Research Assistant in Design

Salary:  £33,002 per annum

Newcastle University is a great place to work, with excellent benefits. We have a generous holiday package; plus the opportunity to buy more, great pension schemes and a number of health and wellbeing initiatives to support you.

Closing Date: 26 February 2026

The Role

The role will involve practicing creative design and supporting collaborative research activities on the EPSRC Northern Health Futures (NortHFutures) Hub programme (https://www.northfutures.org/). The role holder will be supervised by Principal Investigator and Professor of Interaction Design (Prof Abi Durrant), working in close collaboration with a multidisciplinary team of researchers, practitioners, academics and professional services staff at Newcastle University and at our partner organisations.

NortHFutures is a collaborative Digital Health Hub for the North East and North Cumbria (NENC), led by the region’s universities and rooted in the ethos that healthcare technology designs should work for people and communities. We bring together universities, NHS Foundation Trusts, local authorities, industry, and the voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) sector plus members of the public to understand how tools and services that use digital, Artificial Intelligence (AI), and data can be better designed to be useful and useable for people in the communities and places where they live and work. NortHFutures also takes a ‘Research-through-Design’ approach to explore and evaluate new ways to connect and include people from diverse backgrounds, generations, and sectors of work in digital health design research and innovation.

One goal is to deliver high-quality research evidence plus design prototypes and demonstrators that inform strategic and policy decisions for digital health and care in our region.

The role will involve human-centred design research processes, including user research, concept sketching and testing of user interfaces for interactive systems and services, plus low- and hi-fidelity prototyping and evaluation of designs. The role holder will utilise their communication and graphic design skills to produce digital media assets, infographics, illustrations and document formatting for the hub, contributing to engagement by diverse stakeholder audiences via print, web and exhibitions. Overall, the role holder will contribute their design skills to support NortHFutures research (Research-through-Design practice), working in an interdisciplinary, cross-sector team.

Key Accountabilities 

• Design and produce digital media assets, infographics, and illustrations to support NortHFutures communications and engagement via print, web and exhibition platforms, working with project partners


• Support Hub research programme by contributing Creative Design Practice within an interdisciplinary and cross-sector research team


• Undertake relevant training and development activities to develop capacity for taking on wider responsibilities


• Follow Human-Centred Design processes by conducting user research, user-centred concept sketching, low- and hi-fidelity prototyping, and user testing of designs, with Hub partners and stakeholders for the hub programme


• Use initiative and creativity to analyse and interpret research data and draw conclusions on the outcomes


• Contribute to the facilitation and documentation of collaborative design (Co-Design) workshops for the hub programme


• Contribute to and support the preparation of research reports for publication


• Present project work and outputs, to colleagues (studio critique), to partners at project meetings, at public engagement exercises, and at conferences


• Support project administration and research data and media management in line with hub objectives, under the supervision of the Principal Investigator and in line with university policies, ethical protocols and regulations


• Work to deadlines and manage, with support, competing priorities

The Person 

Knowledge, Skills and Experience

• Good skills in interaction design (interactive media design) and visual communication design practice


• Practical work experience of using relevant design and artworking tools such as Adobe Creative Cloud and Figma


• Practical work experience of designing digital and web applications


• Working knowledge of responsive web design and multimedia production


• Good understanding of human-centred design processes, including user research, user-centred design, prototyping, and user evaluation methods


• Use research resources (including, where required, laboratories, workshops and specialist equipment) as appropriate


• Willingness to develop skills and experience working as a designer in a multidisciplinary, cross-sector team on a research programme


• Good level of analytical skills and the ability to communicate complex information clearly, both orally and through the written word

Attributes and Behaviour

• Excellent interpersonal communication skills


• Friendly and approachable attitude


• Able to proactively plan and deliver projects to deadlines working independently and collaboratively in a team and with external partners


• Able to use personal initiative and creativity to solve research problems


• Willingness to present work orally or through a written report to research stakeholders and develop professional experience giving presentations


• Able to prioritise tasks depending on workload and project demands

Qualifications

• Undergraduate and/or Postgraduate Degree in Design or a related discipline

Newcastle University is a global University where everyone is treated with dignity and respect.  As a University of Sanctuary, we aim to provide a welcoming place of safety for all, offering opportunities to people fleeing violence and persecution.

We are committed to being a fully inclusive university which actively recruits, supports and retains colleagues from all sectors of society.  We value diversity as well as celebrate, support and thrive on the contributions of all of our employees and the communities they represent.  We are proud to be an equal opportunities employer and encourage applications from individuals who can complement our existing teams, we believe that success is built on having teams whose backgrounds and experiences reflect the diversity of our university and student population.

At Newcastle University we hold a Gold Athena Swan award in recognition of our good employment practices for the advancement of gender equality.  We also hold a Race Equality Charter Bronze award in recognition of our work towards tackling race inequality in higher education REC.  We are a Disability Confident employer and will offer an interview to disabled applicants who meet the essential criteria for the role as part of the offer and interview scheme.

In addition, we are a member of the Euraxess initiative supporting researchers in Europe. 

Requisition ID: 29063