Research Projects Portfolio Administrator - School of Social Policy and Society- 108216 - Grade 5 in Birmingham

Position Details

School of Social Policy and Society, College of Social Sciences

Location: University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham UK

Full time starting salary is normally in the range £30,062 to £31,900, with potential progression once in post to £35,883 (pro-rata for part time positions)

Grade: 5

Part Time (21 hours a week – 0.60 FTE)

Fixed Term contract for 12 months

Closing date: 15th November 2026

There’s a possibility of extension of the end date, and increase of the FTE, during the post’s duration, depending on additional funding becoming available for the post through new research project grants.

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.

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.

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.

Job context

The post is situated in the Intellectual Disabilities Research Institute (IDRIS) in the School of Social Policy and Society. IDRIS is an applied cross-University research institute established in October 2024 with the appointment of Professor Richard Hastings as 125th Anniversary Chair and Professor of Psychology Health and Social Care. IDRIS also includes, in Social Policy and Society, three other professorial staff, an associate professor, two senior research fellows, an institute manager, a full-time administrator, and a number of research fellows, research associates, and PhD students. Most staff are employed on/funded through external research grants, including those funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR).

IDRIS works in close co-productive relationships and with people with intellectual disabilities, family carers, social care organisations, the NHS, and disability advocacy and professional organisations. IDRIS’s research and policy/practice impact is across the lifespan and across sectors (education, health, social care). IDRIS staff are engaged mainly in research on the development and evaluation of interventions and services to support individuals with intellectual disabilities and their families.

The role holder will work across IDRIS’s portfolio of projects, providing dedicated administrative support on larger projects with the day-to-day duties and responsibilities varying from project to project. They will also be responsible for Centre administration, for example making bookings for Centre events and arranging and minuting Centre meetings. Co-production and external collaboration is vital to IDRIS’s research, and so the role holder will often be responsible for liaising with external individuals and organisations, particularly other higher education institutions, groups that represent people with intellectual disabilities and their families including charities, and healthcare organisations.

You will be line managed by the Institute Manager and will work closely with them. As well as providing central Institute Support, the role holder will initially be supporting two projects; A Multicentre Two-arm Single-blind Parallel Superiority Randomised Controlled Trial Comparing A Behavioural Intervention For Anxiety Disorders And Treatment-as-usual To Treatment-as-usual With Adults With Moderate To Severe Intellectual Disabilities (BEAMS-ID Trial) & The SiblingGame project.

Job summary

As a Research Projects Portfolio Administrator within a team/department you will provide support for a broad range of administrative duties, some of which may be complex. You may also be responsible for managing other staff or for supporting colleagues and sharing knowledge. You will be able to use your wide range of skills, both technical and administrative, and have the opportunity to lead on specific tasks within a team.

Main duties

• You will be able to deal with complex systems and procedures and will be expected to offer advice on these, including deciding on the response to more complex queries.
• You will be expected to exercise your judgment on the answer to queries or on the direction of work within parameters set by your manager.
• On a day to day basis you will be expected to resolve more complex queries without necessarily referring to your manager.
• Act as a role model and coach other members of the team.
• Maintain high profile working relationships with key stakeholders on your own initiative, fielding enquiries and ensuring that appropriate information is disseminated to stakeholders as appropriate.
• You may be involved in organising events including booking a venue, sending invitations, arranging refreshments, liaising with speakers and attendees, manage bookings, co-ordination of colleagues, advertising, collating feedback and reporting back.
• Will manage some smaller projects on own initiative, but will also carry out desk research and source data from internal and external sources in order to contribute to wider projects.
• You will process project expenditure and monitor expenditure against agreed budgets, liaising with central finance teams.
• You will be expected to use a variety of complex University systems and processes to research, analyse and interpret complex data, producing bespoke reports as required.
• This may include identifying and resolving issues with the data.
• Support the management, development and implementation of operational processes and systems.
• Process more complex data (which may be financial, HR, student-related or other), monitoring accuracy, chasing up missing information, and resolving any issues as appropriate.
• Provide specialist advice and training to colleagues on area of activity.
• As required, provide a professional secretarial service to relevant committees and meetings.
• You will be required to be responsible for one or more of the following: monitoring budgets including processing payments, authorising expenditure, raising concerns where finances are not in line with the budget, procuring goods and services through the University system, updating and writing contents for the Institute’s communications eg intranet pages and social media dealing with health and safety and facilities issues, HR-related tasks such as managing staff absence, induction, or dealing with leavers dealing with arrangements for international visitors monitoring internal procedures/compliance and ensuring these are followed and disseminated as appropriate.
• Supports equality and values diversity, moderating own behaviour to avoid unfair discriminatory impact or bias on others.

Required Knowledge, Skills, Qualifications, Experience

• Educated to A Level standard, or equivalent level 3 qualification such as a Level 3 NVQ, or level 3 national diploma or relevant work experience evidencing the skills and ability to undertake the role.
• Minimum of grade C/4 in Mathematics and English at GCSE or equivalent.
• Experience of administration in a research project environment that requires liaising with external stakeholders, including members of the public.
• Highly proficient IT skills, in particular the ability to handle complex electronic diaries and emails, the wider MS Office suite of programmes including Excel and PowerPoint, and some experience of using an enterprise resource planning package.
• The post holder should also be confident and able to quickly learn new IT skills and software packages as required.
• Proven ability to plan ahead and anticipate requirements, proactively planning own (and sometimes others’ workloads) to manage time effectively, progress tasks concurrently and work to deadlines.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, including the ability to write for different audiences, and to required deadlines.
• Excellent interpersonal skills. The postholder must inspire confidence and command authority with a range of colleagues and provide excellent customer service at all times.
• A high degree of professionalism, tact, and diplomacy, and the ability to exercise discretion regarding the handling and management of sensitive information/issues.
• A high degree of initiative, personal judgement, resourcefulness, flexibility, and a self-motivating approach.
• Ability to work effectively in a large, complex organisation, and to develop a good understanding of how the University and higher education institutions work.
• Ability to understand policy and procedures and how to apply these.
• Understands the importance of equality and diversity in the workplace.
• Ability to identify and respond to equality and diversity issues in line with relevant policies and procedures.

Dimensions

This role will require the exercise of personal initiative within and beyond the department. May manage a team or budgets.

Planning and organising

The role is required to work independently on daily, weekly and monthly tasks but also on projects with medium-longer-term horizons without daily supervision. May manage others staffs’ workloads.

Problem solving and decision making

They will work with direction from management but with a significant degree of autonomy. They will deal with more complex queries and be expected to resolve any problems in their area of responsibility. They may also manage the workload of others or coach others to achieve results.

Internal and external relationships

This role will be liaising with internal colleagues and stakeholders, likely to be University-wide and with external stakeholders.

Informal enquiries to Alexander White, email:

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.