Research Economist

World Bank Group•Washington, DC

5d•Onsite

About The Position

The World Bank Group is seeking a Research Economist to support the delivery of the LEADS platform across regions and verticals within the Development Impact (DECDI) unit. DECDI focuses on generating rigorous evidence and leveraging data, analytics, experiments, and research to drive effective public policy. The department is organized into five research labs: Planet, People, Prosperity, Infrastructure and Digital, and Behavioral Science. The successful candidate will be placed in a lab that best matches their skills and interests with WBG demands and DECDI's delivery commitments. This role involves designing and executing research, delivering LEADS engagements, running rapid experiments, contributing to public goods, producing policy-relevant outputs, representing DECDI in forums, and promoting DECDI's work. The position also includes contributing to training, capacity building, and corporate functions.

Requirements

PhD in economics, public policy, or a related field with a minimum of five years of relevant professional experience in impact evaluation, empirical research, and development policy and program design.
Command of causal inference methods, including randomized and quasi-experimental designs, and proficiency in Stata, R, or Python; familiarity with reproducible research workflows is an advantage.
Experience working with field, administrative, or survey data in developing-country settings, including data collection under real operational constraints.
Interest in working across sectors and in moving between research questions and operational problem-solving.
Demonstrated ability to work with government counterparts and operational teams, including the judgment to adapt technical advice to local institutional realities.
Demonstrated interest in development work and the World Bank Group's mission.
Effective written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to translate technical results into decisions policymakers can act on.
Ability to work effectively in diverse, team-based environments, to manage multiple priorities within tight deadlines, and to travel regularly to client countries.
Proficiency in English.

Nice To Haves

Proficiency in French, Spanish, Portuguese, or Arabic is considered an advantage.
Familiarity with reproducible research workflows is an advantage.

Responsibilities

Design and execute research embedded in World Bank Group (WBG) operations across DECDI's sector programs, using randomized and quasi-experimental methods to identify what works, for whom, and under what conditions.
Deliver LEADS engagements with WBG Regions, Country Management Units, and Client Governments, including portfolio design workshops, embedding learning agendas in projects and country portfolios, and supporting data and evidence-based adaptive project and program delivery.
Run rapid experiments and A/B tests at decision nodes along the implementation chain, measure cost-effectiveness, and identify the delivery constraints that determine whether results hold at scale.
Contribute to the global public goods that make evidence usable across and outside of the WBG.
Produce policy-relevant outputs, including academic papers, policy briefs, and presentations, and build client capacity through LEADS workshops and DECDI training programs.
Represent DECDI in internal and external technical and policy forums, including working with development partners and donors to scale up research and maximize policy impact of DIME work.
Promote and disseminate DECDI’s work through contributing to research papers, reports, presentations, briefs, blogs, and other dissemination channels.
Contribute to training and capacity building of clients and partners.
Participate in working paper and corporate reviews, and contribute to corporate functions.