Associate Director of Research & Development - Royal Brompton Hospital

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

• Contracting and commercial management
  • To provide an efficient and fully competent function for contracting and setting up non-commercial research studies through the Research Office and / or the Trust’s central R&D teams
  • To ensure that the set-up and contracting of all non-commercial studies is compliant with all Trust and external research governance and regulations
  • To liaise with Trust central R&D teams to ensure that knowledge and practice of regulatory compliance and governance activities within the Research Office and across the Clinical Group remains up to date and appropriately audited
  • To maintain productive working relationships with legal advisors and commercialisation partners within & outside the Trust so as to (inter alia)( maximise the value of any intellectual property arising from the work of Clinical Group researchers
  • To arrange for the KHP CTO to take on the set-up and contracting for all commercial and CTIMP research studies / trials originated by researchers at RBH & HH
  • To monitor and measure the performance of the KHP CTO in the contracting and setting up of commercial and CTIMP studies originated by researchers across the whole of the Clinical Group; and to provide input into, and hold the CTO accountable for, the management of this performance
  • To initiate, negotiate and secure new research with other organisations (eg peer NHS Trusts), bringing them together with principal investigators and research groups within the Clinical Group

• Delivery support
  • To provide timely feedback to study / trial PIs and other researchers on progress in setting-up, contracting and recruiting to studies / trials within the CTO (commercial) or within the Research Office / central R&D teams (non-commercial)
  • To provide intellectual support and guidance in the preparation of grant and funding applications to Senior Researchers/Investigators
  • To support research leads and managers in monitoring and managing each directorate’s study / project portfolios, identifying and sharing best practice between the directorates; and to ensure that these portfolios are well-aligned with clinical priorities
  • To support the appropriate link-up across directorates between researchers, research leads & research managers within the same domain (eg cv, respiratory or critical care), and to facilitate the recruitment of patients from all directorates / sites within the CG into the same studies
  • Mid-term, working with the deputy medical directors, to bring about appropriate harmonisation and standardisation of practice (eg study assessment / prioritisation criteria) across all directorates
  • To liaise regularly with CG teams providing diagnostic tests for research studies, so as to understand their capacity and constraints, to pursue solutions for these constraints and to ensure their costs are fully reimbursed
  • To develop further and perpetuate a strong ‘can do’ / ‘customer-centric’ ethos within all research office, nursing and support teams to supporting all PRs / researchers in the set-up and delivery of research studies

• Relationship management
  • To liaise and build beneficial relationships with i) Research & Development (R&D) Directors of major pharmaceutical and medtech companies; ii) senior management and academic clinicians within Medical Charities, Research Councils & Networks, and other grant giving bodies; iii) senior academics, researchers and administrators within universities (including but not limited to ICL, KCL, Brunel, South Bank and Buckinghamshire)
  • To ensure that research leads and managers are introduced to, and have an influential ‘voice’ with, all relevant research grant-giving and funding organisations
  • Working with GSTT and RBHH Charities in particular, to develop jointly multi-year funding programmes to stimulate and deliver research that meet their funding objectives and our service objectives
  • To build good working relationships with R&D Directors in peer Trusts and centres within and outside the NHS so as to facilitate research collaboration (eg the set-up of multi-centre studies / trials) and benchmarking (eg around costings to set-up a study)

• Strategy development
  • Working with the deputy medical directors, to ensure research priorities are aligned with and support clinical priorities; and to design and implement a workable methodology for measuring and embedding ‘real-world’ impact of research on clinical practice
  • To encourage and to monitor i) the impact of directorates’ research study portfolios on, ii) the involvement in studies of patients from, underserved cohorts
  • Ensure Clinical Group representatives are contributing effectively to the KHP CAGs and to the development of clinically relevant scientific themes and priorities
  • To lead the development of a 5 year research strategy for the Clinical Group, while in the interim translating the objectives of i) the Trust Research strategy, ii) the R&I committee’s Terms of Reference, into actionable delivery plans

• Education and promotion
  • To work with KCL and ICL’s CATOs to deliver relevant and effective programmes to engage and train non-medical clinical staff to become active researchers
  • To contribute to the development of the Trust’s nursing and AHP research strategies, and to support their delivery within the Clinical Group
  • To work with service leads across all directorates to promote research to staff from all clinical disciplines as a worthwhile and valuable part of their careers
  • To develop and implement plans consistently to communicate to i) all grant-funding and academic partners, ii) all staff within the HL&CC CG, all of the research discoveries and research-based enhancements to clinical practice achieved by HL&CC CG researchers
  • To oversee all research training activities for the Clinical Group
  • To promote a clear understanding amongst HL&CC CG staff of what research is vs service development vs audit, and to guide unsolicited approaches into adopting the appropriate approach

• Financial management
  • To manage the budget of the HL&CC CG Research Office and biobanking teams
  • To maximise the research income earned by the HL&CC CG
  • To support the Director of the CRF in the management of the CRF and research nursing budgets
  • To ensure all costings related to the set-up, contracting and delivery of commercial, CTIMP and non-commercial research studies are accurate and sufficient both to cover direct study costs and to recoup overhead costs, while also remaining competition

You will lead HL&CC CG’s Research Office and work with research leads and research managers across all five directorates of the Clinical Group in providing excellent support in study set-up and contracting, encouraging more clinicians from all disciplines to become research-active, and managing the Clinical Group’s relationships with key grant-funding organisations.

Closing Date: Monday 13^th February (Due to the popularity of some positions, we reserve the right to close the vacancies early on receipt of sufficient applicants.)

Interview Date: to be confirmed, but during the week commencing 27^th February 2023