Situational Awareness Analyst

Job summary

ESRC
Salary: £46,743 per annum
Band: UKRI Band E
Contract Type: Open ended
Hours: Full-time/ Part Time (minimum 0.8 FTE)
Location: Polaris House, Swindon, Wiltshire - Hybrid working available
Closing Date: 18 May 2026

Job description

About the role

This is an exciting opportunity to join a new Situational Awareness Function (SAF) within the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). The SAF is designed to enhance ESRC’s understanding of the UK’s social science research landscape, providing insight, horizon scanning, and timely intelligence to inform future strategic decision-making. The SAF will deliver broad, up-to-date evidence and analysis across the social science ecosystem, drawing on new and existing data sources, and will communicate its outputs to a range of audiences.

As an analyst within the Situational Awareness Function, you will play a central role in developing and delivering high-quality outputs which contribute towards ESRC’s overall strategic decision-making. You will deliver against the SAF’s priorities, working across ESRC and UKRI to gather, analyse, and communicate insights from a wide range of data sources. You will contribute to both ongoing monitoring and ad hoc intelligence needs, identifying emerging trends, knowledge gaps, and opportunities for deeper exploration.

Your responsibilities:

Lead and deliver analysis on the UK’s social science landscape, producing outputs tailored to a diverse array of audiences and decision-making needs, ranging from descriptive analytics to more interpretive and strategic insights. Outputs may include:

• Landscape summaries and dashboards
• Briefings on emerging trends or developments
• Analytical reports and visualisations
• Contributions to strategic foresight and horizon scanning
• Presentations to internal and external stakeholders
• Support the Situational Awareness Lead in shaping and developing the SAF’s analytical work and priorities.
• Deliver joint projects with the UK Metascience Unit that enhance the impact of ESRC’s and UKRI’s research and innovation investment activity.
• Independently identify and initiate new activities, applying innovative approaches to enhance organisational understanding of the social science landscape.
• Represent ESRC externally, including participation in UKRI groups and stakeholder engagements.
• Promote analytical expertise within ESRC, building organisational capability in intelligence gathering and data-informed decision-making.

Person specification

The below criteria will be scored during Shortlisting (S), Interview (I) or both (S&I).

Essential

• Experience of using appropriate statistical methods when working with structured datasets (e.g. bibliometrics, HESA, UKRI grants). (S/I)
• Ability to synthesise and communicate complex information clearly and concisely (S/I)
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills (S/I)
• Familiarity with tools such as R, SQL, or Python for data analysis or the ability and willingness to adopt them quickly (S/I)
• Understanding of survey design and analysis (for one of the two roles only) (S/I)
• Ability to work independently and manage competing priorities (S/I)

Benefits

Alongside your salary of £46,743, UK Research and Innovation contributes £13,541 towards you being a member of the Civil Service Defined Benefit Pension scheme. Find out what benefits a Civil Service Pension provides.

We recognise and value our employees as individuals and aim to provide a favourable pay and rewards package. We are committed to supporting employees' development and promote a culture of continuous learning!

A list of benefits below:

• An outstanding defined benefit pension scheme.
• 30 days' annual leave in addition to 10.5 public and privilege days (full time equivalent).
• Employee discounts and offers on retail and leisure activities.
• Employee assistance programme, providing confidential help and advice.
• Flexible working options.

Plus many more benefits and wellbeing initiatives that enable our employees to have a great work life balance!

For further information on our benefits please see:
Benefits of working at UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)

Things you need to know

Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence can be a useful tool to support your application, however, all examples and statements provided must be truthful, factually accurate and taken directly from your own experience. Where plagiarism has been identified (presenting the ideas and experiences of others, or generated by artificial intelligence, as your own) applications may be withdrawn and internal candidates may be subject to disciplinary action. Please see our candidate guidance (opens in a new window) for more information on appropriate and inappropriate use.

Selection process details

UKRI is an Equal Opportunity & Disability Confident Employer.

Please apply online, if you experience any issue applying, please contact Recruitment@ukri.org

Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.

Security

Successful candidates must undergo a criminal record check.People working with government assets must complete baseline personnel security standard (opens in new window) checks.

Nationality requirements

This job is broadly open to the following groups:

• UK nationals
• nationals of the Republic of Ireland
• nationals of Commonwealth countries who have the right to work in the UK
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities with settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS) (opens in a new window)
• nationals of the EU, Switzerland, Norway, Iceland or Liechtenstein and family members of those nationalities who have made a valid application for settled or pre-settled status under the European Union Settlement Scheme (EUSS)
• individuals with limited leave to remain or indefinite leave to remain who were eligible to apply for EUSS on or before 31 December 2020
• Turkish nationals, and certain family members of Turkish nationals, who have accrued the right to work in the Civil Service

Further information on nationality requirements (opens in a new window)

Working for the Civil Service

Please note this Post is NOT regulated by the Civil Service Commission.The Civil Service embraces diversity and promotes equal opportunities. As such, we run a Disability Confident Scheme (DCS) for candidates with disabilities who meet the minimum selection criteria.

Diversity and Inclusion

The Civil Service is committed to attract, retain and invest in talent wherever it is found. To learn more please see theCivil Service People Plan (opens in a new window) and the Civil Service Diversity and Inclusion Strategy (opens in a new window).

Apply and further information

Once this job has closed, the job advert will no longer be available. You may want to save a copy for your records.

Contact point for applicants

Job contact :

• Name : UKRI Recruitment Team
• Email : Recruitment@ukri.org

Recruitment team

• Email : Recruitment@ukri.org