Programme Manager - College Of Medical And Dental Sciences - 103717 - Grade 8

Position Details

College of Medical and Dental Sciences

Location: University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham UK

Full time starting salary is normally in the range £45,585 to £54,395 with potential progression once in post to £61,198

Grade: 8

Full Time, Fixed Term contract up to June 2028

Closing date: 14th April 2024

International travel may be required for this role

Our offer to you

People are at the heart of what we are and do.

The University of Birmingham is proud to have been a part of the City of Birmingham and the wider region for over 100 years, and we are equally proud to be recognised as a leading global university. We want to attract talented people from across the city and beyond, support them to succeed, and celebrate their success.

We are committed to helping the people who work here to develop through our sector-leading Birmingham Professional programme which provides all professional services staff with development opportunities and the encouragement to reach their full potential. With almost 5,000 professional services jobs in a wide-range of functions in Edgbaston and in our campus in Dubai, there are plenty of opportunities for you to be able to develop your career at the University.

We believe there is no such thing as a typical member of staff and that diversity is a source of strength that underpins the exchange of ideas, innovation, and debate. We warmly welcome people from all backgrounds and are committed to fostering an inclusive environment where diversity is at the heart of who and what we are, and how we work.

Supporting our people to achieve a healthy work/life balance is important both to our employees and to the success of the University and, depending on the role, we offer a variety of flexible working arrangements. We therefore welcome discussions on all forms of flexible working. In addition, you will receive a generous package of benefits including 40 days paid holiday a year, one paid day a year for volunteering, occupational sick pay, and a pension scheme. We also have three high quality subsidised day nurseries.

The University is situated in leafy Edgbaston and there are excellent transport links to our beautiful campus, including main bus routes and a train station on site. On campus we have a state-of-the-art sports centre with pool, shops, places to eat and drink, our own art gallery, museum and botanical gardens.

Find out more about the benefits of working for the University of Birmingham

Background

The Research Delivery team, part of the College of Medical & Dental Sciences Research Office, is a vibrant hub for Professional Service staff (~40 individuals) supporting high-value, strategically important projects and programmes. We work closely with both Professional Services colleagues and Academics across the University and partner organisations, to maximise the impact of funded research, and lead on the development of renewals for large infrastructure awards. The portfolio of research supported is wide ranging ( https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/research/medical-dental/index.aspx ) and includes the recently renewed NIHR Birmingham Biomedical Research Centre - https://www.birminghambrc.nihr.ac.uk/ - and the NIHR Global Health Research Unit on Global Surgery - https://www.globalsurgeryunit.org/global-surgery-our-teams/ . Much of the research supported is interdisciplinary and international in nature.

The advertised role will be embedded within the Research Delivery team, which is located in the Institute of Applied Health. The candidate will benefit from established relationships with programme partners and key stakeholders including NHS Trusts, collaborating research institutions both locally, nationally and globally, patient and public contributors, charities and funders.

Role Summary

We are seeking an ambitious, experienced individual who can develop their programme management career with us, working as part of an inclusive, supportive team within global health and UK research. We welcome applicants with relevant experience in managing international multidisciplinary research working with vulnerable groups and which takes place in both the UK and low- and middle-income countries.

The Programme Manager role will support two recently funded projects. 1. A multi-million-pound Global Health project working across five countries to understand and prevent violence against women and violence against children. 2. A multidisciplinary project based in the UK to develop an equitable approach to reducing gambling related harms. A brief summary of the activities we are proposing to do as part of these projects are below:

Violence against women and children:

Our primary aim is to work across five countries ( South Africa, Mexico, Peru, Brazil and Sri Lanka ) to co-produce (with survivors of violence) research which will help us understand the effects of violence across different contexts, provide recommendations to prevent violence and build local research capacity. We will work in five domains:

