Research Manager (Eastern Africa Consumer Protection Manager) job at Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA)

Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) is a global research and policy nonprofit that discovers and promotes effective solutions to global poverty problems. As its core business, IPA brings together researchers and decision-makers to design, rigorously evaluate, and refine these solutions and their applications, ensuring that the evidence created is used to improve the lives of the world’s poor. IPA has conducted hundreds of randomized evaluations across sectors, learning both whether programs work, and how they can work better.

IPA is seeking a Research Manager to join its Consumer Protection Research Initiative (CPRI) — a global initiative focused on strengthening consumer protection in digital financial services (DFS). The initiative partners with financial regulators and market actors to identify, measure, and reduce consumer harms such as fraud, hidden fees, over-indebtedness, and poor redress mechanisms.

This position will oversee a portfolio of regulatory partnerships and research activities in Eastern Africa – tentatively including work in Ethiopia, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia. The Research Manager will work directly within IPA’s Financial Inclusion Program, while closely interfacing with our Country Office teams in each Eastern African market with an active regulator partnership. The Research Manager will lead the implementation of policy-driven research and support the development of data systems and tools to help regulators monitor and respond to consumer protection challenges.

Responsibilities

Strategic Leadership and Project Oversight

• Lead IPA’s regulatory engagements in Eastern Africa under the Consumer Protection Research Initiative, ensuring each partnership delivers actionable insights that strengthen supervisory capacity and consumer protection mandates.
• Work with regulators to identify priority policy questions and co-design research or data initiatives that apply IPA’s technical expertise to their supervisory mandates.
• Oversee implementation of regulator-driven pilots and studies, translating evidence and technical findings into practical tools and processes for supervisors.
• Support planning and resource management for ongoing and emerging engagements, including scoping, budgeting, and coordination with IPA leadership, academic partners, and funders.

Stakeholder Engagement and External Representation

• Serve as the primary liaison with regulators and partners in assigned countries, tentatively including financial regulators in Ethiopia, Tanzania, Uganda, and Zambia
• Coordinate technical engagement with regulators on data collection, market monitoring, and SupTech pilots.
• Represent IPA in high-level meetings with government partners, communicating findings and supporting evidence used for policy decision-making.

Research Quality and Technical Oversight

• Oversee the full lifecycle of research activities, from research design, to data collection, to analysis and dissemination of results.
• Ensure adherence to rigorous data standards, ethical protocols, and sound research design.
• Support data analysis and interpretation, emphasizing actionable insights for regulatory partners.
• Contribute to the production of research deliverables including policy briefs, presentations, and technical reports.

Team Management and Mentorship

• Supervise Research Associates and field-based staff working on country projects, providing day-to-day management and professional guidance.
• Coordinate with IPA country teams to ensure efficient operations, compliance with IPA procedures, and integration with broader country portfolios.
• Support onboarding, training, and performance management for project staff.

Operational and Financial Oversight

• Oversee project budgets and expenditure tracking, ensuring adherence to donor and IPA financial procedures.
• Ensure timely completion of deliverables, progress reports, and budget forecasts.

Cross-Cutting Organizational Contributions

• Document and share lessons learned from regulator partnerships and research implementation across countries.
• Contribute to CPRI’s knowledge-sharing efforts, including inputs for toolkits, workshops, and dissemination events.
• Collaborate with IPA’s country and global teams to align activities and share best practices across regions.

Qualifications

• Master’s degree in economics, public policy, public administration, or another field emphasizing data-driven policy analysis and program evaluation.
• At least 3–5 years of experience working in the financial inclusion ecosystem, particularly with regulators, policymakers, or consumer protection actors.
• Demonstrated ability to credibly engage with senior regulatory counterparts — understanding institutional mandates, navigating bureaucratic structures, and framing evidence in ways that resonate with financial supervisors’ priorities.
• Experience designing or managing applied research or data analytics projects; familiarity with experimental or quasi-experimental methods and proficiency in tools such as Stata, R, or Python are strong advantages.
• Ability to interpret and communicate quantitative findings for policy audiences.
• Experience working in low- and middle-income country contexts or in complex multi-stakeholder environments.
• Excellent communication and writing skills, including the ability to synthesize technical results for policy audiences.
• Highly organized, detail-oriented, and comfortable managing multiple priorities in a fast-paced environment.
• Experience working with diverse teams across multiple locations, including extensive remote locations of team members.

• Lead regulatory engagements in Eastern Africa under the Consumer Protection Research Initiative.
• Work with regulators to identify policy questions and co-design research initiatives.
• Oversee implementation of regulator-driven pilots and studies.
• Support planning and resource management for ongoing engagements.
• Serve as the primary liaison with regulators and partners.
• Coordinate technical engagement with regulators on data collection.
• Oversee the full lifecycle of research activities.
• Supervise Research Associates and field-based staff.
• Oversee project budgets and expenditure tracking.
• Document and share lessons learned from regulator partnerships.

• Experience in financial inclusion ecosystem.
• Ability to engage with senior regulatory counterparts.
• Experience in research design and data analytics projects.
• Excellent communication and writing skills.
• Highly organized and detail-oriented.

• Master’s degree in economics, public policy, or related field.
• 3–5 years of experience in financial inclusion ecosystem.
• Experience working in low- and middle-income country contexts.
• Excellent communication and writing skills.
• Highly organized and comfortable managing multiple priorities.