Archive for the ‘Jobs’ Category
Recently (And Not So Recently) Advertised Data Jobs…
I’m doing a couple of talks to undergrad and postgrad students next work – on data journalism at the University of Lincoln, and on open data at the University of Southampton – so I thought I’d do a quick round up of recently advertised data related jobs that I could reuse for an employability slide…
So, here are some of the things I’ve noticed recently:
- The Technology Strategy board, funders of many a data related activity (including the data vouchers for SMEs) are advertising for a Lead Technologist – Data Economy (£45,000 to £55,000):
The UK is increasingly reliant on its service economy, and on the ability to manage its physical economy effectively, and it exports these capabilities around the world. Both aspects of this are heavily dependent on the availability of appropriate information at the right place and time, which in turn depends on our ability to access and manipulate diverse sources of data within a commercial environment.
The internet and mobile communications and the ready availability of computing power can allow the creation of a new, data-rich economy, but there are technical, human and business challenges still to be overcome. With its rich data resources, inventive capacity and supportive policy landscape, the UK is well placed to be the centre of this innovation.
Working within the Digital team, to develop and implement strategies for TSB’s interventions in and around the relevant sectors.
This role requires the knowledge and expertise to develop priorities for how the UK should address this opportunity, as well as the interpersonal skills to introduce the relevant communities of practice to appropriate technological solutions. It also requires a knowledge of how innovation works within businesses in this space, to allow the design and targeting of TSB’s activities to effectively facilitate change.
Accessible tools include, but are not restricted to, networking and community building, grant-funding of projects at a wide range of scales, directing support services to businesses, work through centres such as the Open Data Institute and Connected Digital Economy Catapult, targeted procurement through projects such as LinkedGov, and inputs to policy. The role requires drawing upon this toolkit to design a coordinated programme of interventions that has impact in its own right and which also coordinates with other activities across TSB and the wider innovation landscape.
- Via the ECJ, a relayed message from the NICAR-L mailing list about a couple of jobs going with The Times and Sunday Times:
A couple of jobs that might be of interest to NICAR members here at the
Times of London…The first is an investigative data journalist role, joining the new data journalism unit which will work across both The Times and The Sunday Times.
The other is a editorial developer role: this will sit within the News Development Team and will focus on anything from working out how we tell stories in richer more immersive ways, to creating new ways of presenting Times and Sunday Times journalism to new audiences.
Please get in touch if you are interested!
–
Lucia
Head of news development, The Times and Sunday Times
@lucia_adams
Not a job ad as such, but an interesting recent innovation from the BirminghamMail:
We’ve launched a new initiative looking at the numbers behind our city and the stories in it.
‘Behind The Numbers’ is all about the explosion in ‘data’: information about our hospitals and schools, crime and the way it is policed, business and sport, arts and culture.
We’d like you to tell us what data you’d like us to publish and dig into. Email suggestions to ben.hurst@trinitymirror.com. Follow @bhamdatablog on Twitter for updates or to share ideas.
This was also new to me: FT Data, a stats/datablog from the FT? FullFact is another recent addition to my feed list, with a couple of interesting stories each day and plenty of process questions and methodological tricks that can be, erm, appropriated ;-) Via @JackieCarter, the Social Statistics blog looked interesting, but the partial RSS feed is a real turn off for me so I’ll probably drop it from my reader pretty quickly unless it turns up some *really* interesting posts.
Here are some examples of previously advertised jobs…
- A job that was being advertised at the end of last year (now closed) by the Office of National Statistics (ONS) (current vacancies) was for the impressive sounding Head of Rich Content Development:
The postholder is responsible for inspiring and leading development of innovative rich content outputs for the ONS website and other channels, which anticipate and meet user needs and expectations, including those of the Citizen User. The role holder has an important part to play in helping ONS to realise its vision “for official statistics to achieve greater impact on key decisions affecting the UK and to encourage broader use across the country”.
Key Responsibilities:
1. Inspires, builds, leads and develops a multi-disciplinary team of designers, developers, data analysts and communications experts to produce innovative new outputs for the ONS website and other channels.
2. Keeps abreast of emerging trends and identifies new opportunities for the use of rich web content with ONS outputs.
3. Identifies new opportunities, proposes new directions and developments and gains buy in and commitment to these from Senior Executives and colleagues in other ONS business areas.
4. Works closely with business areas to identify, assess and commission new rich-content projects.
5. Provides, vision, guidance and editorial approval for new projects based on a continual understanding of user needs and expectations.
6. Develops and manages an ongoing portfolio of innovative content, maximising impact and value for money.
7. Builds effective partnerships with media to increase outreach and engagement with ONS content.
8. Establishes best practice in creation of rich content for the web and other channels, and works to improve practice and capability throughout ONS. - From December 2010, a short term contract at the BBC for a data journalist:
The team is looking for a creative, tech-savvy data journalist (computer-assisted reporter) to join its website specials team to work with our online journalists, graphic designer and development teams.
Role Purpose and Aims
You will be required to humanize statistics; to make sense of potentially complicated data and present it in a user friendly format.
You will be asked to focus on a range of data-rich subjects relating to long-term projects or high impact daily new stories, in line with Global News editorial priorities. These could include the following: reports on development, global poverty, Afghanistan casualties, internet connectivity around the world, or global recession figures.
Key Knowledge and Experience
You will be a self-starter, brimming with story ideas who is comfortable with statistics and has the expertise to delve beneath the headline figures and explain the fuller picture.
You will have significant journalistic experience gained ideally from working in an international news environment.
The successful candidate should have experience (or at least awareness) of visualising data and visualisation tools.
You should be excited about developing the way that data is interpreted and presented on the web, from heavy number crunching, to dynamic mapping and interactive graphics. You must have demonstrated knowledge of statistics, statistical analysis, with a good understanding of the range and breadth of data sources in the UK and internationally, broad experience with data sources, data mining and have good visual and statistical skills.
You must have a Computer-assisted reporting background or similar, including a good knowledge of the relevant software (including Excel and mapping software).
Experience of producing and developing data driven web content a senior level within time and budget constraints.
