Senior Research Specialist, Health Communications (Systematic Literature Review)

ICF is a mission-driven company filled with people who care deeply about improving the lives of others and making the world a better place. Our core values include Embracing Difference; we seek candidates who are passionate about building a culture that encourages, embraces, and hires dimensions of difference.

@ ICF Next, we are fearless in finding new ways to solve problems, relentless in making sure it pays off for our clients and committed to making a positive change in the world.

Join our community of mission-driven creatives, communicators, strategists, and technologists to challenge the status quo.

We’re currently hiring for a Senior Systematic Literature Review Research Specialist.

Working at ICF Next means applying a passion for meaningful work with intellectual rigor to help solve the leading issues of our day. Smart, compassionate, innovative, committed, ICF Next employees tackle unprecedented challenges to benefit people, businesses, and governments around the globe. We believe in collaboration, mutual respect, open communication, and opportunity for growth. ICF Next delivers all the strategic communications and marketing services of a top-flight public relations agency, plus the domain expertise and resources of a leading international research and consulting firm. Our strategic health communications and social marketing work tackles some of society’s greatest challenges and drives audiences to make positive attitudinal and behavioral changes. 

ICF Next’s Social Marketing research team is looking for an experienced Systematic Literature Review Research Specialist in the field of public health, with at least 5 years of expertise in conducting comprehensive systematic reviews. The ideal candidate will be proficient in developing methodologies, technical approaches, and abstraction forms for systematic reviews, including formulating research questions, establishing eligibility criteria, and implementing quality control procedures. We are looking specifically for a candidate with systematic literature review experience across multiple databases. Experience conducting literature reviews that are not systematic will not be sufficient.  A successful candidate will also support other research projects by managing, designing, implementing, and reporting on communication and social marketing research projects, which may include interviews, focus groups, surveys, environmental scans, and web analytics.

What you will do:

• Lead the design, execution, and reporting of a three-year, large-scale systematic literature review project for a Federal agency.

• Lead the design and execution of multiple, concurrent theory-based research and strategic planning projects, ensuring that work meets a high standard of quality within budgets and timelines.
• Supervise project progress across multiple teams and staff members.
• Review and provide feedback to team members on research and evaluation deliverables (e.g., research tools, reports, strategic plans, presentations, infographics).
• Spearhead the development of creative solutions to research and strategic planning problems.
• Lead reporting and dissemination of research efforts (e.g., via manuscripts, presentations, and posters).
• Lead submissions of research packages to an ICF’s Institutional Review Board (IRB) a data protection team, as well as the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).
• Support collaborations with other research and evaluation teams at ICF (e.g., related to digital analytics, user experience research).

What you will need:

Basic Qualifications

• Doctoral degree in public health, psychology, communications, sociology, or related field and 1+ years of conducting systematic literature review OR Masters degree with 5+years of experience post degree and 1+ year of conducting systematic literature review.
• Demonstrated experience with previous systematic literature review experience (e.g., peer reviewed publications, white papers, report).

Preferred Qualifications

• The successful candidate can expect to submit a publication such as peer-reviewed manuscript, research report, or an evidence portfolio as part of the interview process.
  • Developing methodology, technical approach, and coding (abstraction) forms for systematic reviews (i.e., developing research questions, eligibility criteria, quality control procedures, dual coding protocols/codebooks, screening (triaging) and coding procedures).
  • Conducting systematic search of literature in scientific databases (i.e., developing search strategies using Boolean logic) and screening of literature sources.
  • Coding quantitative and qualitative data from scientific sources with varying study design.
  • Using En