Product Champion and Project Manager –
Australian Reference Genome Atlas

Are you experienced at project/program management, with strong leadership skills?

Interested in biodiversity, biosecurity and genomic applications in these areas?

This could be the role for you!

Role Overview

Reference no: 81189

Tenure: Specified term of 24 months

Location(s): Canberra, Melbourne or Brisbane preferred

Salary: AU$102,724 to AU$111,165 pa (pro-rata for part-time) + up to 15.4% superannuation

What will you be doing?

The Product Champion and Project Manager, Australian Reference Genome Atlas (ARGA) will lead a team of domain specialists, bioinformaticians, data engineers and information technology specialists to build and deliver the Australian Reference Genome Atlas.

In this exciting leadership role, you will use your intellectual input, vision, stakeholder management and program management skills to deliver an Australian first research infrastructure that allows researchers to easily find and discover genomic data associated with biodiversity and agricultural taxa.

In order to realise the vision where genomic approaches can be applied widely across agriculture and biodiversity in Australia, ARGA will provide researchers the ability to:

locate and aggregate descriptions of genomic data relevant to a taxa in one place (e.g. genome assemblies, genome annotations, barcodes, raw data, other -omics data);
enable searching across these data based on a variety of contextual aspects around the organism (e.g. taxonomic grouping (e.g. genus, species, subspecies etc), functional classification (e.g. drought/salt/fire tolerance, conservation status), geographical location/altitude, etc);
enable comparative analysis of genomic data from organisms that have been selected based on the taxonomic or functional classifications, either via download of relevant data for local offline analysis, or via analysis in cloud platforms.

This exciting program will leverage the skills, combined knowledge and infrastructure of the project partners and their extensive international scientific networks.

Project Partners

Leading NCRIS research infrastructures are collaborating to develop and operate ARGA. This exciting program will leverage the skills, combined knowledge, infrastructure, and extensive international scientific networks of the project collaborators.

The Atlas of Living Australia (ALA) is Australia’s largest national biodiversity data source funded by the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS) and hosted by CSIRO. The ALA is the Australian node of the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF).

The Australian Bioinformatics Commons (BioCommons) is an new digital capability that is enhancing Australian researcher’s ability to understand the molecular basis of life across environmental, agricultural and biomedical science.

BioPlatforms Australia is a non-profit organisation that supports Australian Life science research by investing in state-of-the-art infrastructure and expertise in genomics, proteomics, metabolomics and bioinformatics. This is made possible through investment funding provided by the Commonwealth Government National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS).

Duties and Key Result Areas

Use your intellectual input to guide and take responsibility for the delivery of the Australian Reference Genome Atlas;
Provide leadership and strong people management skills to lead a distributed multi-disciplinary team;
Take project management responsibility and deliver status reports and updates to a Steering Committee of the collaborators;
Working with the Steering Committee and User Reference Group to establish and identify research community priorities and gather feedback for function development;
Work with the partners to develop effective communication and stakeholder management campaigns;
Communicate the mission, achievements, impacts and act as the voice of the Australian Reference Genome Atlas;
Build and maintain strategic partnerships with research and government sectors. Establish and maintain partnerships with Australian genomic, taxonomic and collection research communities;
Communicate openly, effectively, and respectfully with all staff, clients and suppliers in the interests of good business practice, collaboration and enhancement of CSIRO and the collaborator’s reputations;
Adhere to the spirit and practice of CSIRO’s Values, Code of Conduct, Health, Safety and Environment procedures and policy, Diversity initiatives and Zero Harm goals.

Who are we looking for?

Essential Criteria:

CSIRO thrives on innovation; innovation that is harnessed by the diversity of the minds and lived experiences brought to our greatest challenges. If you meet some, but not all requirements, we encourage you to submit your application. Our priority is to improve how we recruit diverse, talented people and empower them to flourish.

A postgraduate qualification or equivalent experience in a relevant discipline area such as biodiversity, biosecurity, or agricultural genomics with knowledge of molecular science applications across these disciplines.
Demonstrated experience leading large multidisciplinary scientific research infrastructure programs, ideally with an end-user focus.
Demonstrated experience in program or project management involving multiple partners and stakeholders.
High level written and oral communication skills with a proven ability to represent science concepts to both professional and public audiences.
A record of innovation and creativity in achieving objectives.

Desirable Criteria:

Experience with the application of genomic techniques and methods in breeding/translocation programs, comparative genomics or restoration programs.
Experience working with natural history collections and the taxonomic science community.

Eligibility:

The successful candidate will be asked to obtain and provide evidence of a National Police Clearance or equivalent. Please note that individuals with criminal records are not automatically deemed ineligible. Each application will be considered on its merits.