Research Assistant CV Example (UK)

A Research Assistant CV in the UK is read against a person specification, line by line. The principal investigator on the grant and the panel scoring applications for a university post want to see each essential criterion met with evidence: the methods you have used, the studies you worked on, what you published, and whether you can run fieldwork, manage data and meet an ethics committee's conditions without supervision. A general list of research skills does not score; a named study with your role in it does.

The Sample CV below is for a Research Assistant in population health with six years on funded studies at a university and an NHS research unit, now on a fixed-term grade 6 contract that ends with the grant. The bullets name the study design, the sample, the methods and her own contribution to each output, which is what a panel needs to award points.

If you are applying in the United States, the US research assistant resume example follows the conventions employers there use. In the UK, keep the CV to two or three sides, put publications in a section of their own, and answer the person specification in your supporting statement. The Scholar template handles a publications list cleanly.

Updated . The person and employers in this Sample CV are fictional. Written for applicants in the UK; the page for applicants in the US is the research assistant resume example.

Research Assistant sample CV

Drawn at A4 proportions, the paper a UK CV is printed on.

Tamsin Hollowell

Research Assistant (Grade 6), Population Health, Mixed Methods and Trial Data Management

Bristol, BS8tamsin.hollowell@example.com07700 900689

Summary

Research Assistant with six years on funded population health studies, working across recruitment, qualitative interviews, data management and analysis in Stata and NVivo. Currently coordinate day-to-day running of a five-year NIHR-funded cluster trial in 42 primary schools, including ethics amendments, school liaison and a data set of 3,900 children. Second author on two peer-reviewed papers and first author on a conference paper, and planning to start a part-time PhD alongside my next post.

Experience

Research Assistant (Grade 6, fixed-term), Centre for Child Health Research, Clifton Vale University

– Present

Bristol

  • Coordinate the day-to-day running of a cluster randomised trial of a school-based physical activity programme in 42 primary schools across the South West, reporting to the principal investigator and the trial steering committee.
  • Recruited 39 of the 42 schools through head teacher meetings and governor briefings, and kept 37 in the trial to final follow-up, ahead of the retention assumed in the protocol.
  • Built and maintain the trial's REDCap database and data management plan for 3,900 pupils, running monthly quality checks that cut missing outcome data at the 12-month point to under a tenth of records.
  • Conducted and analysed 34 semi-structured interviews with teachers and parents for the process evaluation, coding in NVivo with a second coder; second author on the resulting paper in a public health journal.
Research Assistant, Severn Health Services Research Unit

–

Gloucester

  • Supported three NHS service evaluations on falls prevention, community pharmacy and virtual wards, from protocol drafting to final report.
  • Prepared and submitted two Health Research Authority applications and one substantial amendment, all approved without a request for further information.
  • Cleaned and analysed routine hospital data in Stata for the virtual wards evaluation and wrote the quantitative chapter of the report to commissioners.
Research Administrator, Clifton Vale University, School of Social and Community Medicine

–

Bristol

  • Managed participant contact, consent records and payments for a survey study of 1,200 older adults.
  • Organised the study's patient and public involvement group meetings and wrote the plain English summaries.

Education

MSc Social and Health Research Methods, Merit

Clifton Vale University, Bristol

Dissertation: a mixed-methods study of GP referral to social prescribing link workers.

BSc (Hons) Psychology, 2:1

Tamarside University, Plymouth

Skills

  • Cluster randomised trial coordination
  • Participant recruitment and retention
  • Semi-structured interviews and thematic analysis
  • NVivo
  • Stata
  • R (data cleaning and descriptive analysis)
  • REDCap database build
  • HRA and university ethics applications
  • Good Clinical Practice
  • UK GDPR and data management plans
  • Patient and public involvement
  • Writing for journals and lay summaries

Certifications

  • Good Clinical Practice (GCP), NIHR Learn,

Start yours from this example

Opens this sample in the editor, in one of the templates below. Swap in your details, then tailor it to each vacancy in about two minutes.

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How a UK CV differs

A UK Research Assistant application is usually a CV plus a supporting statement scored against a person specification, and both are read by a panel rather than one hiring manager. Posts are graded on a university pay spine and are often fixed-term to the end of the grant, so it is normal for your history to show several short contracts. A US research assistant resume tends to be a short page for a lab or graduate school; the UK version is closer to an early academic CV, with publications, conference outputs, ethics experience and funders named.

For a research assistant in the UK

  1. Answer the person specification

    Use the essential and desirable criteria as a checklist. Make sure each one is evidenced somewhere on the CV, then answer them in order in the supporting statement; panels score the two together.

  2. Publications as their own section

    List papers, reports and conference presentations in a standard citation style with your author position. Mark work under review as such, and do not pad the section with internal documents.

  3. Name the study, funder and your role

    Write 'NIHR-funded cluster trial in 42 schools, trial coordinator' rather than 'a research project'. Panels want to see the scale and your part in it, not only the topic.

  4. Fixed-term contracts are normal

    Several short posts read as a research career, not as job hopping. Give the end date of each grant so the reader sees why you moved.

  5. Training that counts

    Good Clinical Practice, research ethics, data protection and methods courses are often listed as desirable. Give the course and the year so the panel can award the point.

  6. PhD plans

    If you are planning a PhD, say so briefly. Many UK projects allow a part-time PhD alongside the post, and investigators often like to support one.

