Director, Applied Research (6-month contract)

Kids Help Phone•Toronto, ON

7d•CA$105,000 - CA$125,000•Hybrid

About The Position

Reporting to the VP, Equity, Programs & Innovation Implementation, the Director, Applied Research is responsible for advancing KHP’s applied research strategy and strengthening the systems, partnerships, and organizational capacity required to support the best possible interaction for young people. The role will support the growth, evaluation, outcome measurement, and sustainability of applied research activities across KHP, with a focus on building research infrastructure, mobilizing knowledge, and enabling program and service leaders to use evidence in decision-making. The Director will be a core member of KHP’s applied research function and will work closely with clinical, program, technology, data, equity, privacy, legal stakeholders and external partners. The role requires deep applied research expertise, strong partnership management, and the ability to design practical evidence, evaluation, and governance approaches that support youth mental health services today. This includes strengthening data and ethics practices, supporting evaluation and outcome measurement, and building staff research literacy across the organization. It’ll take courage, collaboration, innovation, resilience and trust. If you’re interested in transforming e-mental health solutions with KHP, you can explore this opportunity today!

Requirements

PhD or equivalent doctoral-level training in a relevant discipline is required.
5-8+ years’ experience leading applied research, program evaluation, research governance, knowledge mobilization, or related evidence-to-practice work; youth mental health, digital mental health, or community health experience is an asset.
Demonstrated experience building research infrastructure, including ethics and REB processes, data management practices, privacy and data use agreements, and data or project governance.
Proven ability to manage complex research partnerships with academic, community, health system, technology, and/or philanthropic partners.
Strong experience designing evaluation frameworks, outcome measurement approaches, evidence syntheses, environmental scans, and funder or accountability reporting.
Ability to build organizational capacity and staff research literacy by translating complex research, data, and evaluation concepts into practical tools, guidance, and decisions.
Strong leadership, communication, facilitation, and presentation skills, with the ability to influence across functions and simplify complex concepts for diverse audiences.
Experience managing budgets, KPIs, risks, external deliverables, and cross-functional implementation across multiple stakeholders.
Commitment to equity, diversity, inclusion, accessibility, cultural safety, and meaningful youth engagement in research and evaluation.

Nice To Haves

youth mental health, digital mental health, or community health experience is an asset.
Bilingualism in English and French is a strong asset.

Responsibilities

Lead the continued development and implementation of KHP’s applied research infrastructure, including research governance processes, decision-making pathways, and tools that support consistent, ethical, and high-quality research activity.
Strengthen research ethics, REB readiness, privacy, data management, and data use agreement practices in collaboration with KHP privacy, legal, clinical, technology, and data teams.
Support implementation of KHP’s Thought Leadership Strategy, including submitting conference abstracts when relevant and representing KHP at key events.
Liaise with KHP IT and data teams as needed to set up technical environments to support partnerships and projects.
Work collaboratively with clinical, program and data teams to design practical measurement and evaluation frameworks, indicators, and research questions aligned to organizational priorities and youth outcomes.
Leverage KHP datasets and mixed-methods evidence to generate actionable insights that improve the effectiveness, equity, accessibility, and impact of KHP’s services and programs.
Translate evaluation findings into recommendations for practice, reporting, continuous improvement, and strategic decision-making.
Lead KHP's knowledge mobilization strategy, including evidence synthesis, environmental scanning, sector benchmarking, publications, presentations, and translation of findings into actionable insights for internal and external audiences.
Build staff research literacy through resources, learning opportunities, coaching, and accessible tools that support teams to understand, use, and contribute to applied research.
Support clinical resource review and curation by ensuring relevant evidence and practice insights are available to inform program and service development.
Lead the development and management of strategic research partnerships across academic, community, healthcare, technology, and philanthropic sectors, ensuring alignment with KHP's mission, equity commitments, and strategic priorities.
Serve as the primary relationship lead for research partners, overseeing governance, deliverables, issue resolution, and shared accountability across projects.
Lead strategic applied research initiatives related to artificial intelligence and emerging technologies, coordinating external partners.
Support research funding activities, including grant development and funder reporting, in collaboration with internal leaders and external partners.
Supervise a Research Coordinator who will report directly to this role, ensuring they have a clear roadmap of activities and goals.
Lead in alignment with KHP’s values and IDEA strategies, embedding equity, accessibility, youth engagement, and cultural safety into research design, implementation, evaluation, and knowledge mobilization.
Oversee scholar, fellowship, students where appropriate, ensuring supervision, integration, and capacity building are well supported.
Manage portfolio and project budget, KPIs, risks, and reporting for executive leadership, the Board, funders, and external partners.