About the team/job
We are Europe’s flagship research laboratory for the life sciences – an intergovernmental organisation performing scientific research in disciplines including molecular biology, physics, chemistry and computer science. We are an international, innovative and interdisciplinary laboratory with approx. 2000 employees from many nations, operating across six sites, in Heidelberg (HQ), Barcelona, Hinxton near Cambridge, Hamburg, Grenoble and Rome. EMBL offers and maintains a vibrant, cooperative, team-oriented and open working atmosphere, and the COO is a diverse team of different nationalities and gender. The Bioethics Office, which sits within the Chief Operating Officer (COO) division, is located in EMBL’s Headquarters in Heidelberg, and has overall responsibility for Governance, Monitoring, Training and Engagement in the fields of human, animal and environmental ethics. It has close links to the Science & Society Programme, which facilitates internal and external dialogue on the ethical, legal and social implications (ELSI) of EMBL’s research, and which holds a variety of outreach events across all the EMBL sites.
Your role
You will report to the Bioethics Manager, who runs the Bioethics Office. The Bioethics Office supports the Bioethics Internal Advisory Committee (BIAC) and the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC), by overseeing practical processes, monitoring committee applications, and by helping to coordinate, signpost or support relevant training. It is also responsible for monitoring a growing number of other ethical areas, such as the Nagoya Protocol, Machine Learning, and AI. Project managing all training and engagement activities in both the Bioethics Office and the Science & Society Programme, and facilitating staff awareness of and interaction with these activities; Producing, onboarding and maintaining the internal Bioethics training materials and database on the new e-learning platform. This will cover aspects such as human, animal, environmental, and technological ethics, in a single EMBL Research Ethics course with multiple potential specialisms / modules; Assisting the Bioethics Manager with coordinating Bioethics-related external courses and events – such as producing teaching materials, conducting subject matter research and delivering Citizen Engagement projects; Providing administrative support for Science & Society activities, such as the planning and promotion of seminars, conferences, symposia, and local initiatives such as the Heidelberg Forum. This may include inviting speakers, processing speaker reimbursements and organising their travel, social media promotion and follow-up after the events. You will work in close collaboration with: The Legal Services division, and in particular with the Legal Officer (Research Ethics & Compliance); The Compliance department, and in particular the Risk Officer; The European Learning Laboratory for the Life Sciences (ELLS), EMBL’s science education department; and Communications, and Outreach Officers at each of the EMBL sites.
You have
As our ideal candidate, you will have at least 3 years of project management or administrative experience in training, and / or engagement programmes, preferably gained in a life science or research environment. You will have a degree in a relevant discipline across the life or social sciences, and an interest in ethics, as well as a passion for facilitating dialogue on the ELSI of research. You have strong communication, organisational and analytical skills, and you have demonstrated your ability to work in a multicultural environment and to maintain effective working relations with people of different national and cultural backgrounds. You speak and write English fluently, and preferably have a good command of German (native, or near-native preferred).
You might also have
Previous experience of working with research ethics committees, along with a formal project management qualification would be an asset , but is not essential.
What else you need to know
Please note that appointments on fixed term contracts can be renewed up to 9 years in total, depending on circumstances at time of review.