Job Description &

Person Specification

Section 1
Role Overview

Reader / Professor of Environment Systems for

Job title:
Agriculture

Vacancy reference: 3809

School of Water, Energy and Environment /

School/department: Agrifood and Environment /
Centre for Environmental and Agricultural Informatics

Job type: Full time

Permanent

37 hours per week, normally worked Monday to

Hours of work:
Friday. Flexible working will be actively considered

Reader: Salary level 7 – range £54,003 to £60,192

per annum with potential progression to £75,238 per
Salary Details: annum

Professor: Professorial salary – Competitive

Line Manager: Professor Ron Corstanje, Professor of Environmental

Data Science

Closing Date for Applications: 28 November 2021

Section 2
About Cranfield University
As the UK’s only exclusively postgraduate university, Cranfield’s world-class expertise, large-scale
facilities and unrivalled industry partnerships is creating leaders in technology and management
globally. Cranfield's distinctive expertise is in our deep understanding of technology and
management and how these work together to benefit the world.

Find out more about Cranfield, our history, and our rankings and awards here.

Corporate Plan (415i)

Our corporate plan is designed to raise the ambition and enhance the distinctiveness of our
University through our people (staff, students and alumni), the industry partners we work with and
our unrivalled research facilities. To strengthen our distinctive position in higher education and to
grow our University, we have raised our ambition through our 415i goals:

What we value
We value ambition, impact, respect and community. These values inform how we work together and
our relationships with our partners and students. We believe that success is not only about what we
achieve, but how we achieve it. Our values help to define who we are, guide the way we work
together and help to shape our decisions. Our shared values were developed with the active
engagement of colleagues across the University:

Ambition – We aim high. We do all we can to achieve excellence.

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Impact – We change people’s lives. We make the world a better place.

Respect – We value everyone’s expertise. We support each other.

Community – We build and cherish our Cranfield community. We embrace diversity.

Our shared, stated values help to define who we are and underpin everything we do. Find out more
here.

Section 3
About The School of Water, Energy and Environment (SWEE)
Cranfield’s excellence in Water, Energy and Environment is recognised internationally. As a School
we understand that the multiple challenges posed by environmental change today require agile and
transformative adaptation and mitigation solutions.

At scale state of the art experimental facilities underpin the whole system approaches we have
pioneered to address such challnges across each of our water, energy and the environment
research themes within the School. We bring togther the natural, social and digital sciences,
engineering, technology, business, economics, organisational values, and logistics and systems
management to bridge the gap between novel solutions and their successful implementation. As an
institution Cranfield also has the longstanding academic expertise required for sustainable solutions
in technology, science and management, as well as strong collaborative relationships with a range
of influential private and public sector organisations, including government.

Cranfield’s fundamental expertise in formulating and implementing solutions is underpinned by

strengths in environmental monitoring, land use analysis and the application of digital technologies.
Housed within the Environment and Agri-food Resaerch Theme, Cranfield’s Centre for
Environmental and Agricultural Infomatics (CEAI) leads research and education across this area.
We are a member of the National Centre for Atmospheric Science (NCAS) and host the Facility for
Airbourne Atmospheric Measurements (FAAM) within CEAI. CEAI is also key to the campuses
‘Living Laborarory’. The campus is a self-contained and wholly owned ‘Living Laboratory’ - a testbed
for transformative technologies and approaches to delivering social, environmental and economic
outcomes in urban, transport and infrastructure systems, with £7.5 million investment in sensing and
monitoring hardware and water facilities as a UKCRIC Urban Observatory. These unique facilities
evaluate the success of measures aimed at achieving the University’s targets on Net Zero Carbon
by 2030, Zero Avoidable Waste, biodiversity and environmental net gain.

