Market Research Specialist in Edinburgh

Overview

Salary: National (Edinburgh and Leeds) ranging from £74,900 to £86,370 and London from £82,300 to £95,000 (salary offered will be based on skills and experience)

This role is graded as: Technical Specialist, Regulatory

About The FCA And Team

We regulate financial services firms in the UK, to keep financial markets fair, thriving and effective. By joining us, you’ll play a key part in protecting consumers, driving economic growth, and shaping the future of UK finance services.

SPC oversees firms and individuals (supervision), creates and reviews the rules by which they operate (policy) and identifies and remedies ineffective competition in markets (competition). The FCA’s Market Research Team (MRT) provides vital consumer insights that support regulatory decisions. They deliver the Financial Lives survey – a key, nationally representative study tracking UK consumer attitudes, behaviours and financial experiences. They also deliver other data‑driven consumer, firm and stakeholder insights, through bespoke market research and collaboration with third‑party data providers. The team embeds evidence across the FCA to inform policy, identify emerging issues and keep consumer and firm voices central to regulation.

Role Responsibilities

• The holder will be a subject matter expert, who can bring market research best practice and insights and new ideas into the team, and be able to challenge suppliers on the methodologies and designs they offer.
• You will be expected to advise the team on research design, sampling, weighting and analysis, and to take ownership of changes and innovation. This will include helping to improve the Financial Lives survey (FLS) where necessary.
• Primarily, it will involve designing other research and working with our suppliers and their statisticians so that they design and deliver top-quality research.
• You will co-author/ take on lead authorship of our FLS main report, from producing the outline, to taking the report through governance for its publication.
• You will be responsible for a series of smaller FLS spotlight reports, authoring some and supporting others in the team to do so.
• You will also take responsibility for creating and managing a new Consumer Research series on the FCA’s website.
• You will be responsible for one or two of the retail financial sectors or topics covered by the FLS.
• You will manage or contribute to other complex financial services research projects, from clarifying business/research objectives and writing the Statement of Requirements (SoRs), through assessing bids, and working with winning agencies to deliver high quality outputs.
• You will manage multiple stakeholder relationships, including colleagues across the FCA who commission or use research, suppliers, and external stakeholders.
• The holder will support the team manager and two lead associates to manage the work of the team and provide some on-the-job training.

Minimum requirements

Skills required

• Proven experience in financial services research and reporting, with proven experience of designing high-calibre quantitative and qualitative research market research, and of authoring high-quality research reports and technical reports for publication.
• Demonstrated ability to support innovation within the team, in terms of improving our understanding of recent developments in market research data collection and design.
• Demonstrable experience in leadership; coaching, mentoring and supporting less experienced team members on research design and analysis.
• Strong data analytical capability with a proven ability to quickly, clearly and efficiently draw out key and meaningful implications from a broad and varied range of information.
• Strong technical abilities, including survey sampling, segmentations, weighting, advanced analytical skills and high-quality data visual representation.
• Expertise in managing research requests, drawing out business and research objectives, and producing clear, fit‑for‑purpose Statements of Requirements for a range of research briefs.
• Excellent written and oral communication skills, with the credibility to effectively engage with FCA senior management, and confident in leading stakeholder engagement.
• Applies a risk‑based approach to decision‑making, delivering sound and well‑justified judgements.
• Able to work autonomously, to prioritise and to co-ordinate/ deliver to schedule work for FLS and for a wide range of non-FLS work.
• Demonstrable understanding of the demands on the team to deliver high-quality research and actionable insights.

Benefits

28 days’ annual leave plus