Position Announcement: Science Commons Executive Director

["Steven M Adams (smadams@Princeton.EDU)" <smadams@Princeton.EDU>]

FYI.
-------------------------------------
Position Announcement:
http://science.creativecommons.org/
http://creativecommons.org/about/science/directorannouncement

Science Commons Executive Director

Creative Commons is a non-profit organization working to re- establish the
balance between public and private gain in the proprietary control and use
of creative work. Launched in December 2002, Creative Commons has
developed a Web presence and framework of licenses and software for
creators to license their work in digital form to the public on a
non-commercial basis. In its first year, more than 1,000,000 objects have
been placed under Creative Commons licenses and a growing community is
spreading the project around the world.

The mission of the new Science Commons is to recognize, preserve, and
extend the historic openness and collaboration that is indispensable to
progress in scientific and bio-medical research.  In an increasingly
proprietary knowledge economy, Science Commons seeks to promote a sharing
of information that effectively supports basic research and development of
useful innovations, drugs, and other solutions for the public good.

The growing abundance of biological and other scientific data, and the
explosion of technologies permitting their worldwide availability and
distributed processing, present a unique opportunity. Science Commons
seeks to enable scientists, innovators, and entrepreneurs to make the most
of this historic opportunity and its promise for broadening collaboration
and accelerating the pace and depth of discovery. Science Commons will
work to counter the application of locks and legal restrictions on
scientific data, discovery, and experience, while developing the
incentives and means to ease their movement, examination, and productive
use among researchers and industry.

We are seeking an Executive Director to develop and launch Science
Commons. The Executive Director will report to the Creative Commons Board
chairman and will work with active Board and advisory group members.
Executive Director's Responsibilities:

Developing and implementing Science Commons' agenda with the Creative
Commons and Science Commons Board of Directors;

Overseeing hiring and work of paid staff;

Establishing and directing collaboration among paid staff, Board members,
and developing and managing a network of international volunteers;

Planning and executing meetings of scientists, lawyers, academics, and
representatives of government agencies and businesses to define need, set
goals, and develop an agenda;

Establishing effective working cooperation and collaboration on shared
goals and projects with groups and individuals around the world;

Fulfilling requirements and milestones of an existing grant and overseeing
future funding and development;

Setting up the Science Commons office.*

Educational Requirements:

Advanced degree in law, medicine, science, or related public policy field.

Experience and Skills:

The successful candidate will be a highly motivated individual who has
significant achievement in public policy or law in a science- related
field and who can bring energy and commitment to maintaining a private
sector pace and workload for this nonprofit cause. The position requires
the ability to develop and maintain strong working relationships with
associates and collaborators, paid and volunteer, on site and physically
remote.

Applicants for the Executive Director position should have demonstrated:

Proven leadership experience and the ability to work collaboratively and
motivate colleagues;

Excellent written and verbal communication, managerial, diplomatic, and
negotiating skills;

Ability to set goals, prioritize, develop strategy, implement programs,
manage multiple projects, and meet deadlines;

Familiarity with communications technology and Web-based environments;

Familiarity with a broad range of issues in the sciences and technology,
preferably in the pharmaceutical biotech industry and some familiarity
with their legal and regulatory environments;

Areas of work we expect to be important include:

Overseeing research on the effects of intellectual property rights on the
progress of science;

Encouraging meaningful dialogue within the research, publishing, clinical,
and manufacturing constituents of the biomedical and scientific
communities;

Designing strategies to develop effective consensus policies that ensure
maximum public benefit from the results of government- funded research,
Bayh Dole provisions, and university technology transfer practices;

Drafting a set of standardized licensing agreements and winning their
collective, widespread adoption by major research universities and funding
sources;

Investigating the usefulness and feasibility of an intellectual property
rights conservancy or technology trust for biomedical research;

Encouraging open standards and practices for bioinformatics research;
Developing strategies to protect the traditional public domain nature of
databases.

Will require frequent travel.

*The location of the Science Commons office has not yet been determined.
It will be located on the U.S. east or west coast near a major university.

Send a resume and salary requirements to Laura Lynch, Creative Commons,
559 Nathan Abbott Way, Stanford, CA 94305, or by email to
llynch-AT-stanford.edu.

Creative Commons is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity 
Employer.