Position: Head of Participation
Sector: Biodiversity; biodiversity informatics
Location: Copenhagen, Denmark
Duration: Up to five years contract, renewable
Deadline: Monday 4 August 2008

The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) Secretariat seeks an experienced and energetic coordinator for our Participation work area. The Head of Participation (HoP) post is an exciting opportunity to work in a multi-cultural environment on a major international project playing a leading role in increasing our understanding and sustainable management of biodiversity. The role encompasses both growing the awareness of, and participation in GBIF, amongst countries, institutions and others and coordinating ongoing Secretariat-Participant interactions, particularly needs analyses and provision of services to GBIF Participants as we move to a more distributed network model dependent on fully functional Participants. This is a senior-level post reporting to the Director, with an initial contract of up to five years and a highly competitive salary benefiting from the diplomatic status of the Secretariat. The Secretariat is located in Copenhagen, Denmark with a staff of 19.

GBIF is an international ‘public-good’ initiative (current membership of 48 countries and 37 international organisations) with the mandate of mobilising the world’s primary biodiversity data via the Internet in support of national and international science, conservation and sustainable development decision-making. Currently the GBIF data portal provides access to more than 2000 datasets worldwide holding more than 150 million records (http://data.gbif.org). Secretariat priorities, with the emphasis on growing participation and working through partners to mobilise biodiversity data, include developing protocols and standards to ensure scientific integrity and interoperability, building a global informatics and metadata architecture to allow the interlinking of diverse data types from disparate sources, providing training and promoting capacity building and catalyzing development of the analytical tools for improved decision-making. For more detailed information on GBIF please visit www.GBIF.org.

A. The Participation work area currently encompasses all aspects of external relations, with Programme Officer (PO) portfolios covering:

1. Overall communications and PR to the wider scientific, conservation and policy communities, including website content development, media releases, scientific and popular articles and general communications support to the Secretariat and GBIF membership.
2. All aspects of outreach to potential and existing members and Participants in GBIF, focussed on growing participation and the benefits from participation.
3. Working directly with Participant Nodes to understand their needs, and, via constant interaction with the Secretariat Informatics team, providing solutions to these needs.
4. Developing and implementing training and capacity building curricula and materials to enhance participation in GBIF and capacitate Nodes to take advantage of the concepts, products and services developed by the GBIF community.

B. With the recent departure of the PO covering A.1. above, the HoP is a new strategic post designed to fully integrate the Participation work area in order to better coordinate our external focus as well as all internal liaisons with the GBIF Informatics team in addressing needs and developing services and products to benefit Participants and attract new Participants. The HoP will:

1. Lead the development and publication of all external communications and coordinate external liaisons.
2. Identify and pursue significant new funding approaches and opportunities to grow participation, and the benefits of participation in GBIF, including to promote and coordinate the GBIF Campaigns concept.
3. Broker the development and delivery of key informatics products and services to address multi-stakeholder needs elicited through ongoing interaction with Participants.
4. Play a key role in Secretariat strategic planning and serve as the main liaison between the Participation work area and the rest of the Secretariat and GBIF membership.

C. Prospective applicants should ideally have a combination of the following to complement the Secretariat’s existing skills and expertise:

1. A career track record in scientific domains such as biodiversity, biology, ecology, biotechnology, medicine, oceanography, geography and/or earth sciences.
2. Significant experience (at least 5 years) as a programme/project manager for a variety of high-level, innovative science projects, particularly related to web technologies and/or large data sets and data integration, and innovative large-scale analyses.
3. Worked within and/or have a thorough understanding of the realm of biodiversity information, including systematics, conservation science and policy, and the reporting requirements of the multilateral environmental conventions, etc, and experience working with biodiversity-related organisations, treaties, agencies and networks.
4. Experience working on inter-governmental initiatives and coordinating activities involving a wide range of distributed participants, including governmental, NGO and scientific groups.
5. Experience extracting and interpreting disparate user needs and translating these for development into appropriate informatics products and services.
6. Be output and service driven with a proven ability to manage both internal and external teams and deliver relevant products and services in a demanding, dynamic and multi-stakeholder environment.
7. Experience working as a media consultant and/or of conceptualising, planning and implementing product launches.
8. A track record of successful international and national fund-raising.

D. Personal attributes include that an applicant must:

1. Have superb English language skills; fluency in other UN languages is highly desirable.
2. Be comfortable in face-to-face interactions with a diversity of audiences and sensitive to cultural, political and regional differences.
3. Be an excellent public presenter in both preparation of multi-media materials and in presentation.
4. Have excellent inter-personal and communication skills to motivate a team of skilled professionals and external contributors.
5. Be self-motivated, highly innovative and looking for a significant career growth opportunity.

The Head of Participation is expected to take up office by 1 October 2008 or as soon as possible thereafter. Further enquiries and applications should be addressed to the Director, Dr Nicholas King at: HOP@gbif.org. Applications should include a concise CV outlining relevant experience, with a cover-letter detailing how you meet the requirements listed in B, C & D (and numbered accordingly), and your vision for contributing to the overall mission of GBIF. Include 3-5 URLs or full copies of relevant outreach, PR, media, training, fund-raising and general external liaison products or materials. Closing date: 4 August 2008.

Interviews will likely take place the last two weeks of August in Copenhagen.