Research Fellow, Sustainable Development

We are looking for a researcher (holding a PhD degree) to help push the school’s research agenda on Sustainable Development, through the lens of social entrepreneurship and civic wealth creation . Social entrepreneurship leverages the tools of creativity and innovation to drive economic, social and environmental value creation, and to advance positive change in our communities, while civic wealth captures the positive benefits and transformative changes that occur when communities, enterprises, and their supporters come together to improve their well-being and vitality through cooperation, kinship, and commerce. The civic wealth creation lens brings a multistakeholder view to social entrepreneurship. It considers that social entrepreneurial efforts are just one part of a collaborative equation that will bring about positive societal impact, along with corporations, philanthropic organizations, local communities leaders, government agencies, and other stakeholders. 

The research will be conducted as part of the newly launched Coca-Cola Foundation Chair in Sustainable Development, embedded in the Center for Social Innovation . The Chair’s purpose is to lead impact-oriented research , create practitioner insights and programs to fuel critical debate, guide new ventures, and inspire next-generation social impact strategies that shape a more sustainable and equitable world. Topics of collective action, community engagement, and economic empowerment will be given particular attention.

The Job’s mission

The Research Fellow will be involved in multiple concurrent research projects within the Coca-Cola Foundation Chair in Sustainable Development. The Research Fellow will work closely with Professor Sophie Bacq, Professor of Social Entrepreneurship and Lead of the IMD Social Entrepreneurship Initiative , and also collaborate with a growing network of inter-institutional and inter-disciplinary researchers which whom Professor Bacq engages on a continuous basis.

The Research Fellow will help developing and conducting novel and relevant research for the coming years, including study design, application of the latest research methodologies, data collection and analysis, as well as the writing of academic- and practitioner-oriented articles, reports, case studies and/or literature reviews, and ensure the successful completion of the publication process in the leading journals of our field. The Research Fellow will also support the integration/transfer of research insights into IMD programs, engagement platforms, and events. 

Key activities & accountabilities

• Familiarize oneself with latest published research on topics relevant to sustainable development, social entrepreneurship, and civic wealth in timely manners. 
• Design research projects, theoretical and empirical. 
• Collect data, both qualitative and quantitative. 
• Analyze and draw insights from qualitative and quantitative data in a structured manner. The work will range from qualitative case studies to large-scale quantitative studies. 
• Design interview guides based on the study purpose and latest literature, and conduct interviews. 
• Write academic articles publishable, and eventually published, in top academic outlets (e.g., FT50).
• Write practitioner-oriented articles, reports, case studies, and other forms of output. 
• Work collaboratively with other researchers at IMD.