Since 2012, Claudia Burger is the administrative director of the European XFEL, a European research facility under construction in the metropolitan area of Hamburg in Northern Germany.
As an economist, she started her career doing economic research at the German Institute for Japanese Studies (DIJ) in Tokyo and the Berlin Social Science Center (WZB). She then entered public service at the German federal state of North Rhine–Westphalia, where she worked as a senior administrative officer, mainly supervising local authorities. In this position, she was involved in a major administrative reform project, i.e. introducing a new municipal financial management system.
Since 2008, Burger has worked in science management. She built up the administration of the newly established Research Institute for Regional and Urban Development (ILS) in Dortmund, where she was administrative and managing director before joining European XFEL. At European XFEL, she is one of two managing directors and the head of the administration, in charge of finance, controlling, human resources, procurement, legal matters, knowledge management, and the build-up of a user office for the facility. She is also the responsible director for safety and radiation protection.