The School of Water, Energy and Environment at Cranfield University is therefore an ideal base to
develop and deliver tangible and impactful solutions to meet Net Zero Carbon targets and address
the key societal challanges posed by United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDG).
Visit the Cranfield website to learn more about the School, Theme and Centre’s current research
activities, taught programmes and impact:

Learn more about Environment and Agrifood

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Organisational chart

Section 4
Job Details
Job Purpose

As a Professor, you will join our dynamic and transdisciplinary team at CEAI to become the leader
in the area of quantitative decision making critical to the interlinked global challenges of food
security, achieving Net Zero, and reversing biodiversity loss. You will contribute fully to national and
international research addressing such environmental challnges, particularly those frames by the
UN SDG’s. You will inspire and be a thought leader in environmental and/or agricultural systems
modelling and/or their socio-economic analysis. The successful applicant will bring together, and
capitilise on, our management expertise in sustainability, resilience and leadership with our
engineering, agricultural and environmental science, and digital expertise to create an
interdisciplinary research programme that will produce a step change in our activities towards
developing solutions addressing the challnge of Net Zero, and key aspects of the UN SDG’s.

As a Reader, we are looking for an individual with the ambition and trajectory to develop a strong
research and teaching portfolio to grow an internationally recognised multidisciplinary research
program in quantitative decision making. You will be expected to have an excellent trajectory in a
research area associated to quantitative decision making critical to addressing the interlinked global
challenges of food security, achieving Net Zero, and reversing biodiversity loss. In collaboration
with colleagues from across the Centre and, more broadly, across the Theme, School and the
University you will conduct world-leading research and teaching to grow your profile and that of the
Centre.

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At either level the successful candidate wil be expected to strengthen Cranfield’s reputation in
research and education and work with colleagues in SWEE and across the University to develop
our teaching capability, and our excellent research profile in these areas.

Key Deliverables

% of
Description of Deliverables
time

Research
Plan and carry out research activities and programmes in quantitative
analysis of the environmental implications of the interlinked global challenges
of food security, achieving Net Zero, and reversing biodiversity loss

Develop and engage in research methodologies that add to knowledge

/understanding appropriate to the discipline.

Sustain other research-related contributions through conference papers and

presentations and/or consultancy projects and advice.

Lead funding bids which develop and sustain research support for the
specialist area.

Provide expert advice to colleagues and students.

Demonstrate and maintain research activity of high reputation in the UK and

internationally in a major subject area.

1 Lead research programmes and teams, setting up and managing the 60%
resources needed to deliver the plan.

Participate actively in the development of the department's research strategy.

Explain and disseminate research findings through publications and

conferences contributions. Publish high quality peer reviewed journal papers
(i.e. top 10%) from existing and new work to meet the requirements of the
Research Excellence Framework (REF) / Impact Case Study, leading to an
established reputation in the subject area.

Expand your national and international profile by participating in relevant

conferences and national and international multi-partner projects

Additionally, as a Professor
Lead the implementation of research activities and programmes of
outstanding quality and international repute.

Manage the teams of people and other resources needed to deliver the
research plan.

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 Lead major funding bids which develop and sustain research support for
quantitative methods in environmental and/or agricultural systems and
advance the reputation of the department and the university.

Lead the process of acquiring, analysing and interpreting research data using
techniques, models and methods selected, developed or devised for the
purpose.

Publish results in articles and/or books which lead to a sustained reputation in

environmental systems thinking for agriculture

Sustain other research-related contributions through conference papers and

presentations and/or consultancy projects and advice.

Provide expert advice to colleagues and students.

Participate actively in the development of the department's research strategy

Teaching
Develop, deliver and examine courses or learning programmes for students
at all levels.

Plan and review own teaching load and approach to teaching.

Design and supervise practical work where it is part of the course, and advise
students on techniques.

Take responsibility for the design of courses and programmes and for their
quality and promote the development of teaching and teaching methods in
the department.

2 Set and mark coursework and supervise and advise students at all levels. 20%

Act as internal and external examiner for postgraduate students.

Coach and support tutorial groups, developing their knowledge and their
learning skills.

Lead the development of new approaches to teaching & learning. This may
be underpinned by research and evaluation of teaching methods and
systems.

Contribute to the development of teaching and learning policy locally, and to

debate nationally about policy, methods and practices through publications
conference activity and roles that advance quality in the discipline.

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 Act as coach and role-model for teaching methods locally through excellent
practice and mentoring other, less experienced teachers.