• Community engagement and involvement: Our first focus is to develop survivor panels that represent a diverse range of people affected by violence. We also aim to provide training to local communities so that they can learn basic research skills and actively contribute to our efforts.
• Understanding the burden: We want to gather information about the extent of violence in each community. To do this, we will examine the available data and identify any gaps. We will also pay attention to groups of people who are not well-represented in the data. Additionally, we aim to estimate the hidden impact of violence that might not be immediately apparent. By collecting data from underserved groups, we hope to get a more complete picture of the problem. For the first time, we will also include violence against women and children in a model called the Global Burden of Disease, which helps us understand the overall health impact.
• Estimating the economic impacts and social burden: We will study the economic consequences of VAW/C level. By doing so, we aim to make a strong case, based on both economic and human rights perspectives, for investing in violence prevention. We want to show why it is important to allocate resources to stop violence from happening in the first place.
• Influencing interventions and policy: Our goal is to develop frameworks that are culturally sensitive and can be used to evaluate services designed to prevent violence in each country. We will also examine how national policies align with our goals, identify any gaps, and provide recommendations on which areas should be prioritized in order to have the greatest impact. We want to make sure that public policies and interventions are effective and make a real difference.
• Training: We believe in the power of knowledge exchange, so we plan to conduct workshops, provide mentorship, and create educational videos. Our aim is to enhance understanding and awareness of violence prevention strategies. Additionally, we want to build research capacity by supporting early career researchers and providing opportunities for doctoral students in LMICS.

Gambling project:

Step 1: We will look at research on laws intended to reduce the harms caused by gambling, to understand if they work as they are supposed to. Next, we will talk to people who are affected by gambling problems to get their thoughts about when and why laws work well, or do not work well. Then, we will combine this information to identify key lessons about what laws are most helpful in preventing gambling harm. We will share these lessons with people who make and enforce laws, as well as with researchers and the public.

Step 2: To understand the harms caused by gambling, we will look at different sets of data to see who is most affected by gambling problems, and how big these problems are. We will also do a large UK survey to ask people in communities that might not have been heard from before. This way, we can learn more about the different ways that gambling can affect people.

Step 3: After we learn about the laws, and the problems, we will ask different groups of experts about the key outcomes that we should measure to help us in the future to reduce gambling harms. These experts will include people who are directly affected by gambling harm, and their family members, along with charities, and those who make laws around gambling.

This role will typically include coordinating and managing these two research programmes, liaising with international and UK partners to ensure delivery of all work packages, overseeing regulatory requirements and contracts, reporting and tracking of deliverables, budget management, risk management, evaluation and review of project timelines and data collection/management, management of meetings and committees, liaising with external stakeholders, and a firm understanding of the research. The successful candidate will be working closely with research support staff and also with academic staff leading the projects, from a range of disciplines. Further, the role will involve sustained contact with vulnerable groups participating in the research projects, to support their effective engagement.

Main Duties

Project Delivery

• Responsible for managing large or multiple projects that will have contributors from multiple areas. This will include some or all of the following:
  • leading on the management of the project, including influencing and developing complex project plans
  • creating and maintaining an overall project management plan using project management principles and using appropriate software
  • identifying objectives and indicators of success
  • planning, organising and maintaining a regular schedule of project meetings and ensuring sufficient engagement by all relevant parties to the project
  • establishing effective networking relationships with all stakeholders
  • managing the budget for the project as required
  • delivering project outputs as agreed with senior management, on time, to budget and to the agreed quality standard

Monitoring, evaluation and communication

• Develop and implement a comprehensive evaluation strategy for the project.
• Establish and implement reporting procedures which meet requirements, and ensure all necessary data is gathered in a timely and efficient manner.
• Analyse data to determine if it is fit for purpose, and take appropriate action to ensure data quality where necessary.
• Develop reporting mechanisms for the project then report on project progress to the project board or equivalent and highlight any risks.
• Maintain a risk register as appropriate, and communicate risks in a timely manner, proactively proposing solutions.
• Engage and communicate with a variety of stakeholders to ensure progress but also to disseminate outputs of the project as appropriate.

