Open Climate Data Manager

Creative Commons (CC) is a global nonprofit organization working to solve the world’s most pressing problems by opening up knowledge and culture about them. Climate change, and the resulting harm to our global biodiversity, has been one of the world’s most pressing problems for decades.

Climate data needs to be open, accessible and easy to share to ensure scientists, researchers, policymakers, educators, civil society organizations, advocates, citizens, journalists, and others can find it, read it, and build on it. 

Position Overview

CC is looking for an enthusiastic, well-organized and hardworking Open Climate Data Manager to facilitate the creation of a community-supported, long-term solution for the better sharing of large, distributed open climate datasets. These datasets, often in various technical formats with confusing legal terms of use, are largely inaccessible to climate researchers and policymakers. This project will focus on changing this, opening up large climate change datasets and proposing a set of best practices for how we share them. 

Note: This position is a temporary (12 month) contract.

Primary Responsibilities

• Project manage and lead this new open climate data initiative.
• Build, implement and monitor plans and schedules for each project objective.
• Assess project risks and propose changes to the project plan as needed.
• Ensure project deadlines are met.
• Manage and communicate ongoing changes in tasks, goals and performance.
• Work with CC’s Communications team to create communication materials, including blog posts, and social media content.
• Prepare necessary presentation materials for meetings.
• Document and follow up on important actions and decisions from meetings.
• Deliver report on project objectives and deliverables
• Perform other related duties as required.

The Open Climate Data Manager will lead the following work with support from CC’s Director of Open Knowledge:

Objective 1: Conduct a Landscape Analysis: February – April, 2023 
The landscape analysis will be used to help us determine: (a) which organizations and funders already fund, produce, and work with climate data; (b) where the highest quality, most used/cited climate datasets are located; (c) which datasets are free and accessible, which are open (i.e., the data is in the public domain), which are closed, who manages them, and what data should remain closed or in data trusts to protect privacy and/or other human rights; (d) what formats the data is in and if it can be easily accessed and downloaded; (e) current barriers to finding, accessing, and using climate data; and (f) investigate what national and/or regional open climate data policies already exist. We will then publish the above findings openly.
We have funding to hire additional help for the landscape analysis if needed.

Objective 2: Convene “Open Climate Data Group”: March – December, 2023
CC will convene and host regular meetings of an “Open Climate Data Group” made up of organizations and funders already supporting, producing, and working with climate data informed by the previous landscape analysis work.
This project will also coordinate with relevant bodies and similar efforts including but not limited to: CODATA, RDA, EOSC, SDSN Global Climate Hub, etc. 

Objective 3: Establish Proposed Open Climate Data Sharing “Community Standard”: March – August, 2023
CC will work with the Open Climate Data Group to create a proposed “community sharing standard” for climate data (similar to the Digital Public Goods Standard CC helped create). This will be done by running an open, transparent review and feedback process with stakeholders globally to (a) create an ideal, workable proposed standard to share climate data, (b) where possible align the proposed standard with national open climate data policies that already exist, and (c) secure broad community buy-in and use of the proposed standard.This “community standard” (i.e. not a formal governmental or W3C standard) will provide guidance for (a) stewards of large open climate datasets and (b) the broader climate data community (who may not have been involved in its original creation) to share their open climate data in standard ways that maximize access, reuse and sharing.

Objective 4: Socialize the Proposed Open Climate Data Sharing Standard: August – December, 2023
CC will socialize the proposed open climate data sharing standard and solicit feedback from climate change groups and climate scientists at conferences, via newsletters, online webinars, email lists, social media, and other stakeholders to both raise awareness about the proposed standard and improve it.

Objective 5: Provide Training and Direct Consulting Services: August – December, 2023
CC will provide training and consulting services to the largest, most used climate data repositories about the proposed standard and its implementation.

Objective 6: Develop Proof of Concept: August – December, 2023
One of the key climate datasets is the research data associated with climate research articles. This project will liaise with the Open Climate Campaign to better understand the corpus of foundational climate change articles and why the research data associated with the articles must be open. The project will explore if open climate research data can be better shared using the proposed open climate data sharing standard.

Qualifications

Education and Experience

• Experience working with large datasets or climate data and models.
• Experience with torrent files and tools.
• Bachelor’s and/or master’s degree or equivalent level of coursework in a related field, training, or on-the-job experience is preferred.
  5+ year track record planning and overseeing successful large datasets projects, including experience:
  • in facilitating community projects;
    communicating with diverse stakeholders, including individuals, organizations, and/or governments;
    with open scholarship practices including open licenses, open data and/or open science is a plus.
  • Communication experience including developing messaging, identifying key audiences, creating a strategy and successful implementation.

Qualities and Abilities 

• Ability to persuade senior level managers within an organization of the wisdom of open data.
• Excellent project management including time management and work organization skills.
• Ability to navigate politically sensitive issues.
• Affinity with the open movement, in particular open data.
• Strong verbal and written communication skills and presentation effectiveness.
• Excellent analytical and problem solving abilities.
• Social media knowledge and skills.
• Excellent interpersonal skills and ability to maintain collaborative relations in culturally diverse contexts.
• Demonstrated ability to work in a dynamic environment with a high degree of flexibility.
• Ability to work effectively both independently and as part of a team.
• Proficient technology skills (Google suite, Asana, Slack, BitTorrent, etc)
• Demonstrated excellence in independent management of complex projects.
• Time management skills with the ability to meet deadlines.
• Fluent in English; second language competency is a plus.
• Experience in working in international teams is a plus.

Diversity

We believe that diverse teams build better organizations and better services. Applications from qualified candidates from all backgrounds, including those from under-represented communities, are very welcome. Creative Commons works openly as part of a global community, guided by collaboratively developed codes of conduct and anti-harassment policies.

Work Environment and Location

At CC, we are committed to fostering a global and inclusive environment, and strive to have a diverse team that represents many backgrounds. Creative Commons has been a fully-distributed organization since 2015 — we have no central office, all positions are in a remote working environment.  This position reports to and will regularly meet with their manager in US Pacific time (UTC -8). This position will require occasional travel. You must have high-speed broadband access.

Compensation

Creative Commons is a leading non-profit employer, offering competitive salaries and a positive, supportive work environment. We offer a competitive compensation for this contractor position at $9,100 – $10,400 per month, commensurate with experience and relevant skills. This is a grant funded position for 12 months.

How to Apply

Please click "Apply" below to email your resume and cover letter as a single PDF, with the subject heading of “Open Climate Data Manager / [Last Name].” Your cover letter should: address why you are interested in this job, why you’re a good fit based on the requirements and responsibilities, and answer the question “Why do you think open access to climate data is important?”. No phone calls. No recruiters. We are looking to hire for this role ASAP, so please share this opportunity and don’t hesitate to apply.

Note: Application deadline: January 31, 2023. We will not be reaching out to schedule any interviews until after that date.