Act in senior roles within the School or Faculty to advance student academic
development e.g. Senior Tutor, Year Head Coordinator of Programmes at
undergraduate or postgraduate levels

Design and supervise practical work and advise students on techniques.

Coach and support tutorial groups, developing their knowledge and skills.

Act as an internal and external examiner for postgraduate students.

Set and mark coursework and supervise and advise students at all levels.

Additionally, as a Professor
Oversee the development and review of teaching provision for environmental
systems thinking for all students at all levels.

Develop and teach courses or learning programmes for students at all levels.
You will have responsibility for their design and quality. This could include
pan-University.

Lead the development of new approaches to teaching & learning. This may
be underpinned by research and evaluation of teaching methods and
systems.

Leadership and Management

Contribute significantly to the development and running of the Department,
for example in chairing committees, leading development activity on research
or teaching assessment, leading for the department on the admissions
process.

Develop and manage staff and resources, in support of major research or

teaching activities.

3 Represent the university/faculty/school in the disciplinary community 10%

externally.

Monitor and ensure effective management of assets and budgets allocated

as part of the role.

Responsible for managing your research group, including performance,

development and health and safety.

Additionally, as a Professor

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 Take responsibility for the appointment, development and management of all
staff of all types in the directly managed team.

Take responsibility for the handling of major processes in the department

connected e.g. with forward planning, financial management, teaching or
research quality and admissions.

Contribute to the running of the university through designated committee,

representative or project activities.

General
Represent and promote the activities of CEAI, the Environment and Agrifood
Theme, SWEE and the University to external communities.

Support the development and delivery of Environment and Agrifood Strategy.

Recruitment and supervision of academics, research staff and students,

4 including performance, development and health and safety 5%

Develop a set of activities that complement and enhance existing research

and teaching in the School.

Any other tasks required by the Department and/or University, which are within
the remit of the role and the associated grade.

Good Citizenship
Duties for the School can include:
 Serving on research student panels,
 Committee work,
5  External representation, 5%
 Open days,
 Collegiate activity in support of School strategy

Managing and/or mentoring colleagues.

Please be advised that the percentages allocated for the key deliverables may be adapted to
consider the needs of the School and /or University.

Planning and organising

The role is challenging and involves planning, integrating and coordinating diverse responsibilities
in research, consultancy, project management and research student supervision. You will therefore
be self-directed and well organised. You should be able to develop a forward research plan for
yourself and, where applicable, your research team over both short and extended timescales. You
should have leadership and project management skills, ensuring that milestones and deliverables
are achieved to time and to high quality. These timescales will be dictated by the requirements of
your clients and grant funding bodies, and will involve liaison with other project partners from both
within and beyond the university.

You will be expected to integrate your research needs and workload with collaborators in order to
obtain information required for your research. You will also be expected to develop a strategic

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approach to research, aligning it with current and foreseeable future challenges and opportunities.
Your work is likely to range across several different research projects and you will be expected to
have several tasks (e.g. research, result communication, grant bidding and publication writing) that
will be occurring over the same time period.

The role will involve short-term responsibilities such as day-to-day project management, interaction
with a wider project team and organising project meetings. As different tasks will require different
time periods for planning, flexibility and good coordination skills will be important.

You are expected to be able to control the day-to-day management of your time, whilst being
receptive and flexible in your approach to other reasonable requests from your line manager. You
will be expected to refer any additional requests for your input or time to your line manager for
approval. You will also be expected to lead and contribute to communication and publication of your
research findings.

Work will need to be clearly documented on a day-to-day basis, showing a clear development path.

Communicating and influencing

Your role will involve collaboration with a number of national and multi-national organisations,
academic institutions and government departments and their agencies, as well as possible contact
with extended stakeholder groups from the public, private and third sectors. You will be expected
to work closely with researchers from other universities and will be responsible for the day-to-day
communication and collaboration with these organisations. For some of your research, our partners
will provide information that is essential to inform your research, and you will need to manage the
relationships in order to obtain good information, in a timely manner.

You should have excellent written and verbal communication skills. Your role will involve data
analysis and report writing that will need to be of a high quality and delivered on time, and will involve
leadership of research activities. You should also have the ability to effectively contribute to and
lead aspects of large multi-disciplinary teams, ensuring collaborators are performing to expected
standards and are making their contribution to collective outputs. Active and collegiate team
behaviours are the expected norm at Cranfield.

