Vice President - Research Advisory & Practice at Busara Center

Who We’re Looking For

• We are looking for a leader who has successfully operated at scale and can lead across strategy, business development, delivery, people, and organizational development.
• You will be someone who is comfortable building where there is ambiguity, creating systems without creating unnecessary bureaucracy, and bringing different teams and portfolios together around a shared mission. You will combine strong commercial and operational judgment with intellectual curiosity, a deep understanding of behavioral science, and the ability to build trusted relationships with senior stakeholders.
• Most importantly, we are looking for someone who can help Busara move from strong individual practices and portfolios toward an increasingly integrated, scalable, and sustainable organization.

Key Accountabilities/Responsibilities

• The Vice President, Research, Advisory & Practice will provide enterprise-level leadership across Busara’s practice areas, with responsibility for translating strategy into sustainable growth, high-quality delivery, strong partnerships, and organizational capability. The role will work across practices, geographies, and functions to ensure that Busara operates as an integrated organization and continues to deliver meaningful impact at scale.  The key areas of responsibility include and not limited to:

Strategy and Practice Leadership

• Define and lead Busara’s overall research, advisory & practice strategy across sectors and regions in alignment with Busara’s overall organizational strategy
• Ensure coherence and integration across practices, geographies, and portfolios 
• Identify and develop new practice areas, service lines, and strategic opportunities in development and adjacent sectors.
• Translate research, delivery experience, and learning into scalable tools, frameworks, and approaches to strengthen institutional adoption
• Design and model the norms that ensure different portfolios operate as a unit towards a singular mission
• Ensure the overall sustainability of every practice area, measured against revenue, margin, utilization, share of practice partnerships and overall contribution to Busara's mission.

Commercial Leadership and Partnerships

• Own revenue growth, margin performance, utilization, and renewal targets across practice areas
• Oversee the full business development lifecycle, including pipeline management, forecasting, and conversion
• Lead or support the development of major proposals, partnerships, and contracts
• Build and maintain senior relationships with funders, governments, multilaterals, and implementing partners
• Strengthen commercial discipline, including pricing, opportunity selection, and portfolio balance
• Coach and support senior leaders in business development and account management
• Allocate resources strategically across practices.

Delivery Excellence and Impact

• Hold overall accountability for the quality, rigor, and impact of program delivery
• Strengthen and enforce quality assurance systems across all projects and portfolios
• Improve delivery reliability, including timelines, staffing models, and execution consistency
• Monitor portfolio performance and address delivery risks proactively
• Strengthen implementation capability across teams and geographies
• Build and maintain knowledge management systems to support learning and reuse
• Drive continuous improvement based on performance data and feedback

Leadership and Organizational Development

• Lead, coach, and develop senior leaders across practices and portfolios
• Build a strong leadership pipeline and succession plans for critical roles
• Clarify roles, decision-making structures, and accountability across teams
• Strengthen management capability, including performance management and delegation
• Partner with the People function on recruitment, retention, and talent development
• Partner with Director Voice on designing and co-creating impact strategies that are rooted in practice area relationships but can be supported with voice outputs
• Foster a culture of accountability, collaboration, and continuous learning

Experience

• 12–15+ years of experience in global development, consulting, research, or advisory environments with at least 5 years at the senior executive level
• Proven track record of leading strategy, business development, and delivery at scale
• Experience managing complex, multi-country portfolios or programs
• Demonstrated success in building partnerships with funders, governments, or multilaterals
• Experience leading and developing senior teams
• Deep familiarity with applied behavioral science, psychology, economics, or a related discipline.
• Experience working across Africa and South Asia strongly preferred; lived or worked 

Skills and Capabilities

• Strategic thinking with operational discipline – able to hold the long arc and the near-term simultaneously.
• Deep commercial acumen, including revenue growth, margins, and pipeline management
• Entrepreneurial builder  – comfortable creating structure where none exists, and evolving it as the organization grows.
• People leadership – a coach and talent developer who builds diverse, high-trust teams.
• Behavioral science fluency –  able to translate rigorous methods into practical, client-facing solutions.
• External presence – credible, warm, and articulate in front of the most senior stakeholders.
• Cross-functional influence  – able to lead with authority across People, Finance, Comms, and Project Operations.
• Future-oriented: able to engage with new technologies and support implementation of our AI strategy.

What Success Looks Like

• Sustained revenue growth and improved financial performance across practice areas.
• High-quality, consistent delivery across practice areas, portfolios and geographies.
• Strong pipeline and conversion of strategic opportunities.
• Clear and scalable practice areas with increased reuse of tools and approaches.
• Strengthened leadership bench and organizational capability.
• Enhanced reputation and influence of Busara in the global majority development ecosystem.