…
Central to the role is an ability to analyse complicated information and present it to our readers in a way that is visually engaging and easy to understand, using a range of web-based technologies, for which you should have familiarity with database interfaces and web presentation layers, as well as database concepting, content entry and management.
You will be expected to have your own original ideas on how to best apply data driven journalism, either to complement stories when appropriate or to identify potential original stories while interpreting data, researching and investigating them, crunching the data yourself and working with designers and developers on creating content that will engage our audience, and provide them with useful, personalised information.FWIW, it’s probably worth remembering that the use of data is not necessarily a new thing.. for example, this post – The myth of the missing Data Scientist – does a good job debunking some of the myths around “data science”.
Academic Business Communications?
For several years, I’ve idly wondered whether the job ads of a particular company or institution provide some sort of evidence about the health of the organisation, its current strategy (in terms of long term appointments) and its tactics (short term appointments). Short term contract appointments might also reveal insights about current (or soon to be announced) projects, or even act as indicators that a project is in trouble (and hence requires more bodies throwing at it). Whatever…
Looking at appointments across a sector might also give us some sort of insight about the current concerns of the sector. Identifying bellweather or leader institutions that predict sector wide concerns through regularly being first to advertise posts or roles that others may then start to appoint may provide some sort of insight as to the direction a sector may be heading. Again, whatever.
Whilst I haven’t been tracking HE jobs in general, I do subscribe to the OU jobs feed (for a list of other UK HEIs with jobs related RSS/Atom syndication feeds, see this UK HEI autodiscoverable RSS feed directory).
My gut feeling from skimming this feed is that the OU has been appointing IT related jobs like crazy over the last year or so (read in to that what you may; high churn maybe? Or major IT restructuring?) and relatively few academic positions (from which we might conclude as observers either that the OU has a young/middle aged academic workforce, or that managing the size of the academic body through natural wastage is the order of the day). I think Google Reader will have been archiving the feed, so I guess I could try to run some sort of analysis over it. But that’s as maybe…
Anyway – today I spotted this ad: Strategic Communications Programme, Academic Reputation Manager, Communications (temporary contract for 24 months, £37,012-£44,116), reporting to the Head of Communications. Here’s the spec:
The post is formally based within The Open University Communications Unit, but the post holder will spend a significant amount of time working with academic staff and associate lecturers across the University’s seven faculties and two institutes, acting as a conduit for publicity, dissemination and impact across in the media and via the Universities’ advocates, students, alumni, staff and influential friends, making use of social media.
The post holder will report to the Head of Communications (Managing Editor) (and through him/her to the Director of Communications) and work closely with the Director of Marketing. There will be close working relationships with Communications colleagues in the Digital Engagement, Government Relations and External Affairs, Stakeholder and Media Relations teams. Specifically you will work closely with the Senior Manage Research Communications, to co-ordinate activity and avoid duplication. There are no line-management responsibilities associated with this post.
MAIN PURPOSE
• To lead and coordinate publicity activities across the University, ensuring an optimal and consistent approach is taken to maximise the dissemination and impact of our academic excellence.
• To raise external awareness of the profile and calibre of our academics and teaching staff with key target audiences.
• To raise internal awareness of the excellence and accomplishments of our academics and teaching staff across the OU’s faculties and institutes.
• To support the Director of Communications as an OU Ambassador in engaging on, and communicating, the OU Story.MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES
• Develop and implement a new Academic Excellence Communications Strategy for the University based on a focused approach aimed at maximum impact on key opinion formers and decision-makers.
• Develop and maintain knowledge of key areas of OU academic excellence and publicise and disseminate news and information accordingly to target audiences, liaising with the media relations team as appropriate for high impact stories.
• Network across faculties, institutes and relevant service units to maximise news gathering, dissemination and impact.
• Commission and edit news stories for the bi-monthly staff enews and liaise with the PVC (Academic) to ensure that individual achievement is acknowledged with personal thanks and the best examples promoted to the Vice Chancellor for celebrating in his video addresses.
• Working with Digital Engagement, contribute to a pan-university approach to faculty and unit based research websites and social media activity.
• Manage publication of brochures and publicity materials for both web and print.
• Day–to-day quality control of all academic excellence materials, including academic excellence-related media releases and academic excellence elements of external and internal OU publications and websites.
• Contribute to the development of case studies for the OU’s Strategic Communications Programme focussed on acquiring new students and employer sponsors, including enhancing the impact of selected case studies in the run-up to submission.
• Support the development and implementation of stakeholder engagement/communications for specific high impact projects and initiatives.
• Create presentations on academic excellence for the PVC (Academic) and other senior staff and provide briefings and guidance for presentation opportunities.
• Manage high profile events aimed to raise the profile of key academics and the OU’s academic reputation as a whole, where there are significant communication opportunities (national workshops, international conferences, showcase events).
• Review academic staff web profiles and advise on raising the quality of these profiles for impact on external audiences such as potential students and the media.
• Work with Senior Manager Research Communications to develop the OU’s database of expertise as an effective means of maximising OU comment in the media (both proactively and in response to media enquiries).
• Contribute to development of the OU’s iTunes U and YouTube research portfolio.
• Liaise as appropriate with Digital Engagement, Open Broadcasting Unit and Marketing (e.g. for approval of advertisements).
• Coordinate academic excellence competition entries (e.g. for Times Higher awards)OTHER GENERAL RESPONSIBILITIES:
• Understands and takes account of organisational aims and priorities to plan and set clear goals and deliver immediate and long term goals.
• Takes personal responsibility for effectively managing projects to achieve priorities, ensuring efficient use of resources to meet agreed delivery timescales and quality standards.
• Undertake such other duties as may be required from time-to-time by the Director of Communications, to build the reputation of the University.
ORGANISATIONAL RELATIONSHIPS:
• The post holder will be based in the Communications Unit but will also spend significant time working with colleagues across the OU faculties and institutes.
• The post holder will report to the Head of Communications (Managing Editor) (and through him/her to the Director of Communications) but will liaise closely with the Senior Manager, Research Communications, within the Communications Stakeholder Relations team..
