Research and Impact Associate in Child Health (KTP Associate)

Health & Social Care Data Analysis and Evaluation

• Effectively managing workload and responsibilities between KTP project delivery and academic outputs.
• Successfully delivering KTP workplan milestones and supporting Spread a Smile’s KTP Activity inputs.

Technical

• Gathering, consolidating and analysing historical data from numerous sources.
• Accessing and contextualising other forms of data from external organisations.
• Developing data driven insights/tools for understanding the long-term impacts that Spread a Smile activity has on all the people it supports.
• Creating an evaluation framework that effectively demonstrates Spread a Smile’s impacts on its users which is usable for Spread a Smile staff.
• Gaining access to hospitals and relevant ethical approvals.
• Collecting, managing, and analysing complex data relating to patient circumstances (e.g. differing ages, prognoses & length of stay etc.).

People and Change Management

• Communicating and developing relationships with senior academic staff and senior staff and trustees at Spread a Smile.
• Communicating and developing relationships with patients, families and healthcare professionals.
• Understanding the motivations of supporters and ensuring that these insights are developed into research and communicated in support of commercial and charitable impacts.
• Training and embedding knowledge into Spread a Smile staff in an accessible way.

These duties are a guide to the work that the post holder will initially be required to undertake. They may be changed from time to time to meet changing circumstances.

Qualifications

• Master’s degree with a strong component on research methods training in education, epidemiology, psychiatry, health informatics, or a cognate discipline, or similar experience in clinical settings.
• PhD with a unique contribution to causal inference in fields like therapeutic play in education, child psychiatry, health informatics, or a cognate discipline (desirable).

Skills / Experience

• Experience of conducting research in a clinical setting.
• Experience of designing and implementing trials and collecting/managing/analysing data of different types.
• Proficient with data analysis tools/methodologies (e.g., casual machine learning) using R.
• Some knowledge of fundraising and marketing, or a willingness to learn.
• Knowledge of paediatric care and health play specialists, or a willingness to learn.
• Strong organisational and communication skills, including documenting work and presenting technical and/or scientific information to key stakeholders in the research.

As a KTP Associate, the post will offer the following benefits:

• A personal development budget of £4,333 (exclusive of salary).
• Management training and mentoring by an Innovate UK KTP Adviser.
• An interesting and challenging role, with exposure to a variety of stakeholders.
• Full access to the resources available at the University of Essex to complete the project.
• World-leading Academic and Company project supervision, with project support by a dedicated, sector leading KTP Office.

This is a fixed-term, full-time job opportunity. The KTP Associate will be required to attend the Spread a Smile offices during the week. Office days are currently Monday, Tuesday and Thursday with the remainder being work-from-home, in line with our Hybrid Working Policy.

The University of Essex in partnership with Spread a Smile offers an exciting opportunity to a postgraduate with the relevant background, skills, and knowledge to use evidence-based research and expertise to assess and demonstrate the positive impact of entertainers from a specialist children’s charity who visit seriously ill babies, children and young people in hospitals, and to create an evaluation framework to enable the charity to optimise their service delivery, maximise impact, and increase income streams.

About the business

Spread a Smile brings joy and laughter to seriously ill children in NHS hospitals and hospices across the country. Through in-person and virtual visits and events, our entertainers – from magicians to musicians, artists, fairies and therapy dogs – enhance wellbeing and help young patients cope with the pain and anxiety of serious illness and hospitalisation. Alongside our visit programme, our resident artists help to make the hospital environment more child-friendly and we also deliver a programme of family-focused events, enabling families to spend precious time together outside of hospital. Since our founding in 2013 as a charity, we have built a reputation for developing bespoke relationships with each family and each health setting, so that we can offer the most meaningful, impactful support. In 2024-25, we delivered over 13,200 in-person bedside visits and over 2,600 virtual visits, in partnership with 39 NHS hospitals and six hospice partners.

Please note – Spread a Smile operates dog friendly offices.