Research Contract Officer

Randstad is recruiting a proven Research Contracts Officer for a prominent higher education partner. This role requires exceptional contractual acumen, meticulous attention to detail, and the ability to foster enduring stakeholder relationships within an agile, mission-driven academic environment.

About your new role

Research Contracts Officer is primarily responsible for hitting the ground running to clear a peak year-end surge of strategic research and commercial funding agreements before the Christmas deadline. Operating with substantial autonomy, the successful candidate will draft, review, redline, and negotiate a diverse portfolio of competitive grant and commercial agreements including collaborative research arrangements, contract research, sub-contracts, Co-operative Research Centres (CRCs), Centres of Excellence, and intellectual property licensing deals.

They are tasked with managing clause-level terms, rigorously evaluating legal, financial, and operational risks (especially regarding IP rights, warranties, indemnities, and liability caps), and preparing formal risk recommendations for authorised delegates to execute agreements.

What you will need to exceed

• Extensive experience reviewing, redlining, and drafting complex, multi-party commercial and research agreements from scratch or bespoke client templates.
• Ability to propose creative, alternative wording to unblock negotiation impasses between institutional policy requirements and commercial counterparty demands.
• Mastery of high-risk commercial clauses, including mutual vs. unilateral indemnities, liability caps/carve-outs, warranties, insurances, IP warranties, publication delays, dispute resolution, and termination for convenience/default.
• A firm grasp of how background IP, project/foreground IP, and third-party IP are allocated, licensed, or commercialised in joint ventures and collaborative research.
• Practical understanding of balancing academic publication rights and student graduation dependencies against patent filing timelines and commercial confidentiality.
• Direct familiarity with Australian research funding structures, including Australian Research Council (ARC) grant schemes, NHMRC, Cooperative Research Centres (CRCs), Centres of Excellence, and Defence/government procurement guidelines.
• Strong organisational stamina to maintain meticulous audit trails in contract management systems

Must have

• Be available ASAP
• Must have substantial, hands-on experience reviewing, drafting, and redlining commercial contracts at the clause level (e.g., Commercial Lawyers, Contract Lawyers, or Dispute Lawyers who transitioned into commercial drafting).

Next steps

If you are a research expert with a commitment to inclusivity, collaboration, and transformative change, we invite you to apply and be part of this inspiring journey.