• The post holder will work with other individuals, teams and units across the University where required.
So – profile building and celebration of academic achievements seem to be the order of the day, as well as getting OU comment into mainstream media? Thinking about OU content I share, most of it is generally on the basis of what I think is interesting, novel, “important”, quirky, or possibly of interest in one of the communities I believe I communicate into. But I don’t limit myself to sharing info about just OU activities…(The original naming of OUseful.info was inspired by a desire to share info that might be useful in an OU context, facing both outwards (linking to OU projects that were of interest), as well as inwards (bringing ideas from the outside that might contribute internally to the development of the OU mission).)
The job description doesn’t mention the REF, but work also appears to be being commissioned to support that bundle of laughs at a data management level – REF Publications Linked Data:
Key tasks will include:
- The review with others of the existing Research Publication Facility (RPF);
- Design and development of agreed enhancements and additions to the existing system;
- Delivery of an agreed programme of enhancement/development;
- Maintenance and user-support of the live RPF system;
- Direct liaison with users during the REF preparation period, to handle and progress queries and issues etc. as they arise;
- The postholder will also be expected to devise and introduce additional features to the RPF should they be identified as REF Preparations proceed – e.g. improved MI reporting for the REF Coordination Team and the Institutional Research Review Team (IRRT);
- Undertake such other duties as may be required from time-to-time by appointed line/project managers in support of REF preparations and related systems.The use of linked data to support Research and Scholarship is an exciting field of research development in its own right, and part of the postholder’s role will be to work in association, as directed, with select colleagues in KMi, the PVC’s Office and elsewhere to identify other relevant opportunities for using linked data in support of the Research and Scholarship agenda, where this is considered appropriate and workload allows. The postholder’s primary responsibility however, will be direct support of the OU’s REF submission.
The job ad also mentions that the role “will include in particular the modelling and exposure as linked data of newly identified data not already covered by the current datasets, the constant maintenance and update of existing data. The Project Officer will in particular integrate a team working in collaboration with the Digital Engagement and the Open Media Units [the Open Broadcasting uint, as was...] of the Open University to create linked databased tools and systems related to improving the discoverability of open educational resources”. From which we maybe learn the Digital Engagement Unit and the OMU are sponsoring the OU’s Linked Data effort? As for example further evidenced by this second Linked Data related job ad – Project Officer – Linked Data
- linking and integrating information regarding the outcomes, impact and media appearance of research projects at the Open University;
- creating and making available new sets of data to support the connection between the Open University and external organisations;
- developing applications and tools to support the navigation in, search and reuse of content available at the Open University;
- improving how OU and external linked data is used by the OpenLearn website (open.edu/openlearn) to group relevant content and make recommendations to users;
- connect educational and research content with online services used by researchers and academics at the Open University;
- supporting the use of linked data in research projects;
A good example of what might be involved in that strand of work is suggested by the DiscOU (Discovering Open University Content from Other Online Resources) project:
Back on the jobs front, the Strategic Communications Programme is also appointing a couple of other positions at the moment – an Employer Engagement & Employability Manager “engag[ing] employers with the benefits of sponsoring staff on OU qualifications, and students with the impact an OU qualification can have on their career” and a Campaigns Manager (Social Media) “comfortable in the online and social media environment [who] will develop our reputation for thought leadership in areas of special interest to the University”. The Further Particulars for the Campaigns Manager go on:
Early priorities for the post will be to develop and implement the existing Social Media Content Strategy to respond to the needs of the Strategic Communications Programme (focussed on attracting more students and employers). In doing so the post holder will begin to develop The Open University’s place in public debate and position the University as a thought leader in areas of special concern. To do this, the post-holder will need to engage key academics and senior staff in the potential of social media as a tool to raise the profile for the University and themselves.
MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES
• Develop and implement a SCP Social Media Content Strategy for the University based on a focused approach aimed at maximum impact on prospective students, employer sponsors, key opinion formers and decision-makers.
• Develop and maintain knowledge of the OU’s areas of special concern, encourage debate, disseminate opinion and information accordingly to target audiences, liaising with the media relations team as appropriate for high-impact stories.
• Network across faculties, institutes and relevant service units to maximise engagement of relevant expertise and opinion gathering, to help you stimulate public debate, dissemination and impact.
• Contribute to the development and maintenance of the OU’s presence in Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn to attract and inform target audiences.
• Working with Digital Engagement, contribute to a pan-university approach to social media activity.
• Work with the Senior Manager, Stakeholders and Ambassadors, on the development of our thought leadership event programme harnessing social media to increase our impact with this programme.
• Day-to-day quality control of all student and employer facing content in our primary Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn presences.
• Work closely with the Senior Manager, Research Communications, to expand the reach of our impact case studies for the OU’s Research Excellence Framework submission.
• Support the development and implementation of stakeholder engagement/communications with key influencers in Social Media.
• Create and deliver presentations for staff training on the power of social media to help us strengthen our reputation for excellence and thought leadership, providing briefings and guidance for presentation opportunities.
• Work with academic staff to develop their social media profiles for impact on external audiences such as potential students and the media.
• Work with staff to optimize their text, audio, and video content and social media channels, evaluating existing content. Dependent on their abilities, this may include producing and editing digital content for them.
• Identify and disseminate digital content and social media best practices to the University community.
• Contribute to development of the OU’s iTunes U and YouTube portfolio and amplify the excellent content delivered into these environments.
• Liaise as appropriate with Digital Engagement, Open Media Unit and Marketing.
• Coordinate OU competition and league tables entries and amplify our success across social media and OU owned channels (e.g. for Times Higher awards)
Social media is definitely in-scope as a comms channel, then…?!
PS no time to go in to them here, but I also notice ads for a Digital Campaign Manager, a Digital Marketing Director, and a Research and Analysis Manager, all within the Open University Worldwide Ltd Business Development Unit. Apparently, “”[t]he Open University has ambitious plans to grow the number of students and associated revenues from overseas. As part of the Open University Worldwide (OUW), the Digital Marketing Director will be accountable for the marketing strategy and delivery of the marketing plan targeted at both new and existing B2C overseas markets, the highly influential Research and Analysis Manager role will be accountable for a range of activities from providing market, competitor and regulatory analysis to shape market strategy, through to producing insight and analysis of day to day performance, the Digital Campaign Manager will be responsible for the delivery of the marketing campaigns targeting B2C overseas markets.”"
