A mentor should be someone who can show you the way through things. They may not have THE answer, but they probably have AN answer. A bit like a Sherpa helps people up mountains. They cannot climb the mountain for you, but they can give you the best advice and support about how to climb.
Leaving Academia
The decision to become an academic researcher is often based on passion for science or research. And although leaving any profession is hard, the decision to leave academia is often a tough one. There are often conflicting emotions concerning staying or leaving. Not to mention the conversations with staff, students and colleagues. And sometimes it […]
Developing Your Transferable Skills
PhD graduates are clearly capable of doing many things beyond the running of an individual research project. However, that is not always obvious to their potential employers. Here, I look at how to track, record and build transferable skills developed in your PhD or research career, so they can be made “accessible” to your potential […]
Managing Virtual Teams
Virtual teams, or my preferred term – distributed teams – have come into prominence as a result of many governments implementing physical distancing measures to curb the transmission of COVID-19. However, virtual teams have been in operation for many years. Banks and utilities have had personnel placed across the globe for varying functions for the […]
Things to Do When You Cannot Conduct Experiments
Whether it is a global pandemic or broken machinery, there are times when doing experiments might not be possible. In this webinar, Richard go through some of the things you could do when collecting data is not possible. We also hear from participants – about their go to things to do when they cannot do […]
Building an Enhanced PhD Program
It is no longer enough to offer “just a PhD program”. Universities and their faculties, colleges, schools and departments all need to prepare PhD graduates for the workforce. And not just the research or academic workforce, but the wider workforce. We know that 50% of PhD graduates will immediately go onto a non-academic career, and […]
Looking at Career Options
According to research from the UK, 2/3 of final year PhD students are unclear on what they want to do after their PhD. And about 1/3 (30%) of PhD graduates would not do the their PhD again. I think the two are linked. That not know what you want to do next means you get […]
Moving Career Streams
Across all areas of training there are essentially five streams of work: (1) Practitioner – doing the work you were trained to do. (2) Researcher – investigating a topic of interest. As an academic you are simultaneously a Practitioner and a Researcher (3) Educator – Training others based on your skills, experience and training. (4) […]
Facebook for Researchers
Social media is a key part of your research communication arsenal. Facebook is the largest social network. It has more than 2.4 billion active users. But what does it mean to a researcher? How can you get access to a small slice of that attention? In this webinar Richard goes through some of the things […]
Identifying Your Potential Selling Points
Getting funding as a researcher – let alone an early career researcher or PhD student – is increasingly difficult. And everyone is being encouraged to get an industry partner. But how do you know what they want? Especially for biomedical sciences where drug discovery takes YEARS and heaps of money? In this webinar I’ll look […]