There is an expectation that you will seek large-scale, long term funding from recognised funding
bodies. Additionally, that you will publish at least two to four peer-reviewed journal papers per year
in high quality journals.

Problem solving

Problems will be solved through experience and through the guidance and mentoring available.
Beyond this day-to-day engagement, typical challenges associated with this post would be
concerned primarily with managing disturbances to project timelines and dealing with resource
issues and time conflicts.

You will be expected to resolve most problems using accumulated experience. You will be expected
to be able to relay information about your work in a clear and concise manner and to discuss
problems constructively with the line manager or other colleagues, to help each other, and to be
proactive in resolving issues at all levels with the support of the research team, group, department
and school.

As a Tutor/Supervisor, you may have to deal with students who are struggling with their work – you
may also have to deal with any issues regarding content and delivery of some of the lectures. You
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may also encounter problems / difficulties in negotiating research contracts with clients and in
liaising with the University contracts office.

Decision making

In general, you will have considerable autonomy but with many opportunities for decisions to be
taken with reference to others.

l) Decisions you will take without reference to others

Your line manager will offer general orientation and advice, in addition to support in developing and
implementation of research strategy; there will be an appropriate degree of independence.

 Day-to-day management and planning of activities (including teaching and research) within
the overall specifications provided by project proposals, and/or other frameworks.
 Writing papers for journals (mentoring and advice is provided)
 Writing and submitting proposals for student MSc thesis projects
 Developing and delivering of long and short course materials, providing mentoring and advice
when needed (in many cases existing materials may be available to you)
 Establishing collaborative links both nationally and internationally
 Taking spending decisions within agreed budget limits.
 Responsible for whole project budgets and management; identifying development
opportunities.
 Responsible for resourcing decisions, e.g. project personnel, key purchases.
 Adapting activities to changing circumstances and opportunities.
 Proposing new, innovative, avenues of research
 Recruitment of staff and PhD students
 Activities to enable the dissemination and exploitation of research results.
 Applications to programme grants, and large initiatives will need to co-ordinated with your
colleagues to maximise University success rates.

ll) Decisions you will refer to your manager/colleagues

 All funding based decisions will need to be made with line manger approval.
 Submission and approval of new proposals to existing and new customers
 Develop new research proposals, consultancy work and sources of funding
 Balancing research, project management and publication/proposal related activities.
 Budgetary issues related to research contracts.
 Decisions that involve modifications to contracted deliverables where you are not the
Principle Investigator.
 Changes to the deliverables for research contracts will require input from the Principle
Investigator where you are co-investigator.
 Attendance at conferences
 Submission of papers to journals and conferences
 Development and modification of long and short and executive courses, modules and events.
 Pricing and submitting research proposals will require input from finance staff and approval
from senior managers.
 Strategic planning should be done in consultation with colleagues and the line manager.
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  Strategic decisions will be discussed with the Head of Centre, Director of Theme and School
PVC.

Guiding framework

The principal guiding framework for this role is the University’s Corporate Plan – 415i. If appointed
as a Professor you will also be required to follow the duties and responsibilities of a Professor.

The School of Water, Energy and Environment’s Academic Plan is the principal reference point for
all our activity and sets out our School ambitions, operating strategy and tone of delivery. It supports
the University’s Corporate Plan which is focused on the application of scientific excellence in a
financially viable operating environment.

There are established working practices, processes, systems and procedures that you will learn and
must be used. Alterations to any of these must be agreed with the line manager. You can expect
close support from the line manager in research, career development, mentoring, project
management and publications/proposals.

Our performance and development review scheme provides a set of objectives agreed with the line
manager for the year ahead and expected SMART targets.

Duties and responsibilities should be carried out with due regard and compliance with the General
Data Protection Regulations, Health and Safety and the Equality Act 2010. All staff must conform
to the requirements of the Financial Manual. The role will be subject to normal school and university
systems and procedures. A very high emphasis is placed in particular on conformity with health and
safety, environmental and ethical policies of the university.