As to the sorts of skills these roles require:
• Exceptional understanding of all areas of online marketing, including SEO, SEM, social media and eCRM, acquisition, retention, display, affiliates & partnerships.
• Extensive experience of web management and analytics including knowledge of content management systems, content change process, knowledge of establishing web analytics and implementing measurement tools.
• Extensive experience of managing digital agencies.
• Excellent record of success delivering ROI via innovative online marketing campaigns.
• Proven analytical skills and the ability to drive insight from consumer and market data.
• Innovative approach and understanding of how to build a brand and create online communities.
So… that’s the business of the academy then?!
OU Jobs Round-Up – Academic Positions in Educational Technology
Seems like some academic posts are appearing again to bolster REF performance, this time in IET:
- Professor in Educational Technology (£60,217 – £84,307): We are seeking a dynamic individual with a national and international reputation in Educational Technology to support the Director in ensuring the OU is positioned at the leading edge in the following areas of research: e-assessment, mobile learning, learning/data analytics. (Learning and data analytics? Yeah, right… Btw, here’s a link to my LAK11 keynote…)
- Senior Lecturer in Educational Technology (£46,696 – £52,556): You will play an important role within IET’s Academic Team in conducting teaching, research and scholarship in support of the strategic aims of IET and the OU. You will provide leadership in learning and teaching to members of other faculties and units, and will therefore be excellent in your own teaching and understanding of the student learning experience, as well as being a skilled communicator. (I’ve been told not to bother because of my crap research record and zero academic profile/credibility;-)
- Research Fellowship in Technology Enhanced Learning x 2 (£36,862 – £44,016, Temporary for 24 months): We are seeking two independent researchers to conduct a programme of research linking the work of the Institute of Educational Technology (IET) to colleagues in the Centre for Education and Educational Technology, and the Centre for Research in Computing. The general themes of the research are ‘Educational Futures’ and ‘Pervasive, Ubiquitous and Ambient Computing’ and you would be expected to specify a two year programme of work in either area. The proposal should demonstrate how this work would be relevant to at least one of the Digital Scholarship, Next Generation Distance Learning or Learning in an Open World research programmes running in IET.
For folk engaged with the data side of the business, this post has also turned up:
- Research Data/Information Manager, Research School (£29,972 – £35,788, Temporary contract for 1 year): Could you be the person we are looking for to help support the development and delivery of research data and information? This post will play a key role in the production, development and delivery of statutory institutional returns and management information relating to the University’s Research & Enterprise activities. Duties include planning, scheduling, analysis, interpretation, communication and dissemination.
Corporate Data Analyst and Online Comms Jobs at the OU
Though I’m sure these sorts of job have been being advertised for years, it’s interesting tracking how they’re being represented at the moment, and the sorts of skills required.
Corporate Data and MI Analyst, Marketing (£29,853 – £35,646)
Main Purpose of the Post:
The post holder is a member of the Campaign Planning and Data team and will be required to play a pro-active role in that team, balancing the needs and recommendations of their own areas of responsibility with the wider needs and priorities of the team and the whole Marketing & Sales Unit.This post has been constructed to assist the University to develop its marketing capacity so that challenging targets can be met. It will be essential for the post holder to work to harness the energies of academic and academic related staff in the University’s academic units, service units and regions to develop a more effective marketing strategy. This will require influencing and networking skills and an ability to adapt engagement style to an academic context.
The post holders work within a team producing Campaign Plans for both new and continuing students. The plans drive the allocation of over £10M of promotional activities (acquisition and retention campaigns).
Description of Duties of the Post:
Contribute to optimising the University’s customer targeting capability via regular reappraisal of segmentation policy with a view to increasing market share in high yield segments
Contribute to development and delivery of robust models, tools, skills and resources to enable segmentation, competitor and market analysis and data mining within the Campaign Planning Team and more widely within Marketing and Sales.Planning 60%
Input into overall marketing plans and support planning process.
Segment the prospect data mart by developing key prospect indicators to provide Response, Reservation, Registration, Retention and other key metric predictions for each.
Support quantification of product performance predictions to provide Response, Reservation, Registration, Retention and other key metric predictions for each.
Maintain and contribute to development of a targeting model, which overlays product performance predictions/actual by segment over the agreed marketing plan to provide a targeting matrix.
Communicate targeting matrix to stakeholders and overlay tests and current campaign activity to provide an agreed campaign plan based on minimising Cost per Registration and maximising marketing mix and integration strategy.
Monitor performance daily and update segmentation, product and targeting models to maintain a data driven test and learn cycle. Identify significant deviations from forecast and potential actions.
Continually review the Customer Journey through input into creation of a Retention model based on a balanced scorecard approach. Work with key stakeholders to prioritise and implement developments.
Input into model validation and quality control.Data 20%
Support development of a marketing data mart to primarily support marketing analysis and campaign execution.
Provide input into marketing data developments encouraging sharing of data and best practise.
Support development of in-house tools and processes to improve marketing analysis and campaign execution, primarily SAS and SIEBEL. Support other areas in evaluating tools and systems.
Where appropriate, maintain the relationship with OU data providers ensuring relevant data processing, development, quality and SLA’s are controlled.
Promote data use within marketing and other OU areas, maximising the use of data and providing a hub for data developments to be controlledMI 20%
Input into development of key performance measures to be used across the OU.
Develop relationships with key OU stakeholders to ensure common goals are met.
Facilitate the use of marketing data across the OU and develop tools to support.
Support data focused research and tests with analytical input.
Input into development and maintenance of campaign performance measures.Person Spec – Essential
Substantial experience in a campaign planning, analysis or similar role including for
example; campaign execution, data extraction, the development of data infrastructure.
Experience of Direct Marketing.
