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The courses and workshops outlined in our programme are designed to meet the needs of all groups of staff within the College and offer a wide variety of development opportunities in five key areas:

 

• Health & Safety

• Information Technology

• Leadership & Management

• Skills & Knowledge

• Wellbeing

 

In our 2009/10 training programme, we introduced a section specific to the development of researchers, in response to principle 4 of the Concordat. This section has continued to develop following feedback received from research staff, line managers and principal investigators.

 

Research staff may also attend any of the other Staff Training & Development courses offered in the programme.

This Forum allows research staff the valuable opportunity to join discussions, hear developments, share practice and network.

The Social Media sessions demonstrated a successful integration of a student-led initiative within a formal graduate training provision. The initiative underlined the importance of engaging PhD students in their own learning and training needs, in both sharing expertise with peers and in contributing to their own professional development. In doing so, it demonstrated to other postgraduate researchers how they might utilise their own areas of expertise to develop further student-led initiatives.

A website dedicated to research staff informing of local & national events & opportunities such as research, training & careers.

Open competition to fund projects relating to research staff development

The Jubilee Graduate Centre (JGC) has been exclusively developed for postgraduate students and early career researchers. It works closely with Schools on the Jubilee Campus to develop Faculty-specific training and careers events for PGRs/ECRs focusing on transferable skills, and which reflect the requirements of the Funding Councils.

Glasgow’s researcher development initiative aims to develop and support a vibrant community of researchers who can participate in meaningful engagement with researchers from other fields, policy makers, the wider public, and the local community and business sector. This has been achieved through our flagship ‘Making an Impact’ event which connects researcher training with opportunities to put what has been learnt into practice in real scenarios. ‘Making an Impact’ ran 3 times in the last academic year and was well attended by early-career researchers from all disciplines, as well as prospective PhD students. The overarching aim of the event was to help researchers to consider how their research and how they as researchers can have an impact on the local community, Government policy or the economy. Each event had two distinct sections as well as networking opportunities: Part A: Presentations from PhD alumni These were designed to help participants consider the wide range of career opportunities open to them and identify possible routes into these. Many speakers brought examples of how they are continuing to work closely with academia, thus enabling researchers to understand how their research could be used to inform work in museums, policy, social enterprise and spin-outs. These talks have cemented relationships between local organisations and the University. For example, discussions are now underway between a current research student in Adult Education and one of the Social Enterprise speakers about possible research collaboration. Following the presentation from a representative of Glasgow museums, a current researcher was invited to visit and meet curatorial staff to help clarify her career goals. Part B: Presentations from current research students Current researchers presented their work, considering how best to convey its value and interest to an audience outside of their own field (including the external speakers). Pitching their talk at the correct ‘level’ was particularly challenging for many students but they appreciated having an ‘outsider’ perspective as well as finding out about research methods and practice in other fields and areas where they might collaborate or learn from each other.

Programme of workshops available to research staff, mapped to Loughborough Skills Statements and Concordat Principles

A quarterly newsletter for research staff working at the University of Manchester written and edited by fellow researchers, highlighting activities, information and personal perspectives relating to professional and career development.

A one day conference for research staff in the University of Liverpool. The day consisted of plenary presentations and parallel sessions and offered to research staff the opportunity to explore in detail three main themes: T1: Enterprising Researcher and Knowledge Exchange T2: Supporting Research Excellence T3: Funding and Fellowships Academic staff with PI roles, senior researchers and the University's senior management contributed to the day's sessions. An interactive Q&A panel discussion offered a very informative ending to a successful and highly productive day.