Every CV in the UK

A4 paper
Set the page to A4, 210 by 297 millimetres. A Letter-sized PDF prints with odd margins on A4 and reads as imported from the US.
Two pages is normal
Most UK CVs run to two pages. One page suits a first job; three is rare and only for senior roles with a lot to show.
No photo, no date of birth
UK employers do not expect a photo, a date of birth, marital status or nationality on a CV, and most prefer not to see them.
Dates as DD/MM/YYYY
Day first where a full date appears, and month and year for each role: "Mar 2022 – Present". Never the US month-first order.
British English
Organise, programme, centre, licence, specialise. A CV in American spelling reads as written for somewhere else.
Town and postcode area, not a street address
A line such as "Manchester, M4" is enough. A full postal address, and the US-style "City, ST 12345" line, are not expected.

More on applying in the UK, with every CV example for it, on the UK page.

Templates for the research assistant CV

All templates

Every template exports on A4. The previews are drawn on Letter; the editor sets the page size when you export.

How the CV changes with experience

The same research assistant CV, written at three levels: a profile and three bullets for each.

Entry level

Zero to two years, or a first post in the title

Psychology graduate with a summer research placement and a year as a study recruiter on an NHS-based trial, applying for a first grade 5 Research Assistant post.

  • Screened and consented patients for a trial in two outpatient clinics, logging every contact in the trial database.
  • Ran a literature search and drafted the background section of a funding bid during a ten-week placement.
  • Entered and double-checked 600 paper questionnaires against the data dictionary.

Mid level

Three to seven years, owns a process or a workload

Research Assistant with four years in a university education department, running fieldwork in secondary schools and analysing survey data for a funded study on pupil wellbeing.

  • Organise survey fieldwork in 18 schools a year, including consent from parents and data sharing agreements.
  • Analyse survey waves in R and draft tables for the study's annual report to the funder.
  • Co-author of a peer-reviewed paper and presenter at the department's research conference.

Senior

Eight years or more, leads people, budgets or programmes

Senior Research Associate with ten years in health services research, managing a team of four on a programme grant and leading the qualitative strand.

  • Manage four research assistants and the qualitative workstream of a five-year programme grant.
  • Lead author on four peer-reviewed papers and co-applicant on a successful follow-on bid.
  • Represent the study on the funder's monitoring calls and write the annual progress reports.

Skills to put on the research assistant CV

Hard skills

Study design and methods
Person specifications list the methods the project needs, and naming the designs you have worked on lets a panel tick the essential criteria.
Qualitative interviewing and analysis
Many UK health and social science projects have a process evaluation or qualitative strand, and experience with NVivo or a named approach is often essential.
Statistical software such as Stata, R or SPSS
Even on mixed-methods projects you will clean and describe data, and the panel wants to know which package you can already use.
Ethics and HRA approvals
Projects stall without approvals, and a Research Assistant who has written applications and amendments saves the investigator weeks.
Data management and UK GDPR
Funders require a data management plan and universities audit how personal data is stored, so experience here is a strong point.
Recruitment and retention of participants
Many studies succeed or fail on recruitment, and figures from your last study are evidence a panel can score.
Academic writing
Papers, reports to the funder and lay summaries are part of the post, and named outputs show you have finished pieces of work.

Soft skills

Working independently
Investigators are busy and often off site, so they look for someone who can keep fieldwork moving without daily supervision.
Attention to detail
A wrong consent form version or an unchecked data field can undo months of fieldwork.
Building relationships with partners
Schools, GP practices and NHS teams take part because someone they trust asked them, and keeping them on board is part of the job.
Planning against a deadline
Grants run to fixed end dates, and reporting milestones to the funder depends on fieldwork and analysis finishing on time.

Mistakes that cost research assistant interviews

  1. Skills without the study

    Listing 'qualitative methods, data analysis, literature reviews' gives a panel nothing to score. Attach each method to a named study, a sample size and an output, so the evidence sits next to the claim.

  2. Ignoring the person specification

    Panels shortlist by scoring criteria, and a missing essential criterion can rule you out even if you have the experience. Check every one is answered before you submit.

  3. Unclear authorship

    A publication list without your author position, or with work in preparation mixed in with accepted papers, makes a panel doubt the whole section. Bold your name and mark the status of each item.

  4. A one-page American-style CV

    A single page with no publications or methods section looks thin for a UK research post. Two to three sides is expected, as long as each section adds evidence.

  5. Hiding administrative work

    Ethics amendments, data management plans and recruitment logs are real research skills, and investigators value them highly. Write them up as properly as your analysis work.

Write bullets with the XYZ formula: what changed, the number that shows it, and how you did it, in one line.

Questions about the research assistant CV

What should a Research Assistant CV include in the UK?

Your posts and the studies you worked on, the methods and software you used, publications and presentations with your author position, ethics and data management experience, relevant training such as GCP, and your degrees. Two to three sides of A4 is normal.

Do I need a PhD to be a Research Assistant?

No. Most UK Research Assistant posts ask for a good first degree or a master's in a relevant subject. Research Associate and Research Fellow posts often ask for a PhD or one that is nearly finished.

How should I list publications if I only have one or two?

List them anyway, in full citation style, and add conference presentations, posters, funder reports and published protocols you contributed to. Mark anything under review honestly; panels expect early career researchers to have a short list.

Is a supporting statement more important than the CV?

They are scored together. The statement is where you answer each criterion in turn, and the CV is the evidence it points to. A strong statement with a CV that does not back it up rarely gets shortlisted.

How do I explain several fixed-term contracts?

Give each post's funder and end date and, where helpful, a short note such as 'grant ended'. UK panels see short research contracts all the time and read them as experience across studies.

How do I tailor my CV to each research post?

Copy the person specification into a list and move the evidence for each essential criterion to the top of the relevant post. You can paste the job description into Resume Master to get a version of your CV ordered against it, then check every method and output is described accurately.

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