Experience of B2B and / or B2C marketing.
Experience of data propensity and segmentation modelling.
A balance of marketing analysis and technical skills, including data quality and protection.
Experience of test and learn data driven analysis, targeting processes and systems;
Proven ability to see trends in data and drill down to issues or key data.
Proven ability to develop relationships with key decision makers and stakeholders.
Proven ability to translate marketing requirements into planning / execution requirements.
Excellent presentation and facilitation skills.
Provide analytic support and direction to colleagues to ensure understanding.
Proven ability to meet challenging deadlines without compromising quality.
Still no adverts* for a “learning data analyst” though, tasked with analysing data to see:
- whether effective use is being made of linked to resources, particularly subscription Library content and open educational resources;
- whether there’s anything in the student activity data and/or social connection data we can use to predict attainment and/or satisfaction levels or improve retention levels.
* That said, IET do collect lots of stats, and I think a variety of stats are now available relating to activity on the Moodle VLE. I’m not sure who does what with all that data though…?
PS I wonder if any of the analysts that companies like Pearson presumably employ look to model ways of maximising the profitabilty, to those companies, of student acquisition and retention, given education is their business? (See also: Apollo Group results – BPP and University of Phoenix, Publishing giant Pearson looks set to offer degrees).
PPS This job ad may also be of interest to some? Online Communications Officer, Open University Business School (£29,853 – £35,646)
Again, it’s interesting to mark what’s expected…
This brand new role in the School will drive the development of online communications. Focusing on increasing engagement and traffic through the website, you will ensure this work is appropriately integrated into the wider work of the University’s Online Services, Marketing and Communications teams. Reporting to the Director of Business Development and External Affairs, it will be your responsibility to develop the website including content, usability, optimisation, interactivity and driving increased visitor numbers and online registration. You will continually find new and inventive ways to engage with our stakeholders and promote the reputation of the Business School through the online channel.
Your responsibilities will also extend to the School’s virtual presence through social networks, iTunes U and YouTube and utilise these channels to our advantage. You will increase our presence as well as delivering virtual campaigns to improve the overall student numbers. In this role, it will also be your responsibility to develop relationships with other areas of the University engaged in this work and will play a key role in the management of these relationships.
Summary of Duties
The main duties of the Online Communications Officer are detailed below.• Advance the social media strategy ensuring it is inline with the Universities media position, market response and the development of new technology.
• Manage the online activity of the Business School’s social media communities
• Liaise, as appropriate, with units within The Open University, such as Online Services to keep up to date with policy changes and AACS regarding technical developments.
• Liaise with the Business School’s Information Officer for the maintenance and feeding of the Research Database into the website
• Generate assets to host on the website e.g. an Elluminate Demo Video
• Keep abreast of trends and developments to ensure that the Business School’s online presence remains at the forefront
• Work alongside Online Services, to monitor the visitor traffic of the website and establish appropriate and effective KPIs for dissemination across the Business School, for example through the creation of a dashboard.
• Engage in personal development based on organisational needs and developments to foster a high level of professional skills and technical ability
• Ensure that corporate branding and media guidelines are adhered to
• Understand and appreciate internal procedures and standards and be proactive in recommending improvements
• Ability to apply best professional practice to deliver effective solutions that take into account technical, budgetary and other project considerations
• Edit the content of both the internet and intranet
• Collate, interpret and select key information for dissemination on the latest trends and research in social media both within the OU and externally
• Produce graphics where necessary or liaise with designers in the University or outside agencies to produce graphics.
• Create/collate digital assets including audio and video files
• Post moderate discussion forums
• Disseminate best practice through a variety of communications channels eg project website, OU Life news, brief updates etc.
• Develop and maintain awareness of different audience needs in relation to appropriate communications channels (eg email, screensaver, website, print).
• Act as a flexible member of the Business Development and External Affairs team.
• Carry out other tasks as specified from time to time by the Project Director
Related: Joanne Jacobs’ Are you social or anti-social?: “How to employ a Social Media Strategist, and how you should measure their performance. (Social media isn’t going away. But some Social Media Strategists should go away.)”
So You Want to be a Data Scientist…?
Just a quick post to remark on a coincidence of job ads I’ve spotted over the last couple of weeks:
- Linked In – Senior Data Scientist: The Senior Data Scientist will play a leadership role on a focused existing team consisting of data scientists and business leadership to work on a series of high-value activities:
1) Build predictive models to help the Hiring Solutions sales & marketing leadership team with expansion planning, account allocations and prioritization. Use machine learning techniques to optimize over time
2) Create self-serve reports and dashboards for our leadership team, marketing personnel, and sales executives to better understand our overall business, as well as specific opportunities
3) Provide customized analysis to help us work with our most valuable prospects and customers, including building some of our reporting capabilities to share with our thousands of customers
4) Above all else, drive and enable our team to take fullest advantage of our valuable & quickly expanding proprietary data set - Last.fm – Data Scientist: We’re seeking a top notch data scientist with strong programming skills to join the small and very enthusiastic data and recommendations team at Last.fm. This is a full-time position, based in London.
Are you a superb data analyst as well as a hands-on implementer that understands the trade-offs of the memory hierarchy and is able to work around constraints in disk speed, memory size and CPU cycles? Are you familiar with all common data structures and their complexity? Do you take pride in being clever and solving difficult problems creatively? Are you full of ideas and always looking for new ways of making use out of data? Are you an advocate for data-driven development and fully capable of conducting a proper A/B test? Do you love music?
We need a motivated data hero to explore and learn from our rich datasets, build data-related services and infrastructure, conduct data-driven evaluations and experiments, improve our recommendations and other data-based products, and show off on http://playground.last.fm.
- Foursquare: Data Scientist: We are just starting to ramp-up our data science and analytics team and are looking for talented individuals to help us with projects ranging across the full spectrum of Machine Learning and Statistical Programming disciplines. We are aggressively building out predictive systems and methods for improving our data quality and improving our core algorithms. We are specifically interested in people with experience with prediction or recommender systems, search and ranking algorithms, and classification algorithms.
