Interdisciplinary Researcher

About the Team The Macro Research team operates as ByteDance's internal knowledge and advisory function, conducting rigorous research on economic and philosophical studies, geopolitics, technology governance, international affairs and history. The team tracks macro trends, produces long-horizon strategic assessments, and provides deep, contextualized insights to senior leadership on the global environment in which the company operates. Our work informs executive decision-making on market expansion, regulatory preparedness, and strategic positioning.

Responsibilities:

• Lead independent, end-to-end research and complex policy analyses spanning domestic and foreign policy, global geopolitics, tech governance, and comparative political economy, and synthesize findings for senior business leaders
• Produce high-quality written intelligence products (strategic assessments, country briefings, trend analyses, issue-specific deep dives) and deliver presentations to senior management on topics of strategic interest
• Build and maintain trusted, substantive relationships with leading scholars, researchers, policy experts, think tanks, and academic institutions to collect expert insights and perspectives
• Work with relevant internal teams across the business to provide longer-term strategic context that complements their near-term regulatory and policy work
• Interpret long-term trends across multiple jurisdictions and connect them to the company's business strategy
• Respond to ad hoc research inquiries from leadership and business units; contribute to recurring team products (ie: tech landscape newsletters, regional assessments)Minimum Qualifications:
• 5+ years of demonstrated depth in historical analysis, strategic research, geopolitical analysis, or policy research (gained in settings such as think tanks, intelligence analysis, academic research institutions, or in-house corporate research/strategy teams), with the proven ability to set research priorities and lead complex analyses independently
• Ability to navigate complex or ambiguous policy environments across multiple jurisdictions, adapting analysis to local political, legal, and cultural context, and to interpret long-term political and regulatory trends and their implications for business strategy
• Pre-existing relationships with scholars, researchers from public and private sector, think tanks, universities, and policy institutions
• Ability to synthesize complex, interdisciplinary information from diverse sources and produce clear, concise, and actionable written outputs for a non-specialist executive audience
• Comfortable delivering oral briefings and written assessments to senior business leaders; able to turn deep research into clear and concise briefings
• Proven track record of owning end-to-end research projects with minimal supervision, from question definition through analysis to final product delivery
• Comfortable operating in ambiguity, trying new approaches, and iterating based on feedback

Preferred Qualifications:

• Advanced degree (Master's or PhD) in Political Science, International Relations, Public Policy, Economics, History, or a related social science/humanities discipline or equivalent depth gained through professional experience
• Deep expertise in the political and economic history of North America and at least one of the following: cross-border geopolitics and major-power relations, tech governance/policy, international political economy
• Experience producing research products for C-suite, senior executive or senior policy audiences
• Prior experience at a major research institution, think tank (e.g., RAND, Brookings, CSIS, CFR, Chatham House), tier one University, strategic consultancy, or in-house strategic corporate intelligence function
• Professional network spanning North American domestic policy circles and international affairs communities