Dr. Stephanie Haddad is a Managing Director in McAllister & Quinn’s Research Universities Practice. In this role, she supports R1 and R2 universities in capacity building, strategic intelligence, project management, and proposal development. Stephanie enjoys supporting academic leadership, investigators, and research development professionals in navigating the federal funding landscape, aligning institutional strengths and goals with agency and program priorities, and advancing competitive research initiatives.
Prior to joining McAllister & Quinn, Stephanie was an Associate Director of Research Development in the Office of the Vice Provost for Research and Innovation at Vanderbilt University. Before Vanderbilt, she was a Research Development Specialist supporting Environmental Sciences and Studies in the Office of Research at the University of California, Santa Cruz. In these roles, she supported over 200 proposals to over 45 public and private sponsors, and advised faculty on diversifying their funding portfolios, developing competitive proposals aligning with the priorities of federal and foundation sponsors, and building strategic teams well-positioned to submit complex, multi-institutional proposals to various federal agencies. She also designed and implemented training programs to support early-career faculty applying to the NSF CAREER program.
Prior to starting her career in research development, Stephanie was a Research Assistant Professor at the University of Memphis, where she secured federal and state funding to pursue her own research. She also served as a faculty member in the Biology Department at Rhodes College.
Stephanie obtained her B.S. and M.S. in Biological Sciences at the American University of Beirut and her Ph.D. in Biological Sciences at the University of Memphis. She has publications in the fields of phylogenetics, evolutionary biology, and ecology. She is an active member of the National Organization for Research Development Professionals (NORDP) and participates in NORDP’s mentoring program