Happier Lives Institute
Remote (any location) | Full-time
Salary: £40,000 p.a. (or $50,000)
Start date: As soon as possible
Reporting to: Lead Researcher, Joel McGuire
Professional experience required: 0–5 years
About the Happier Lives Institute
The Happier Lives Institute (HLI) is a nonprofit research organisation that identifies the most effective ways to improve global wellbeing. Our work combines insights from economics, psychology, and other social sciences to compare charities and interventions based on how much they improve people’s lives.
We pioneered the use of WELLBYs (Wellbeing-adjusted life years) to evaluate charities and guide donors toward the most impactful opportunities to improve global happiness.
Our research informs donors, policymakers, and organisations around the world about how to do the most good.
This is an exciting opportunity to join our growing team!
The role
We are hiring a Research Analyst to join our small, mission-driven team. This role is ideal for someone who enjoys applying rigorous quantitative and analytical methods to real-world problems.
You will work closely with HLI’s research team across two strands of work: evaluating charities and interventions that improve wellbeing, and our broader research on global wellbeing, led by our Director, Dr Michael Plant, on topics like how and why happiness is changing around the world.
For the first year or so we expect most researchers to not be originating their own projects, but working on the HLI research agenda. As part of a small and growing organisation, you will also have the opportunity to shape research directions and contribute to HLI’s wider impact.
Key responsibilities
Research and analysis
- Contribute to charity evaluations and comparative analyses
- Develop cost-effectiveness models using wellbeing data
- Conduct literature reviews, meta-analyses, and evidence syntheses on interventions that affect wellbeing
- Collect, clean, and analyse datasets relevant to HLI’s research agenda
Research outputs
- Write and contribute to research reports, blog posts, and technical analyses
- Translate complex findings into clear insights for donors and other audience
Collaboration and engagement
- Consult with academics and partner organisations to inform research
- Represent HLI in discussions with external stakeholders when relevant
- Support management of research interns or volunteers where needed
- Contribute to the ongoing monitoring of charity recommendations
Is this role for you?
This role might suit you if you:
- Enjoy working across a range of interventions and questions, rather than specialising in one narrow topic
- Are comfortable putting numbers on uncertain things and making well-reasoned calls without perfect data
- Ask whether a claim is actually true, not just whether it sounds plausible
- Want to build applied research skills with close support from senior researchers
It might not suit you if you:
- Want to set your own research agenda from day one (for the first year or so, most of your work will be on HLI’s research agenda)
- Want a role focused mainly on academic publishing
- Prefer to wait for conclusive evidence before reaching a view
About you
We expect many strong candidates will have:
- Strong analytical and quantitative skills
- Conscientiousness with strong organisational skills
- Training, to a Masters level or equivalent, in economics, psychology, statistics, or another relevant social science
- Experience conducting empirical research or evidence synthesis
- Ability to communicate complex ideas clearly in writing
- Motivation to improve global wellbeing and contribute to impactful work
- Enthusiasm and ability to work independently on a project
Desirable but not required:
- Experience with cost-effectiveness modelling or impact evaluation
- Familiarity with wellbeing research or subjective wellbeing data
- Meta-analysis skills
- GitHub or other version control experience
- Programming or statistical analysis skills (e.g. R, Python, Stata)
Working at HLI
- Fully remote, work from anywhere
- Flexible working environment in a small, collaborative team
- Annual team retreats and opportunities to travel to attend conferences
- 25 days annual leave, UK public holidays and sick pay
- Pension for UK employees – HLI matches your contributions up to 6%
- Enhanced parental leave for UK employees
- 50% of mental health support costs covered by HLI
- Coworking allowance to support you to do your best work
- Opportunity to contribute to research influencing global philanthropy and policy for a happier world!
How to apply
Applications will close EoD 30 November 2026.
Please submit using this Google Form, explaining why you are interested in the role and how your background fits. Include your CV and a short work example: a real example of your most relevant written work (minimum 2 pages, maximum 10; an excerpt is fine).
Start date: As soon as possible – we’re ideally planning for February 2027 but can be accommodating for the right candidate.
Our process
We try to keep the process proportionate, and we’ll only invite you to the next stage if we think you have a good chance of progressing.
- Application form (about 30 minutes), with your CV and work example
- A test task (about 3 hours)
- An interview
- A second interview
- Reference checks
How we set pay: We pay one salary for this role, wherever you’re based, so that pay is fair and transparent across the team. Salaries are reviewed annually. Candidates based outside the UK work with us as independent contractors at the equivalent rate. If salary would stop you from applying, please get in touch at alex@happierlivesinstitute.org.
HLI is an equal opportunities employer. We welcome applications from everyone and do not discriminate on the basis of age, disability, gender, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex or sexual orientation. We believe diverse perspectives make our research better, so we use a structured, consistent selection process and avoid requirements that aren’t genuinely needed for the role. If you don’t meet every criterion listed, we’d still encourage you to apply.
If you need any adjustments to apply or take part in the selection process, please contact alex@happierlivesinstitute.org.
Recruitment fraud: HLI will never ask you for money, bank details or other financial information at any stage of our recruitment process, and we will only contact you from an @happierlivesinstitute.org email address. If you receive a suspicious message claiming to be from HLI, please don’t respond and report it to hello@happierlivesinstitute.org.