PhD position in the field of Managing Charitable Giving Dynamics

Department

Faculty of Economics and Business

Organisation

Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, University of Groningen, V25.0150

Job description

Since its foundation in 1614, the University of Groningen has enjoyed an international reputation as a dynamic and innovative center of higher education offering high-quality teaching and research. Belonging to the best research universities of Europe and joining forces with prestigious partner universities and networks, the University of Groningen is truly an international place of knowledge.

Faculty of Economics and Business
The Faculty of Economics and Business offers an inspiring study and working environment for students and employees. International accreditation enables the Faculty to assess performance against the highest international standards. It also creates an exciting environment of continuous improvement. FEB's programmes, academic staff and research do well on various excellence ranking lists.

FEBRI, the graduate school and research institute of the Faculty of Economics and Business has one PhD position in the field of Managing Charitable Giving Dynamics available.

Project description
Many societally important causes depend on charitable giving. While the amount of charitable giving by individuals, foundations and corporations is high ($557 billion in the U.S. in 2023), more and more causes depend on such charitable giving. It is therefore no surprise that these causes are interested in retaining donors and increasing donations. Though the topic of charitable giving has been studied a lot in the past, there is ample room for research focused on dynamics, long-term effects, large datasets and field experiments. The topic is closely connected to the ‘better marketing for a better world’ literature, which has received increasing attention in top marketing journals in recent years.

You will study questions related to how, why and when donors should (and should not!) be approached, with a specific interest in dynamics and effects over time. Such questions are not limited to one charitable cause, but can also involve the interplay between multiple charitable causes. In this project, you will collaborate with Data Inside, a member of the UG’s Customer Insights Center which has data available from several Dutch charitable organizations. These organizations have also indicated their willingness to participate in field experiments.

The PhD position is embedded in the research programme Marketing of FEB’s Research Institute. You will therefore be working at the Department of Marketing. The project will be supervised by Dr Roelof Hars, Dr Hans Risselada, and Dr Marijke Leliveld.

Requirements

The ideal candidate is ambitious, highly motivated and wishes to make a career in research. He or she has a thorough training in quantitative research methods, speaks and writes English fluently and has obtained excellent results in the master phase.

Furthermore, the ideal candidate…

- Has a background (MSc, Research Master) in a quantitative discipline such as (Quantitative) Marketing, Econometrics, (Quantitative) Psychology, Data Science or related fields.
- Is skilled in working with time series, panel and/or unstructured data.
- Has demonstrable experience in R, Python, or a related programming language.
- Has demonstrable experience working with (large) datasets.
- Is familiar with experimental methods (preferred, not required)
- Already has some knowledge of or has clear affinity with the areas of customer relationship management and/or charitable giving.
- Preferably speaks and understands Dutch at B2 level or higher. We expect that the data you will be working with will (partially) be in Dutch.

Conditions of employment

Contract length: 48 months.

We offer you in accordance with the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities:

- A gross monthly salary from a minimum of € 2,901, which increases yearly to a maximum of € 3,707 for a full-time appointment.
- Based on the gross salary an additional 8% holiday allowance each year in May, and an additional 8.3 % end of year bonus in December. PhD candidates contribute 20% of their time to teaching in years 2-4.
- A temporary full-time appointment for a period of four years, under the condition of a positive assessment at the end of the first year.

Starting date: Preferably per 1 September 2025

Job Application

The application package consists of the following separate documents: - A motivation letter (1A4 max) and a short document (2A4 max, shorter is acceptable) outlining your initial research ideas for this PhD project. You may assume the data you would need is available. - Your CV. - A scan of your diploma including transcripts. - Proof of English proficiency. - Other relevant documents. An assessment may be part of the procedure, consisting of psychological tests and an interview. The documents 1-4 are compulsory and please note that incomplete application packages will not be taken into account. You may apply for this position until 30 March 11:59pm / before 31 March 2025 Dutch local time (CEST) by means of the application form (click on "Apply" below on the advertisement on the university website). The University of Groningen strives to be a university in which students and staff are respected and feel at home, regardless of differences in background, experiences, perspectives, and identities. We believe that working on our core values of inclusion and equality are a joint responsibility and we are constructively working on creating a socially safe environment. Diversity among students and staff members enriches academic debate and contributes to the quality of our teaching and research. We therefore invite applicants from underrepresented groups in particular to apply. For more information, see also our diversity policy webpage: https://www.rug.nl/about-ug/policy-and-strategy/diversity-and-inclusion/ Our selection procedure follows the guidelines of the Recruitment code (NVP): https://www.nvp-hrnetwerk.nl/nl/sollicitatiecode and European Commission's European Code of Conduct for recruitment of researchers: https://euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/charter/code We provide career services for partners of new faculty members moving to Groningen. Unsolicited marketing is not appreciated.

Additional information

For additional information, please contact:

For more general information, please send an email to
[email protected]

Dr Roelof Hars (for more information on this specific project)
[email protected]

In your application, please always include the job opening ID V25.0150

Digital application form