There may be occasions when existing procedures may not cover new circumstances and where
you need to work collaboratively with the Head of Department, academic staff and the Department
administrators to develop new processes for the future.

You must respect the fundamental code of conduct for academic and scientific work. You may be
privy to confidential information relating to staff and students and it is imperative that absolute
discretion and confidentiality is shown at all times.

For specific projects, there will likely be documentation which will outline the tasks, milestones and
deliverables related to the project. If applicable, the specific responsibilities of each of the
participants in the consortium would also be outlined in a consortium agreement / grant agreement.

Impact

The role will be focused on meeting the aims and objectives of projects.

You will be expected to play a proactive role in enhancing the academic reputation of the University
through internationally-recognised research, teaching and consultancy. You will be expected to work
closely with the environmental, agricultural and food sectors.

In particular this role will contribute to:

 Working closely with the environment, agricultural and food sectors in academia, industry and
government. Your innovative research will contribute to the future sustainability of the
agricultural sector and inform policy for an improved future environment.

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  Enhancing the research reputation of Cranfield University through international high impact
journal publications that influence environmental and agricultural policy-making and practice
internationally.
 Building up lasting and productive relationships with project partners and stakeholders.

Facts and Figures

As a Reader you will take day-to-day control of the budgets for projects that you are Principal
Investigator on.

As principal investigator for a research proposal / contract, you would be responsible for ensuring
that the cost of delivering the work did not exceed the revenues expected and that it will fulfil its
commitments to the satisfaction of the client. Support is available to help you to do this.

You will be set targets for research income and recruitment of research students.

Section 5
Am I suited to this role?

Criteria Essential Desirable

PhD in a Science or Engineering
discipline, incorporating Environmental Membership of relevant
or Agricultural Science, Mathematics and professional bodies
Modelling, Environmental Assessment
Education / and Systems Analysis (or related subject A teaching qualification
Qualifications area) (PGCert in Academic Practice
or equivalent) and/or
Membership of Higher
Education Academy

Experience of leading a research group Strength and expertise in

conducting high impact, national quantitative analysis of
excellent research on the application of environmental systems using
mathematical tools to environmental and advanced quantitative
agricultural systems methods

Successful track record of writing and

winning research council proposals as
Principal or co-investigator
Experience
Successful track record of winning and
delivering research projects sponsored
by industry and/or government agencies

Substantive publication record, in

leading journals, demonstrating
strategic, thought leadership in
environmental and agricultural systems

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 Extensive experience and demonstrated
success in developing methods and
coaching colleagues

Established and widely recognised

excellence and reputation internationally

Understanding of, and contribution to, Operation of UK Higher

broader management processes Education sector
Knowledge
Awareness of academic standards in UK
Higher Education sector

Skills in counselling and motivating

students at all levels

Good project and time management

skills, ensuring that milestones and
deliverables are achieved to time and to
high quality

Skills / Excellent oral and written communication

Aptitudes and presentation skills and good
technical writing skills

Ability to develop business opportunities

and attract income

The willingness and ability to travel and

work overseas with national and
international partners

Ability to demonstrate our values:

Ambition, Impact, Respect and
Community.

High degree of personal motivation and

the ability to work with minimal
supervision

Values Initiative in identifying and realising

opportunities

Ability to work independently and as a

team player

Commitment to promoting industrial,

commercial and policy relevance of
research and teaching

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 Due to the requirement to travel
Other internationally you should have no travel
restrictions on passport

As part of Cranfield’s continuing commitment to developing excellence in learning and teaching,

members of staff with teaching responsibilities are expected to obtain formal recognition of their
professional expertise in teaching. It is normal expectation, during probationary period, that
individuals will enrol for and successfully complete module 1 (Teaching, Learning and Student
Support) of the PGCert in Academic Practice, which leads to Associate Fellow of the Higher
Education Academy (HEA) unless an equivalent qualification is held already.

The module focuses on student learning, teaching methods and support of students, consists of 5
one day workshops, and assessment of two written submissions of approximately 3000 and 5000
words. Additional modules may be taken to gain Fellowship of the HEA, and the PGCert in
Academic Practice if appropriate to the individuals continued development.

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