Location: The consultant should be based in Africa, particularly Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, or Uganda given existing project work.

Start date: Immediate

Project Title: Skilling in the Age of AI

Duration: 6 months, full time, with potential opportunities to continue on additional projects at Caribou.

Reports to: Program Director

Summary:
The role is for a consultant with several years of experience drawing across multiple kinds of data (literature reviews, qualitative and quantitative primary data gathering, and expert stakeholder insights to produce well-written public reports) to focus action in “inclusive digital economies”. The consultant in the role needs the experience and confidence to design and lead these studies from beginning to end.

Details:
You’re fascinated by and knowledgeable about the connections between technology, people, and systems. You use diverse methods to synthesize knowledge and advance it through primary research. And you’re eager to share insights with organizations that turn them into action. To illustrate, let’s break down each part of the job title:

“Research” – We’re looking for professionals with a deep curiosity and hands-on experience in applied research. Alongside a strong generalist consulting toolkit, research consultants at Caribou bring a mix of qualitative and quantitative expertise from business, technology, economics, and the social sciences. They communicate findings through rigorous yet accessible reports, presentations, and scholarly publications.

“Consultant” – This role is both structure and mindset. Research consultants begin work with Caribou on a per-project basis, joining teams to tackle specific research questions. One project often leads to another, creating longer-term collaborations. Our work spans surveys, experiments, qualitative research, stakeholder consultations, and data analytics, all within fast-moving projects with clear deliverables. But being a consultant is more than how we work—it’s how we think. Research consultants don’t just analyze data; they turn insights into action. Every research study leads to a clear “so what.”

“Inclusive Digital Economies” – Digital technologies are powerful tools for improving lives and livelihoods, but they also form a larger system—a digital economy—that shapes how we live and work. Your expertise engages the key elements that define this system. You’ve spent years working in or researching these challenges, recognizing the patterns that underpin our core areas: inclusive digital business models, technology for livelihoods and prosperity, policymaking for digital futures, and the intersection of technology, sustainability, and bold climate action.

For this role, we need a researcher to lead a project on Skilling needs in the Age of AI. The project spans multiple countries in Africa, drawing on literature synthesis, surveys, interviews with young job seekers, and expert consultations. It’s a complex, high-impact topic requiring sharp insight and strong leadership.

About Caribou

Caribou is a global consultancy partnering with ambitious organizations to reimagine and deliver impact in a digital age.

We design strategies, manage funds, uncover insights, and measure impact.

Trusted by leading foundations, companies, and governments, we support our clients to deliver programs that mobilize and shape technology to achieve their impact goals while uncovering new pathways to positive change.

As part of a digital transformation, we strengthen livelihoods and shared prosperity, promote inclusive business models and technologies, ensure the fairness and safety of future digital systems, and enable bold climate action.

Our expertise spans many technologies - earth observation, AI, digital financial services, digital identity, and digital public goods, and many broader global challenges, from gender inequity and forced migration to the youth boom and isolation of rural areas. The intersections are many, but so too are the opportunities for progress.

Our vision is a world in which digital economies are inclusive and sustainable.

What it’s like working with us

We have always been a remote-first company. We have no physical office and use digital tools for day-to-day work and collaboration. There are team and regional meetups several times per year, and an annual all company retreat, usually in a place where we have one of our programs running so that the full team can experience the work we do and the impact it has (last year we went to Kenya). This is a really important time to get to know each other, and discuss broader company strategy, plans and priorities. We also cook, play games, do sports and generally hang out together.

Core to our culture is supporting our staff to have autonomy over where, how, and (within reason), when they work. We trust and empower our teams to work in a way that achieves successful outcomes, while providing flexibility to manage all aspects of their life.

We hire people because they are the best at what they do, so we’re pretty sure that our team are some of the smartest and most interesting people you’ll meet. Come join us!

Key Responsibilities

Study Module

• Refine the design of a study to explore skilling needs in the Age of AI, using a combination of interviews with workers, interviews with key stakeholders and experts, and literature synthesis.
• Conduct expert interviews; work with a regional partner to commission interviews with young people
• Work with a videography team to capture first-person testimonials from job seekers
• Analysis: use qualitative/grounder theory approaches combined and pragmatic business analytics methods to identify key pathways for action
• Prepare a report for public presentation
• Prepare a slide deck for the primary client
• Convene and host a webinar with key constituents to discuss findings
• Participate in PR and press discussions around the findings

Other team responsibilities

• Guide colleges on several other research/action research studies underway simultaneously
• Participate in a distributed, dynamic, heterogeneous team of professionals working on youth employment
• Help design and scope future studies under the same project umbrella

Experience and Qualifications

The following experience and qualifications are essential:

1. Ethnographic/qualitative research fluency – Comfortable working with narrative methods and leveraging insights from digital ethnography partners.
2. Clear, persuasive communication – Able to translate complex findings into compelling narratives in both slide decks and written reports.
3. Strategic insight, sensemaking & storytelling – Goes beyond descriptive stats to connect insights to strategy and action.
4. 3+ years of relevant experience – Hands-on applied research experience in inclusive digital economies (broadly defined).
5. Research contributions – A track record of publications in inclusive digital economies.

The following experience is preferred but not essential:

1. Expertise in gender, technology, and inclusion – Experience in gender-focused research, ideally in emerging markets.
2. Expertise in livelihoods, technology, and inclusion – Experience in livelihoods-focused research, ideally in emerging markets and with small and informal enterprises.
3. Applied quantitative research expertise – Skilled in turning survey data into insights through frequencies, crosstabs, statistical tests, constructed variables, indices, and possibly factor analysis or segmentation. This is applied social science, not data science—similar to the approach of a market researcher or policy analyst.
4. Project management skills – Proven experience managing research projects with external partners or vendors.
5. Relevant education – Master’s or PhD in a related field (communication, design, economics, informatics, development studies, etc.).

Required attributes

You’ll be a colleague, not just a contractor, so we’re also looking for:

• A Collaborative mindset – Comfortable working in distributed teams and contributing as a key member. As part of Caribou’s research team, you will collaborate with internal specialists across strategy, impact measurement, data science, and communications to ensure research findings are rigorous, actionable, and widely understood
• Intellectual curiosity & adaptability – Excited to take on complex challenges in technology and development, with a willingness to think deeply and embrace ambiguity.
• Confidence (or audacity!) – Driven to work hard every day to change the world through research.

If this sounds like you, we’d love to hear from you. Join us in shaping a more inclusive digital future