Policy & Research Coordinator – DEGIS Policy Lab (m/f/d)

We are looking for a Policy & Research Coordinator to help build the DEGIS Policy Lab into a trusted, evidence-based voice on international education, migration, and labour-market integration. This is an analytical generalist role at heart: you will design surveys, analyse quantitative data, screen external research, and turn evidence into clear policy insights and excellent writing. This is also a build role: our outlook is to compile our own unique data and produce original statistics on it, and you will establish from the ground up the reproducible-research standards, analytical workflow, and toolchain that make those findings credible and defensible.

You work closely with the Managing Director and provide the analytical substance for senior policy positioning, briefings, and representation. The Managing Director owns top-level policy relationships and final positions. Our Marketing Coordinator owns formats and distribution across Community and Policy; our Community Team brings lived experience and feedback from international students and talent into the work. You connect these perspectives and make them analytically useful.

What You'll Do

Surveys, Data & Reproducible Analysis

• Develop research questions and design surveys involving international students, alumni, universities, and employers

• Build questionnaires, assess sampling and data quality, and identify potential bias and methodological limitations

• Clean, analyse, and visualise quantitative data reproducibly in a scripted environment – we work primarily in R, but strong Python or Stata skills and a readiness to work in R are equally welcome

• Use descriptive statistics, significance testing, and basic regression logic appropriately – and distinguish correlation from causality

• Keep raw data immutable and make every result a saved, re-runnable script rather than a one-off calculation — documenting data sources, assumptions, coding decisions, and limitations so that any published figure can be independently reproduced and defended, not merely asserted

Policy Intelligence & Writing

• Systematically screen studies, policy papers, and reports from universities, ministries, OECD, EU institutions, DAAD, SVR, foundations, associations, and research institutes

• Assess evidence for methodological quality, relevance, and transferability; compare sources and identify gaps or contradictions

• Connect external evidence with our own data and community experience and derive clear implications for Germany

• Write strong first and near-final drafts of policy papers, policy briefs, insight pieces, executive summaries, argumentation papers, and Managing Director briefings

• Develop evidence-based LinkedIn drafts with clear messages, accurate claims, and sourceable facts; work with Marketing on final formats and distribution

Presentations, Collaboration & Policy Support

• Present findings to universities, International Offices, project partners, workshops, and professional audiences

• Prepare talking points, briefing notes, charts, and presentations for senior meetings, panels, and public positioning by the Managing Director

• Work closely with the Community Lead to translate lived experience into relevant research questions and to reality-check interpretations

• Help build the Policy Lab from the ground up: establish its reproducible-research standards and analytical toolchain, set up a structured and searchable knowledge base, and shape the research agenda and quality standards

AI-Supported Research with Human Quality Control

• Use Artificial Intelligence as an accelerator — for search strategies, literature triage, survey drafts, writing and debugging analysis code, documentation, visualisation, and first text structures — while the method itself always lives in reproducible, saved code, not in a chat

• Design repeatable AI-supported workflows that save time while keeping sources, prompts, analytical decisions, and outputs traceable

• Verify every AI-generated claim, citation, quotation, calculation, and code result against sources, underlying data, and reproducible tests

• Recognise hallucinations, false precision, bias, and unsupported conclusions; protect confidential and personal data and use only approved systems

What We're Looking For

You do not need many years of experience; we care about whether you can analyse data, think clearly, and write exceptionally well. Here's what matters to us:

• A Master’s degree in public policy, economics, empirical social sciences, political science, sociology, education research, or a related field

• Practical experience designing and running surveys, including questionnaire design, sampling considerations, and data-quality assessment

• Around 2–3 years of relevant experience in a research institute, think tank, foundation, consultancy, university, NGO, public-sector, or policy environment

• Practical command of a scripted analysis environment – we use R day-to-day; strong Python or Stata skills and a willingness to work in R are equally welcome

• Sound understanding of samples, data quality, bias, uncertainty, statistical significance, correlation, causality, and basic regression logic

• Excellent structured writing: you can turn complex evidence into concise, accurate, and persuasive policy content

• Confidence presenting findings to professional audiences and the judgement to communicate uncertainty honestly

• Very strong German (C1 or equivalent) and fluent English, written and spoken

• A structured, independent working style and a reproducibility mindset — you treat the saved script and documented data as the real deliverable, and you are comfortable setting up standards and tooling where none exist yet — plus genuine interest in international education, migration, integration, and labour markets

• Based in Berlin or open to relocating; we work hybrid but value regular in-person time at our Mitte office

Nice to Have

• An empirical Master’s thesis or comparable research project in which you independently applied quantitative methods

• Knowledge of the German higher-education or migration system

• Experience with policy briefs, data visualisation, Git, Quarto, or R Markdown

• First experience with LinkedIn thought leadership or presenting research externally

What We Offer

• The opportunity to help build a new Policy Lab from the ground up, with real ownership from day one

• Direct collaboration and regular analytical sparring with the Managing Director

• Gross annual salary of €48,000–€50,000, depending on relevant experience and demonstrated capabilities

• Hybrid work setup with flexibility to work from home or abroad (with prior agreement)

• Access to our office in Berlin Mitte whenever you need it

• Monthly team events and a close-knit, international team culture

• Home-office equipment, work laptop, and phone

• Learning budget for courses and books and a steep learning curve with room to grow

Equal Opportunity

We are committed to building an inclusive team. What matters to us is what you bring to the table – your skills, mindset, and potential – regardless of age, gender identity, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability status, or religion. Please leave photos and age out of your application.

How to Apply

Send one PDF document with your CV, short cover letter, and one or two relevant writing samples. Please also include your empirical Master’s thesis or a concise summary of its research question, methods, and findings. Shortlisted candidates will be asked for a short R, Python, or Stata code sample or a repository link and will complete a compact, role-relevant assessment; it will not be used as unpaid work for DEGIS.