Managing Director

The University of Notre Dame is searching for a Managing Director (MD) for its new Environmental Change Initiative directed by David Lodge. The MD will function as the Chief Operating Officer of the Initiative, and assist the Director in developing and implementing the Initiative's intellectual and programmatic vision.

The Initiative is a new effort drawing together researchers from several ND administrative units to stimulate translational research on ecosystem services. Interactions among invasive species, land use, climate change, and water resources will be emphasized. The Initiative already has strong ties to like-minded efforts in the Great Lakes region, nationally, and internationally.

The MD will have exciting opportunities to help shape and drive a program of significant innovation at the cutting edge of interdisciplinary research to better understand human-nature interactions and help design solutions to issues of global importance.

Responsibilities: 

In consultation with the Director, the MD will have the following specific duties and responsibilities.

Administration, finances, and operations:

The MD must have excellent organizational skills, requisite to the day-to-day management of the financial and operational aspects of a set of activities involving 40 faculty, in addition to junior researchers and support staff spread over multiple Notre Dame departments and colleges. The MD will have significant personnel management responsibilities, including a central role in recruiting, hiring, orienting, and facilitating the work of a cohort of new Research Assistant Professors (RAPs) and postdoctoral fellows (PDFs), and assist in recruiting graduate students.

The MD will administer internal research seed grant programs; manage outreach efforts and lectures, workshops, and meetings; and assume a supervisory role for the Initiative's staff members, including a new administrative assistant to help the MD and Director.

Strategic planning, implementation, and reporting:

The MD will establish strategies to maximize the effectiveness of the Initiative's programs, and play a central role in the Initiative's planning and evaluation of its programs and priorities. The MD will monitor internal benchmarks, and lead regular communication with Notre Dame's Office of Research, including regular budgetary analysis and the preparation of an annual report. The MD will assist in the determination of priorities based on opportunity, and current and future resources.

Internal communication:

The MD will devise and oversee the implementation of appropriate vehicles of communication within the Initiative and with other constituencies at Notre Dame. The MD will facilitate the work of interdisciplinary research groups supported by the Initiative, and will be a catalyst for the creation of new research topics/groups. In general, the MD will help build intellectual communities that are horizontally integrated across disciplines, and vertically integrated across participants at different career stages (tenured and 2 tenure-track faculty, RAPs, PDFs, graduate students, undergraduates).

Proposal stimulation and preparation:

The MD will work with Initiative faculty and staff to facilitate the production of complex multi-PI proposal activities, taking as much of the administrative burden as possible off of faculty.

External relations:

The MD must be able to communicate the excitement of the research being pursued to internal and external research audiences. The MD will manage all the external relationships of the Initiative, and, with the Director, will be the public face of the Initiative. To help shape research priorities and communicate research results, the MD will talk and meet regularly with policy makers, agency officials, representatives of industry, NGOs, and foundation program officers. The MD will establish vehicles for communicating with the Initiative's various external constituencies, including coordination and maintenance of the Initiative web site.

Qualifications: 

Education, Training and Skills:

The MD will have a doctorate degree; demonstrated organizational, management, and interpersonal skills; demonstrated written and verbal communication skills appropriate to both non-specialist and expert audiences; and a vision for how academic research can be conducted and communicated to increase its influence on natural resource management or policy. The MD will also have experience and skills that add to and complement expertise currently present within the Initiative.

Experience in natural resource management or policy, ideally at the national level, would be especially valuable, as would experience in government or funding organizations. Exceptional judgment and the ability to identify important academic work that can influence management or policy are essential.

Experience:

Candidates with 5+ years experience managing people, strategic development, and administration of an interdisciplinary academic program or a natural resource management or policy group is highly desirable.

Compensation: Salary will be commensurate with experience. Benefits are excellent.

To Apply:

Phone inquiries should be directed to David Lodge. For written inquiries, please send one pdf file containing a cover letter, curriculum vitae, and list of 3-5 referees to Program Coordinator Joanna McNulty, with a copy to David Lodge.

Formal application procedures will be available in the near future via the Notre Dame Office of Human Resources. Screening of applicants will begin in early June and continue until the position is filled.