People management

• Manage diverse groups of staff ensuring relevant targets and goals are achieved within resource constraints.
• Create a motivating environment where staff are challenged, developed, encouraged and supported to achieve outstanding results.
• Responsible for ensuring all annual review processes, including Performance and Development Reviews are conducted in the service area.
• Identify appropriate opportunities for development and change and encourage other team members to do the same.
• Guide staff through periods of change, communicating a clear and positive vision.

General

• Actively manages equality, diversity and inclusion through monitoring and evaluation and actively challenging unacceptable behaviour.
• Supports the University’s sustainability agenda through resource efficient working.
• Any other duties commensurate with the grade.
• Actively engages vulnerable communities to ensure their voices are represented

Required Knowledge, Skills, Qualifications, Experience

• Relevant degree or relevant equivalent professional qualification, plus significant project management experience (in increasingly large and/or complex projects) or substantial relevant experience evidencing the experience required in this role
• Formal Project Management qualifications such as APMP, Prince2 or MSP
• Authoritative knowledge of the work practices, processes and procedures relevant to the role, including broader sector awareness.
• Proven ability to meet targets, with minimal supervision to deadlines
• Substantial experience of engaging, and collaborating, with internal and external stakeholders.
• Proven analytical and problem-solving skills that will help to identify and implement improvements and efficiencies across the project or projects you work on
• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills, and when under pressure, with the ability to influence and negotiate effectively with a range of stakeholders
• Experience of managing large financial budgets along with experience of budget planning and forecasting
• Highly proficient IT skills, including the MS Office suite. You should be confident and able to quickly learn new IT skills and software packages as required
• Excellent people management skills, with some experience of leading, motivating and managing diverse teams
• High level of self-motivation and personal accountability with ability to plan and deliver goals to deadlines under pressure
• Ability to monitor and evaluate the extent to which equality and diversity legislation, policies, procedures are applied.
• Ability to identify issues with the potential to impact on protected groups and take appropriate action.
• Experience of championing Equality, Diversity and Inclusion in own work area.
• Ability to monitor and evaluate the extent to which equality and diversity legislation, policies, procedures are applied.
• Ability to identify issues with the potential to impact on protected groups and take appropriate action.
• Ability to undertake occasional international travel.
• Experience of working with vulnerable adults and children and knowledge / expertise in safeguarding.
• Evidence of literacy and numeracy, with the ability to write clearly for a variety of audiences, and to produce and analyse source material, information and data.

Role context

Roles at this level provide authoritative professional advice across a range of activities and/or will lead and manage diverse team(s) and resources. You will use your professional skills to resolve problems where the solution is not immediately apparent. Significant evaluation and independent thought is therefore required to resolve ambiguity. You will have wide discretion to decide on direction whilst ensuring activities are broadly consistent with operational policies. You will be able to influence policy through advising on the impact of policy change and implementation in your area of work. You will need to assess the impact of your activities across your area, with related areas and to ensure they fit with the broader objectives of the University.

Core competencies/transferable skills

Working at this level you will be able to develop and successfully use the following core competencies/transferable skills in each of the areas shown below. You will be expected to take ownership for getting things done, including calling on or joining others to assist. You will be expected to be flexible as required in supporting your department and wider University.

Further particulars can be found here

Informal enquiries to Joht Chandan email: j.s.chandan.1@bham.ac.uk

View our staff values and behaviours here

We believe there is no such thing as a 'typical' member of University of Birmingham staff and that diversity in its many forms is a strength that underpins the exchange of ideas, innovation and debate at the heart of University life. We are committed to proactively addressing the barriers experienced by some groups in our community and are proud to hold Athena SWAN, Race Equality Charter and Disability Confident accreditations. We have an Equality Diversity and Inclusion Centre that focuses on continuously improving the University as a fair and inclusive place to work where everyone has the opportunity to succeed. We are also committed to sustainability, which is a key part of our strategy . You can find out more about our work to create a fairer university for everyone on our website .