Job Opportunity for Senior Policy Associate at Poverty Action Lab

The Policy team at J-PAL South Asia (J-PAL SA) at the Institute for Financial and Management Research (IFMR) disseminates findings of J-PAL’s research; engages with governments, civil society, and academic stakeholders; catalyzes scale-ups and replications of effective projects; and assists in conceptualizing new research projects. The team works closely with the global J-PAL office based at MIT to align the regional strategy with broader organizational objectives. In line with its mission to create a long-lasting culture of evidence-informed decision-making, over the past decade, J-PAL SA has continuously developed and refined a model of engaging with state governments in India which ensures that we continue to build on evidence generation through rigorous research, and most importantly, enable the translation of research into action.

To deepen and expand our work in collaboration with state and central governments in India, J-PAL South Asia recently launched the Alliance for Scaling Policy Impact through Research and Evidence (ASPIRE). ASPIRE seeks to bring together governments, donors and CSO partners with the goal of generating new policy insights and evidence to inform the design and implementation of policies and programs that improve development outcomes. ASPIRE is a joint initiative of J-PAL South Asia at IFMR and Veddis Foundation.

J-PAL South Asia seeks a Senior Policy Associate to join our team to support ASPIRE. The senior associate will work closely with the Associate Director-Policy and ASPIRE Unit Director, on a number of important priorities, including project management, internal and external communications, donor reporting and coordination with J-PAL SA’s sector, scale-ups and research teams.

Key Responsibilities

• Donor Management: Work with the ASPIRE Unit Director in compiling monthly and quarterly reports for our donor. This will include working with various team members to track and synthesize updates from ongoing projects and policy outreach, preparing reports, slide decks, and project summaries for the donor to keep them informed about ongoing activities. 
• Project Management: Through ASPIRE, J-PAL South Asia will be conducting a number of scoping studies, pilots and carrying out scale-ups of evidence based programmes with several governments in India, including in Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh and Delhi, as well as central government agencies, such as the NITI Aayog. The senior policy associate will be responsible for:
  • Supporting the Unit Director in building a pipeline of projects to be supported through ASPIRE
  • Liasoning with the wider team at J-PAL to track progress on ongoing projects, escalate problems in ongoing projects, tracking and reviewing deliverables submitted by teams.
  • Creating dissemination products from completed research and scale-up projects.
• Communications:
  • Developing and executing the communications strategy for ASPIRE 
  • Work towards making ASPIRE’s policy and research insights accessible to non-specialist audiences by writing blog posts in formats such as Explainers and Q&A
  • Lead the development of external-facing communication products for ASPIRE including press notes, videos and the ASPIRE microsite
  • Collaborate with the Communications Team to produce content for social media
  • Collaborating with the Associate Director – Policy and J-PAL South Asia’s Policy team to create policy-research memos, proposals, and slide decks for key stakeholders and partners, including state governments[1] 
  • Work with the Associate Director – Policy to scope new states for J-PAL South Asia to expand its flagship Institutional Partnership model 
  • Work closely with the J-PAL SA policy team to support the generation, dissemination and synthesis of J-PAL’s evidence across sectors.
  • Write about J-PAL’s evaluations in relevant documents with a clear, accurate, and non-technical format for a policy audience.
  • Support the J-PAL SA policy team on any other tasks, as needed.

Qualifications

Your technical expertise, creativity, strong communication and organizational skills, passion for translating research into action, and interest in international development make you an ideal candidate for the position of Senior Policy Associate.

• Education: A master’s degree with training in economics and statistics is a minimum requirement. A technical understanding of economics, statistics or evaluation is necessary to ensure that J-PAL’s findings are translated into general policy conclusions in a way that is both simple to follow but also accurate and undistorted. Strong interest in international development policy, South Asia development, and/or program evaluation as demonstrated by coursework and professional experience. 
• Experience: 2 years of relevant work experience. You may be a recent graduate with related internships, or you may have previous experience in research and/or development work. This position requires excellent project management skills and experience doing so is a must.
• Communication: You are detail-oriented, have advanced writing skills, and are comfortable with public speaking. You understand how to communicate policy lessons from technical academic research in ways that policymakers and non-technical audiences can understand. You are precise, clear, and creative.
• Organization: You are a strategic thinker. You can handle multiple projects at once, meet deadlines, and effectively manage your time. You bring great thoroughness and initiative to all projects you undertake.
• Attitude: You love learning. You are passionate about international development policy and the rigorous research that informs it. You are self-motivated, work hard, and enjoy working in teams.