Our ideal candidate will be comfortable in a fluid start-up environment and will bring an energetic, fun and creative approach to their work. You have experience building real products in the real world from the ground up or extensive research experience dealing with large datasets. Your teammates see you as a rock star, and go to you with their toughest problems. You’re comfortable jumping in the deep end, learning new skills on a bleeding edge platform, and pushing out tons of high quality work fast.
- Aviagen Ltd: Analytical Data Scientist: We are seeking an outstanding Analytical Data Scientist, reporting to the Global Head of Technical Systems, to develop and apply statistical and optimization techniques to internal and external production databases to identify trends in performance, opportunities for improvement and formulate best practice advice. You will also contribute to the development of software tools to enhance product technical support.
Give it a year and I reckon we’ll be seeing an increasing number of these, as well as bleeding edge ads for “visualisation engineers” or “data visualisation analysts”…such as this one:
Senior Visualisation Engineer
Fantastic opportunity to join and organisation that has a 1b Turnover and over 140 offices globally.
You will be working specifically on Transportation projects a taking a lead role in visualisation project work to include developing business both internally and externally, supervision of junior staff and some direct technical work creating visualisation
Or maybe it was always thus…? Time to start tracking things on IT Jobs Watch, maybe?
Educative Media?
Another interesting looking job ad from the OU, this time for a Web Assistant Producer with Open Learn (Explore) in the OBU (Open Broadcasting Unit).
Here’s how it reads:
Earlier this year the OU launched an updated public facing, topical news and media driven site. The site bridges the gap between BBC TV viewing and OU services and functions as the new ‘front door’ to Open Learn and all of the Open University’s open, public content. We are looking for a Web Assistant Producer with web production/editing skills.
You will work closely with a Producer, 2 Web Assistant Producers, the Head of Online Commissioning and many others in the Open University, as well as the BBC.
You need to demonstrate a real interest in finding and building links between popular media/news stories, OU curriculum content, research and more. You must have experience of producing online educational material including: Researching online content, writing articles; sourcing images or other assets and/or placing and managing content text, FLASH and video/audio content within a Content Management System.
(I have to say, I’m quite tempted by the idea of this role…)
One of the things I wonder about is the extent to which “news” editorial guidelines will apply? When the OU ran the Open2.net website (now replaced by the revamped OpenLearn) content was nominally managed under BBC editorial guidelines, though I have to say I never read them… Nor did I realise how comprehensive they appear to be: BBC Editorial Guidelines. (Does the OU have an equivalent for teaching materials, I wonder?!)
As a publisher of informal, academic educational content, to what extent might editorial guidelines originating from a news and public service broadcaster be appropriate, and in what ways, if any, might they be inappropriate? (I think I need to try out a mapping from the BBC guidelines into an educational/educative context, if one hasn’t been done already…?)
Anyway, for a long time I’ve thought that we could be trying to make increased mileage of news stories in terms of providing deeper analysis and wider contextualisation/explanation that the news media can offer. (In this respect, I just spotted something – now a couple of days old: oops! – in my mailbox along exactly these lines. I’m working towards inbox zero and a shift to a new email client in the new year, so fingers crossed visiting my email inbox won’t be so offputting in future!) So it’s great to see that the new OpenLearn appears to be developing along exactly those lines.
A complementary thing (at least in the secondary sense of OpenLearn as open courseware and open educational resources) is to find a way of accrediting folk who have participated in open online courses and who want to be accredited against that participation in some way … and it just so happens that’s something I’m working on at the moment and hoping to pitch within the OU in the new year…
PS in passing, as the HE funding debate and demos rage on, anyone else think the OU should be license fee funded as a public service educator?!;-)
What is a Data Journalist?
Jod ads come and go, so I thought I’d capture the main elements of this one from the BBC:
Data Journalist – Role Purpose and Aims
You will be required to humanize statistics; to make sense of potentially complicated data and present it in a user friendly format.
You will be asked to focus on a range of data-rich subjects relating to long-term projects or high impact daily new stories, in line with Global News editorial priorities. These could include the following: reports on development, global poverty, Afghanistan casualties, internet connectivity around the world, or global recession figures.
Key Knowledge and Experience
You will be a self-starter, brimming with story ideas who is comfortable with statistics and has the expertise to delve beneath the headline figures and explain the fuller picture.
You will have significant journalistic experience gained ideally from working in an international news environment.
The successful candidate should have experience (or at least awareness) of visualising data and visualisation tools.
You should be excited about developing the way that data is interpreted and presented on the web, from heavy number crunching, to dynamic mapping and interactive graphics. You must have demonstrated knowledge of statistics, statistical analysis, with a good understanding of the range and breadth of data sources in the UK and internationally, broad experience with data sources, data mining and have good visual and statistical skills.
You must have a Computer-assisted reporting background or similar, including a good knowledge of the relevant software (including Excel and mapping software).
Experience of producing and developing data driven web content a senior level within time and budget constraints.
A thorough understanding of the BBC World Service’s aims and the part this initiative plays in meeting them.
Excellent communication and interpersonal skills with ability to present information concisely to a broad audience including journalists and commissioning editors. You should be able to demonstrate the ability to influence, negotiate with and persuade others.
Central to the role is an ability to analyse complicated information and present it to our readers in a way that is visually engaging and easy to understand, using a range of web-based technologies, for which you should have familiarity with database interfaces and web presentation layers, as well as database concepting, content entry and management.
You will be expected to have your own original ideas on how to best apply data driven journalism, either to complement stories when appropriate or to identify potential original stories while interpreting data, researching and investigating them, crunching the data yourself and working with designers and developers on creating content that will engage our audience, and provide them with useful, personalised information.
You will work in a multimedia way, when appropriate, liaising with online but also radio and TV and specialist output producers as required, from a range of language services. You will help lead the development of computer-assisted reporting skills in the wider news specials team.MAIN RESPONSIBILITIES
To identify a range of significant statistics and data -driven stories that can be developed and result in finished graphics that can be used across BBC News websites.
