If you’re passionate about building a better future for individuals, communities, and our country—and you’re committed to working hard to play your part in building that future—consider WGU as the next step in your career.

Driven by a mission to expand access to higher education through online, competency-based degree programs, WGU is also committed to being a great place to work for a diverse workforce of student-focused professionals. The university has pioneered a new way to learn in the 21st century, one that has received praise from academic, industry, government, and media leaders. Whatever your role, working for WGU gives you a part to play in helping students graduate, creating a better tomorrow for themselves and their families.

About the Role:

The Senior Research Analyst plays a critical role in WGU’s culture of data driven continuous improvement. The successful candidate is curious, skeptical, technical, and possess a strong business acumen. An ideal candidate is also a continuous learner, working to improve their analytical tool kit and increase productivity. This Senior role is responsible for providing leadership across the IR and WGU organization to gain a deep understanding of the strategies, tactics, and goals of the data used to lead the organization. The Senior analyst is responsible for rigorous data analysis to help guide decision-making within the IR unit and across the university through various collaborations. They are expected to present findings clearly, concisely, and directed toward action.

Overall, Research Analysts in Institutional Research support the data, research, and analysis needs of WGU to improve student outcomes. They will design, conduct, and report results of ad hoc research and analytical studies supporting academic and administrative planning, policy formulation, and evaluation. The ideal candidate is comfortable using a range of analytic methods to answer university questions. Analytic methods include summary statistics, statistical testing, time-series forecasting, and predictive modeling. Analysts will need to be able to communicate results in automated reports that can be run on demand in Tableau and Cognos as well as in written and presentation form. In addition, this position will need to be able to work with internal customers to understand requirements and be able to design user stories. The analyst will use business user stories to define data acquisition requirements and develop, deploy, manage and revise reports and analysis supporting the user stories. This is a technical role that requires extracting and manipulating data using SQL and perform analysis in Python, R, or SAS.

What You'll Do:

• Extract and manipulate data using SQL. Develop database objects

• Code and perform unit testing of developed code

• Proficient analytical skill set and experience with creating, cleaning, and analyzing large data sets

• Develop and deploy complex reports and dashboards

• Create data-informed processes to resolve business problems and use analytical methods to produce actionable insights

• Manage change requests and troubleshoot data issues

• Complete root cause analysis on KPIs

• Collaborate in the forecasting of key business drivers and KPIs

• Present findings to technical and non-technical audiences including executive staff

• Design process and business audits for data quality

• Ability to attend to detail, manage multiple tasks and meet deadlines

• Work closely and communicate effectively with business users and stakeholders. Requirements gathering and documentation from stakeholders

• Responsibility to Lead or Manage an IR-supported initiative or project at the enterprise-wide level

  • Meet and Consult with the project stakeholders to determine scope, requirements, final product, and if needed, on-going maintenance support

  • Facilitate needs-analysis and IR resource allocation of project

  • Communicate project statuses and activities to IR and WGU leadership

• Represent Institutional Research at meetings and other coordinating events to provide IR insights, perspective and results

• Assist, train, and guide less experienced members of the team in technical processes

• Performs other related duties as assigned.

Knowledge, Skill and Abilities You'll Need to Succeed:

• Advanced Excel

• Advanced SQL skills

• Understanding of inferential statistics and predictive modeling

• Understanding of time-series forecasting

• Proficiency in visual display of data

• Experience developing and producing reporting using Cognos, Tableau, Power BI, or similar applications

• Experience with working with different file formats such as JSON, XML, and CSV

• Experience in data validation and testing to analyze, debug and fix issues

• Knowledge of qualitative research analysis, methodologies and best practices

• Experience in KPI development and application

• Expertise in understanding, manipulating and querying large data sets with complex file structures

• Experience and success with creative problem solving particularly with respect to innovative data applications

• Ability to bridge communication and action between business user stories and technical requirements

• Ability to explain complex data and research issues in a professional manner with technical and non-technical colleagues

• Excellent communication and documentation skills

• Ability to work well in a team environment

• Professional communication across all levels of the organization

• Experience working with enterprise data warehouses and big data

• Familiarity with ETL techniques

• Demonstrated ability to identify project risks.

• Experience in change management

• Skilled in project design and management. Can do big picture project management and detail results delivery

• Skilled in stakeholder facilitation. Ability to anticipate customer needs and understand customer requirements

• Ability to work independently

• Experience in designing, organizing, and managing multiple complex projects simultaneously and with meeting deadlines.

Minimum Requirements:

• Bachelor’s degree in Statistics, Economics, Computer Science, applied mathematics discipline, business, or other related degrees

• 4 years’ experience in data analytics, business intelligence, or information technology

• Experience working with Agile methodology

• Demonstrated experience in project management

Preferred Qualifications:

• Master's degree in statistics, social sciences, data analytics, or other related degree

• Experience working in Higher Education

• Experience working with Salesforce

• Time-series forecasting, machine learning, advanced ETL development, Spark, and big data

• Experience coding in SAS, SPSS, Stata, or other recognized statistical software

• Proficiency in Python, R, or Scala for processing and analyzing data

• Experience creating Machine Learning Predictive Models

• Experience in survey design and sampling methodology

• May have broad knowledge of project management.

Physical Requirements:

• Prolonged periods sitting at a desk and working on a computer.

• Must be able to lift up to 15 pounds at times.

Disclaimer: This Job Description has been designed to indicate the general nature, essential duties, and responsibilities of work performed by employees within this classification. It does not contain a comprehensive inventory of all duties, responsibilities, and qualifications that are required of the employee to do this job. Duties, responsibilities and activities may change at any time with or without notice. This Job Description does not constitute a contract of employment and the University may exercise its employment-at-will rights at any time.

The salary range for this position takes into account the wide range of factors that are considered in making compensation decisions including but not limited to skill sets; experience and training; licensure and certifications; and other business and organizational needs.

At WGU, it is not typical for an individual to be hired at or near the top of the range for their position, and compensation decisions are dependent on the facts and circumstances of each case. A reasonable estimate of the current range is:

Pay Range: $77,200.00 - $115,700.00WGU will accept applications for this position until 06/03/2024

How to apply: apply online

Full-time Regular Positions (FT classification, standard working hours = 40)

This is a full-time, regular position that is eligible for bonuses; medical, dental, vision, telehealth and mental healthcare; health savings account and flexible spending account; basic and voluntary life insurance; disability coverage; accident, critical illness and hospital indemnity supplemental coverages; legal and identity theft coverage; retirement savings plan; wellbeing program; discounted WGU tuition; and paid vacation, holidays, sick time, and parental leave.

The University is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability or protected veteran status.