Associate VP, Research & Data Ops — Scale & Automation

Tunnl; United States; Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 230,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health Insurance

401(k) match

HSA & FSA options

Hybrid work policy

Paid vacation

Paid holidays

Commuter stipend

Cell phone reimbursement

Job summary

Tunnl is seeking an Associate Vice President, Research & Data Operations to lead teams delivering audience datasets and research products at scale. You will shape data quality, audience methodology, survey design, and downstream activation while building scalable systems and teams.

DC-area strongly preferred, with a flexible hybrid work policy. You will partner with Account Management, Product, Partnerships, Sales, and senior leadership to align research operations with revenue and delivery

Qualifications

• 8+ years of experience in research operations, data operations, audience technology, survey methodology, or a related field.
• Proven experience leading multiple technical or research teams simultaneously.
• Deep familiarity with at least two of: audience modeling/creation, programmatic audience activation, survey research methodology, ETL processes, or advanced analytics.
• Demonstrated ability to influence C-suite executives and senior leaders.
• Strong track record of building scalable delivery systems and enforcing quality standards.
• Experience aligning team structure to revenue and business goals.
• Strong cross-functional communicator bridging technical and strategic conversations.

Responsibilities

• Provide strategic leadership across Audience Operations, Survey Operations, and Activation Operations.
• Set shared standards for quality, delivery, and documentation across all three functions.
• Ensure resources and structure meet current and future client demand.
• Own the RDO delivery model end-to-end from intake to handoff to Revenue teams.
• Sponsor cross-functional infrastructure improvements across data ingestion, audience distribution, activation integrations, and survey tooling.
• Translate RDO needs into tooling requirements and prioritized roadmap items.
• Define expectations for consistent and accurate deliverables across delivery functions.
• Establish methodology standards across survey programming, weighting, and analytics.
• Balance rigor with speed and client-focused decision making.
• Serve as the technical escalation point for data quality and activation issues.
• Oversee technical relationships with downstream activation platforms.
• Maintain and improve API connections and data integrations.
• Set standards for delivery troubleshooting when audiences misbehave.
• Ensure exec visibility into RDO capacity, priorities, and risks.
• Partner with Revenue teams on scoping conversations where technical judgment is needed.
• Coach teams on leadership and cross-functional collaboration.
• Build a culture of accountability and continuous improvement.
• Foster cross-training between Survey and Audience Operations.

Skills

Audience technology

Research operations

Data operations

Survey methodology

Leadership

Cross-functional communication

SQL

Python

R

Tools

SQL

Python

R

Job description

Tunnl is seeking an Associate Vice President, Research & Data Operations to lead teams delivering audience datasets and research products at scale. You will shape data quality, audience methodology, survey design, and downstream activation while building scalable systems and teams.

DC-area strongly preferred, with a flexible hybrid work policy. You will partner with Account Management, Product, Partnerships, Sales, and senior leadership to align research operations with revenue and delivery