To take a lead role in devising compelling ways of telling data-driven stories on the web, working with specials team designers, developers and journalists as required. Also liaising with radio and TV and specialist output producers across World Service as required, providing a joined-up multi-platform proposition for the audience.
To work with senior stakeholders and programme teams and be an internal expert who can interpret and concisely explain the significance of data to others, and related good practice.
Support the College of Journalism – to help devise training sessions in order to spread the knowledge and best practices of data driven journalism
To help inform the future development by FM&T of tools which enable data-driven stories to be told more quickly and effectively on the web.
To keep abreast of developments in data driven journalism, and pursue collaboration with other teams working on the same area, both within the BBC and also with external organisations.
Willingness to work across a range of online production skills in a flexible manner to BBC standards and values.
· Using their own initiative the successful candidate will be required to build relationships with major sources of content (e.g. BBC networks, programmes, external interest groups) and promote opportunities for cross-media productionCOMPETENCIES
Editorial Judgement
Makes the right editorial and policy decisions based upon a clear understanding of the BBC’s distinctive news agenda, the requirements of news and current affairs coverage.Planning & Organising
Is able to think ahead in order to establish an effective and appropriate course of action for self and others. Prioritises and plans activities taking into account all the relevant issues and factors such as deadlines and resources requirements.Analytical Thinking
Able to simplify complex problems, process projects into component parts, explore and evaluate them systematically.Creative Thinking
Is able to transform creative ideas/impulses into practical reality. Can look at existing situations and problems in novel ways and come up with creative solutions.Resilience
Can maintain personal effectiveness by managing own emotions in the face of pressure, set backs or when dealing with provocative situations. Can demonstrate an approach to work that is characterised by commitment, motivation and energy.Communication
The ability to get one’s message understood clearly by adopting a range of styles, tools and techniques appropriate to the audience and the nature of the information.Influencing and Persuading
Ability to present sound and well reasoned arguments to convince others. Can draw from a range of strategies to persuade people in a way that results in agreement or behaviour change.Managing Relationships and Team Working
Able to build and maintain effective working relationships with a range of people. Highly effective team player.
All Jobs Digital at the OU…
Is something in the air?
Currently advertised on the OU jobs website are the following:
- Information Technology, Assistant Director IT Programmes
What’s it worth? Senior Salary band 3 £79,171- £91,167
This is a challenging time for the Higher Education sector which is seeing significant changes in state funding. The entry of more private providers has also increased the consumer power of fee-paying students, placing a premium on service delivery and cost efficiency.
The University recently appointed its first Chief Information Officer and he is now building the Systems Futures programme and the IT executive team which will lead the work in delivering the systems to enable the University to achieve its ambitions. The OU is well placed to respond to these challenges and this team will play a crucial role in enabling the University to adapt and be successful in this changing environment.
We are seeking a dynamic, innovative and value focused individual to join this team and support the development of robust, enterprise-scale IT Systems to lead the University into its next chapter.
You will play a key role in the transformation of the OU’s systems and capability. You will achieve this by leading the Systems Futures programme which will establish the future organisational process and service needs and deliver the systems to meet them. - Information Technology, Assistant Director – IT Service Delivery
What’s it worth? Senior Salary band 2 £69,574 – £81,570
We are seeking a dynamic, tenacious and value & service focused individual to join this team and support the development and operational delivery of robust, enterprise-scale IT services to lead the University into its next chapter.
You will play a key role in the transformation of the OU’s IT services and capability. You will achieve this by championing and leading the drive for service excellence and the introduction of world class methods and standards. - Assistant Director IT Development , Information Technology
What’s it worth? £79,171- £91,167
We are seeking a dynamic, innovative and value focused individual to join this team and support the development of robust, enterprise-scale IT Systems to lead the University into its next chapter.
You will play a key role in the transformation of the OU’s systems and capability as well as providing effective business-as-usual delivery using a mix of bespoke software and package solutions. You will achieve this by establishing the IT Development Strategy and take advantage of industry best practice. - Media Project Manager, Learning and Teaching Solutions (LTS)
What’s it worth? Temporary contract until 31 July 2011, £36,715 – £43,840
Do you have an excellent record of managing media production and building successful relationships with clients? Would you enjoy leading a team of media specialists working on a portfolio of distance-teaching modules?
As Media Project Manager, you will manage the development, production and maintenance of teaching materials across a range of media, from early planning through to the finished product. You will work closely with academic and media production staff on specifications, product development and delivery of module materials to quality, time and budget. - Research Assistant/Research Associate in Digital Scholarship, Institute of Education Technology
What’s it worth? £27,319 – £35,646 p.a, Temporary until 31 July 2011, Part-time and job share applications considered
We wish to develop work aimed at understanding the changes in communication and publication practices of academic researchers in higher education due to the impact of the information age. The impact consists of a changed landscape which offers researchers new ways of working and offers new kinds of academic output for educators to use in their teaching. The focus therefore is a programme of research to explore the ways that changes in technology are changing the discourse and practices of academic researchers, and the consequences that these changes have for professional practices of educators. - Two Research Fellowships in Technology Enhanced Learning, Institute of Educational Technology,
What’s it worth? Temporary posts for 24 months, £36,715-£43,840 p.a.
Research Fellowship in Technology Enhanced Learning (Educational Futures)
Research Fellowship in Technology Enhanced Learning (Pervasive, Ubiquitous and Ambient Computing)
Applications are sought for two independent researchers to conduct a programme of research linking the work of the Institute of Educational Technology (IET) to colleagues in the Centre for Education and Educational Technology. The general themes of the research would be ‘Educational Futures’ and ‘Pervasive, Ubiquitous and Ambient Computing’ and candidates would be expected to specify a 2 year programme of work. The proposal should demonstrate how this work be relevant to at least one of the Digital Scholarship, Next Generation Distance Learning or Learning in an Open World research programs running in IET. Researchers would be required to demonstrate a strong record of Publication and a track record of successful external funding bids.
