statistician at IDinsight

About the Statistician’s role

The Statistician will support a large portfolio, across diverse geographies, sectors, and methodologies. The Statistician will primarily work on the design and analysis of representative sample surveys, working closely with IDinsight’s DoD team, but will have an opportunity to contribute to causal analysis (“impact evaluation”) and data science initiatives.

The Statistician will think critically about how to optimize methodological rigor given our clients’ time, operational, political and budget constraints. The ideal candidate should love having many different types of problems thrown at them, be able to quickly digest and understand the program and evidence objectives, and provide advice and guidance on how best to proceed.

The Statistician will be an important member of IDinsight’s Research Evaluation and Data (RED) Team. The RED Team is responsible for ensuring that the services we provide to clients are statistically and methodologically sound. In collaboration with the RED Team lead and personnel, the Researcher’s role will include, the following activities:

• Designing and implementing representative sample surveys and other related activities for IDinsight clients in collaboration with project teams. The Statistician will play a key role along with our client teams in designing and implementing studies for IDinsight clients, including in-person household surveys, secondary analysis of administrative data sets (like IHDS), strengthening data quality controls , remote surveys, complex estimation techniques (e.g. multiple frames, hierarchical modelling, etc.), and incorporating recent developments in data science in primary survey design and analysis. ,.
• Ensuring technical rigor of project deliverables. The Statistician will support project teams in drafting and refining technical documents, which include research designs, pre-analysis plans, sample size calculations, data collection instruments, technical reports, and other documents. The Statistician will also be a crucial resource to the country office where he or she is stationed by providing technical expertise on short-term issues that confront project teams.
• Contribute to technical innovations: The Statistician will work with project teams and external collaborators to contribute to innovation efforts in sampling design (ex: GIS based, prediction approaches to sampling theory), data quality (ex: machine learning to predict data quality issues), embedded experiments for survey methodology, and analytical techniques (ex: Small area estimation, Bayesian modelling and inference), and other related topics.
• Working with culturally and geographically diverse project teams. The Statistician will work with project teams that can be spread across the globe, from different nationalities and cultures.
• Supporting the technical professional development of staff. The Statistician will prepare and lead training sessions on technical topics (such as sampling design, statistical inference) on a regular basis. He or she will also provide individualised support to staff on their technical professional development.
• Publishing IDinsight studies in academic and policy journals. The Statistician will have the opportunity to co-author publications in academic and policy journals to showcase results from IDinsight studies, based on IDinsight’s client needs and the Statistician’s interest.
• Develop new projects and services. The Statistician will have the opportunity to develop new projects and client relationships in accordance with IDinsight’s values of client-focused and decision-focused research.

The Statistician will be expected to fulfill these responsibilities and others with professionalism and on strict deadlines. He or she will also be expected to propose, design and implement new initiatives for supporting project teams and increasing the technical rigor of IDinsight’s work.

Qualifications

• Deeply passionate about social, economic, and environmental policies and programs, and social impact
• Advanced degree in statistics, demographics, population studies, survey methodology, economics, econometrics, political science, public policy, public health, sociology, anthropology or other applied fields.
• Outstanding quantitative and critical thinking skills
• Self-starter who will thrive in a start-up setting by taking ownership and initiative
• Intellectual curiosity and sense of humor
• 3+ years of relevant work experience preferred, including designing and managing research programs, quantitative analysis, field research, and managerial experience in a developing country
• Significant experience with either Stata or R required. Experience with additional programming languages a plus
• Prior work authorization in one of the position locations
• Deep contextual knowledge and experience in the regions where IDinsight works
• Candidates interested in the Senegal or Rabat office should ideally be fluent in french