Job Recruitment at ACLED

Specific tasks and responsibilities

The Data Extraction Specialist will be responsible for the following tasks: 

• Develop bespoke web scrapers and general web crawlers to extract data from online news sources.
• Deploy and monitor the performance of scrapers and crawlers to ensure reliable and continuous data acquisition.
• Implement logging and alerting systems for scraper performance and failures.
• Maintain and troubleshoot existing scrapers and crawlers, adapting them to changes in website structures and data formats.
• Deploy models and monitor ML/NLP models for filtering and classifying extracted news articles. 
• Develop and deploy scalable data engineering pipelines using cloud platforms (preferably AWS), Docker, or serverless technologies.
• Ensure all developed scrapers and crawlers adhere to best practices for web scraping, including ethical considerations and respect for website terms of service.
• Document all configurations, assumptions, and limitations to ensure consistency and transparency.
• Collaborate with other teams at ACLED to understand data needs and align scraper strategy with broader organizational goals.

Skills and competencies

Required

• Proven experience in developing and deploying web scrapers and crawlers for production use.
• Proven experience developing language models for practical applications.
• Strong proficiency in Python and JavaScript.
• Experience with major web scraping frameworks and libraries (Scrapy, Beautiful Soup, Selenium, Playwright, Puppeteer, etc.).
• Experience deploying machine learning models, including transformers-based NLP models, for processing source texts.
• Experience with data engineering tools and frameworks (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes, Airflow, Databricks).
• Understanding of ethical and legal considerations in web scraping, including compliance with robots.txt and terms of service.
• Experience working to deadlines with limited supervision.
• An extremely high level of attention to detail.
• Flexible team player, especially across a remote, global team.
• Fluency in English.
• Bachelor's degree required.

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Specific roles and responsibilities

The Associate Social Media Officer will be responsible for the following:

• Content creation and scheduling:  Assist the Senior Social Media Officer in executing ACLED’s social media strategy by generating content and scheduling posts across the organization’s channels (currently Twitter/X, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Instagram). 
• Content design and multimedia production: Create visual assets for social media, including graphic cards, short videos, GIFs, and other multimedia materials using Canva.
• Monitoring and evaluation: Assist in tracking and analyzing social media engagement, reach, and impact for both internal and external reporting.
• Social listening: Contribute to social listening efforts by monitoring relevant conversations, studying audience behavior, and engaging with comments, mentions, and messages across platforms. Assist the Senior Social Media Officer in researching industry leaders who are reposting or who can amplify ACLED’s work on social media platforms.
• Administrative support: Provide general administrative support to the Senior Social Media Officer as needed, as well as occasional ad hoc support to the wider External Affairs team.
• Management of ACLED’s Digital Library: Help with maintaining the organization of ACLED’s repository of digital assets in Google Photos and Google Drive and help supply photos or other materials to team members upon request. 

Skills and competencies

ACLED is seeking applicants who have the following skills and experience:

• A relevant bachelor's degree (for example, in communications, journalism or in social sciences).
• At least one year of relevant experience in social media management, content creation, or digital communications. 
• Ability to work during European time zone hours, to align with the core hours of the External Affairs team. 
• Fluency in English. (Fluency in Arabic or French is a strong asset).
• Excellent writing skills.

Ability to multitask, collaborate across departments, and work independently in a remote setting.

• A knack for taking initiative and presenting new ideas or approaches that amplify the data and analysis that ACLED collects and conducts. 
• Good judgment, strong organizational and planning skills, and close attention to detail.
• An ability to meet deadlines and communicate effectively on the status of projects.
• The ability to seek feedback and take it onboard, as well as offer feedback to others.

Preferred experience  

• Experience with data and quantitative/qualitative research.
• Experience monitoring trends and performance on social media to determine opportunities for improvement or campaigns.
• Experience with creating digital assets for social media (YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter/X, Facebook, and Instagram) and an understanding of current video platform trends and willingness to pitch and initiate new approaches.
• Experience with Canva or other editing platform.
• Past work focused on political violence, peacebuilding, conflict, demonstrations, human rights, and/or foreign affairs.

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Position responsibilities:

• Reviewing resources and familiarising themselves with ACLED guides, FAQs, and other materials; 
• Preparing for training and participating in training on the cleaning, review, and coding of data,as the role requires;
• Reviewing news media and other source reports available online for information on violent conflict and political unrest in a set of allocated countries; 
• Monitoring the emergence of new actors, regimes, and significant political developments in a set of allocated countries, and proposing revisions to the project’s actor file and regime year’s database as required;
• Managing and organizing regional desk files and documents;
• Cleaning and organizing data lists, such as for regional actors and locations;
• Undertaking general quality assurance tasks provided by the Research Manager;
• Reviewing and integrating feedback into ongoing coding efforts and data work; 
• Assisting with data review and cleaning as required; 
• Contributing analytical content to the project’s reports, or other research if required;
• Performing sourcing and coding work if needed;
• Assisting with the management of the regional desk;
• Filling in for the Research Manager when needed.

ACLED is seeking applicants who meet the following requirements:

• Good understanding of ACLED methodology (essential);
• Strong analytical and problem solving skills (essential);
• Experience with management and providing feedback (preferred);
• Solid understanding of Excel, including basic formulas, (essential) and Tableau (preferred); 
• Excellent command of English;
• Experience working to deadlines with limited supervision;
• A high level of attention to detail (essential) and ability to receive and incorporate feedback;
• Research focus or professional experience in conflict research or peacebuilding (preferred).