Hmmm… where did it all go so wrong for me…?!;-)
PS what’s a finder’s fee on a a £90k job? If by chance you saw the ad here, go for the post as a result, and get it, you owe me a coffee. Every time I’m in MK… And I will maybe see if I can get promoted into HR…
PPS Oops – forgot this one… Make a difference, protect the vision – join the OU Council
New Year, New Job? OU Vacancies Round-Up
Given that OUseful.Info is a personal – rather than a corporate – blog, you may be forgiven for wondering why I post round-ups of OU job ads every so often. The answer is simple – I look at the OU jobs listings (via a public RSS feed) to find out about what projects are actually going on around the OU, and get some idea about where the institution’s current priorities lay, at least in terms of staffing needs. And then I post on details about some of the jobs that I think may be interesting in a OUseful.info context, both as a personal reminder to find out who’s been appointed to the posts but also because there’s an outside chance that a small percentage of the OUseful.info readership might actually be interested in applying…
So without further ado, here’s a quick round-up of posts that are currently being advertised. (Note that the deadline on some of them is – err – today…)
- Enterprise Content Management Programme Manager: ECM will touch all aspects of our business; from committee minutes, to product catalogue workflows, to learning materials production. This is just not about technology; it is about changing our culture, understanding business processes, and building intelligent workflows.
You will work with many other parts of the University including Computing Services (who manage the technical developments of ECM), and Learning and Teaching Solutions (LTS), who manage the production of our learning materials.
Our core tool for ECM is EMC Documentum; released to a number of early adopters we have just upgraded to version 6.5. - JISC TELSTAR Project Manager : This is a superb opportunity to join a proactive world class Library service and provide leadership and excellent project management skills for The JISC (Joint Information Services Committee) funded TELSTAR (Technology Enhanced Learning supporting students to achieve Academic Rigour) project. TELSTAR is a collaborative project between the Library, Learning and Teaching Solutions and Proquest and is based at The Open University headquarters in Milton Keynes.
The project aims to deliver; more integrated systems solutions for managing course and programme related references within web based courseware; an improved personalised student experience for the management of bibliographic references for learning, teaching and research purposes. - Research Associate/Assistant: Semantic Web: The Open University’s Knowledge Media Institute has an opening for a Research Associate to participate to the research activities realized within the NeOn EU-funded integrated project on knowledge sharing and ontology publication. This work is part of our ongoing research program on enabling the development of the Semantic Web, and in particular, of the next generation of Semantic Web applications, by providing the necessary foundation for the realization of such applications. More precisely, this work is at the forefront of emerging semantic technologies, combining infrastructure components for Semantic Web search (i.e., the Watson Semantic Web gateway) and peer-to-peer knowledge sharing with principles of social networks for collaborative evaluation and trust management in ontologies. Core to the work is the development of a new ontology sharing and publication system (Cupboard), which addresses the need for an open, distributed ontology repository system for the Semantic Web.
- Senior Lecturer in Education (‘Educational ICT’ and Professional development): You will lead the development of courses to extend practitioners’ ability to support the effective use of new technologies in both formal and informal educational contexts (e.g. playgroup, school, home, youth club). This will require understanding how ICT can be used as a tool to enhance subject learning and its assessment across the curriculum as well as in informal settings and workplaces. In addition you will provide academic leadership in the use of ICT to enhance course design within the Department. In this respect you will support course teams in using ICT as pedagogic tools in a way that models the practices that students are expected to develop as an outcome of their study. You will be contributing to the development and transaction of a range of courses as well as playing a key role in extending research in the area of ‘educational ICT’ and the future of education.
- Senior Learning Developer: Are you interested in on-line learning development? Can you help meet the growing demand for professional learning and development? The Centre for Professional Learning and Development (CPLD) is looking for a Senior Learning Developer to join the team. This appointment offers the opportunity to help shape the OU’s Professional Learning and Development provision that is key to diversifying the learning opportunities we provide to current and potential students and alumni and to our commitment to engage with employers’ skill development needs.
- Producer Sound & Vision: Learning and Teaching Solutions (LTS) is The Open University’s media production centre. We take academic ideas and turn them into multimedia products for the OU’s distance learning courses.
We are looking for an imaginative producer to work with academics and within media teams to create innovative ways to deliver educational ideas and content.
What are you like? You are most likely to have started out in television, video, or radio, and will have taken those narrative and storytelling skills into the world of interactive media. You understand the value and uses of video and audio in education and in multimedia products. You will have had experience of overseeing production teams to ensure high quality and on budget deliveries. - Internal Communications Manager: We are looking for a top-flight, Internal Communications Manager to help us align our internal communications with our external image. Working within Communications you will play a strong part in developing effective communications systems, including our intranet, with professionals from within the unit and with colleagues throughout the University. You will be a skilled communicator with a strategic approach.
- Media Relations Officer, Communications: We’re looking for a creative media professional to help us tell the world. The university needs an experienced media officer to join a small team working in a busy and dynamic environment. We are looking for a media professional with proven experience in a press office or journalism. Experience in the corporate sector, TV publicity and social media would be an advantage. You will need to have strong communication, interpersonal and organisational skills to service the needs of internal and external clients, and the drive and enthusiasm to take advantage of an almost inexhaustible source of PR opportunities.
- Publications Co-ordinator, Marketing and Sales: You will be responsible for project managing the production and delivery of some of our University publications, aimed at both prospective and existing students. This will involve managing the output to print, digital and online formats of all the university prospectuses and subject-specific prospectuses. You will also be responsible for the production project management of the core publication which conveys the OU/BBC partnership and its activities.
- Information Literacy Specialist: We are looking for an enthusiastic and creative information professional to help us to develop and embed information literacy skills through all areas of the curriculum.
You will be a superb communicator with experience of developing effective and engaging learning materials and an up to date knowledge of both information and digital literacies. - Business Performance and Planning Manager, The Library and Learning Resource Centre: We are seeking an enthusiastic, highly motivated individual with sound experience of managing budgets and working with complex financial information.
Providing direct support to the Associate Director (Business Performance and Management) you will be ensuring delivery of the business performance and management agenda.
Please note, that (as ever) I have nothing to do with any of the posts mentioned above – though if you do apply for one, and get called to interview or even take up a post, feel free to ping me for a coffee sometime ;-)
