Qualitative Research & Interview Lead - Freelance

**Location:** Remote (United States) **Duration:** Through April 2027 **Overview** This is the largest and most demanding role on a small team of independent experts conducting a funded research study on how prize competitions and other open-innovation mechanisms are used to fund scientific research. The study examines both how universities and research institutions perceive and pursue prize-based funding, and what prevents program officers who oversee research budgets from choosing that mechanism over traditional grants. Findings are intended for publication and must meet academic standards of rigor throughout. Over roughly seven months the team will interview more than 130 people. You own the methodology behind all of them, conduct the majority yourself, and run the analysis that turns a large and messy interview corpus into findings that will withstand peer review. You are the methodological standard-bearer. Two subject matter experts and a data analyst feed into the corpus you design and maintain; it is your coding scheme and your evidence thresholds that make their contributions comparable. **Key Responsibilities** - Design the interview methodology: instruments, protocols, consent and recording practice, and a documented coding scheme applied consistently by everyone on the team - Recruit and schedule participants across faculty, research staff, graduate students, and sponsored research offices, spanning institutions of varying size, region, and research focus - Conduct approximately 75 interviews, in both individual and panel format, across the course of the engagement - Produce clean recordings and structured written summaries for every interview you conduct, and hold the rest of the team to the same deliverable standard - Run thematic analysis across the full corpus of 130+ interviews, identifying patterns, gaps, shortcomings, and barriers to adopting prize-based research funding - Design and support the supplementary surveys that extend the study's reach beyond the interview sample, in partnership with the data analyst - Safeguard academic rigor across the study so that selected findings can be submitted for peer-reviewed publication **Required Qualifications** - 7+ years conducting qualitative research at volume, with a proven track record in interview-based data collection - Demonstrated ability to extract findings from qualitative data and draw defensible conclusions about emerging patterns - Fluency with qualitative analysis software such as NVivo, Dedoose, or ATLAS.ti, and a documented, defensible coding methodology - Experience setting a methodological standard that other researchers work to, not only executing your own interviews - Skill in identifying gaps, shortcomings, and structural barriers rather than simply reporting what respondents said - Familiarity with the academic research environment and how faculty, research staff, and sponsored research offices operate - The organizational discipline to sustain a high interview cadence over several months without letting summaries or coding fall behind - Exceptional written and verbal communication skills; your interview summaries are a client deliverable, not internal notes **Preferred Qualifications** - Interview-based research in educational, grant-funding, or research administration settings - A peer-reviewed publication record, particularly in qualitative or mixed-methods work - Experience recruiting hard-to-reach academic respondents at scale - Prior experience coordinating a distributed group of interviewers to a shared coding standard **Work Location & Requirements** - U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident (firm requirement that cannot be waived) - Must be physically located in the United States for the full duration of the contract and perform all work from within the U.S. - Must be able to successfully complete a standard background check and any onboarding or compliance training required before starting work - Must have a professional, quiet remote working environment with internet connectivity capable of sustained video calls and live presentations - Work is performed fully remotely from within the United States on a flexible schedule, with the exception of scheduled interviews and team checkpoints