WBG Pioneer - Regulatory Efficiency and Subnational Business Environment Assessments
About The Position
WBG Pioneers, the World Bank Group’s Internship Program, offers undergraduate and postgraduate students a high impact learning experience at the heart of global development. Participants gain hands on experience in a diverse and dynamic environment, contribute fresh perspectives and innovative ideas, and connect with international professionals working to end poverty on a livable planet. Background/Organizational Context The Regulatory Efficiency Unit (DECRE) in the Development Economics Vice Presidency supports data-driven diagnostics of business regulatory environments and public service delivery. The unit’s subnational business environment work adapts the Business Ready (B-READY) methodology to city, regional, and country-specific contexts to identify regulatory implementation gaps, benchmark good practices, and generate actionable evidence for policy reform, private sector development, job creation, and inclusive growth. This internship will support DECRE’s core pipeline of Subnational B-READY and related business environment assessments, including legal and regulatory research, expert-based data collection, data validation, and preparation of analytical outputs for client-facing and knowledge products.
Requirements
- Currently enrolled in a postgraduate program (master’s or PhD) in law, economics, public policy, international development, public administration, urban/regional development, data analytics, or a related field; strong final-year undergraduate candidates may be considered if operationally appropriate.
- 0–6 years of relevant professional experience and demonstrated interest in development work, private sector development, regulatory reform, and the World Bank Group’s mission.
- Strong analytical, legal research, writing, and problem-solving skills, with attention to detail and ability to synthesize complex regulatory information clearly.
- Excellent command of Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.
- Proficiency in English is required.
- Ability to work effectively in diverse teams, manage multiple priorities, maintain confidentiality, and deliver high-quality work within agreed deadlines.
Nice To Haves
- Experience with Stata, R, Python, data visualization, survey tools, or structured data cleaning is an advantage.
- Professional fluency in one or more additional languages, including Arabic, French, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Chinese, German, Serbian, or other project-relevant languages, is an asset.
Responsibilities
- Conduct desk research and legal/regulatory analysis on selected business environment topics, including business entry, business location, utility services, international trade, taxation, dispute resolution, market competition, and business insolvency.
- Support preparation, customization, administration, tracking, and quality checks of expert questionnaires and data collection instruments for subnational assessments.
- Assist with identifying relevant private sector experts, public sector counterparts, and institutional sources, and maintain organized trackers for outreach, responses, and follow-up.
- Help code, clean, compare, and validate questionnaire responses against laws, regulations, public websites, administrative data, and other secondary evidence.
- Support process mapping and preparation of short analytical notes, tables, charts, presentations, and background inputs for reports, briefings, blogs, and dissemination materials.
- Provide operational and research support to task teams, including meeting notes, source organization, document management, and other project needs under tight deadlines.
Benefits
- This position is offered under the WBG Pioneers No-Fee Internship Track.
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What This Job Offers
Career Level
Intern
