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Use of employers and former postdocs to deliver a session addressing how to present commercial awareness during the application process.

This is a brief summary of the organisational model that we have adopted in order to work more closely with Schools, Faculties and Departments and 'partner' with them in understanding and providing for the needs of their particular staff in a ‘bespoke’ way where appropriate. This positions us better to target our resource towards meeting real needs, while striving for enhanced alignment between UCL’s research strategy and individual aspirations. This new model also enables us to work more closely in partnership with other key people deployed at a Faculty or Department level, such as Research Facilitators, Research Leaders, HR Consultants, Faculty Managers etc.

Workshops are facilitated by editors of high impact journals who discuss with participants key aspects within the writing process and the aims of the journal. Brief writing exercises on papers published by participants take place during the workshop. In addition, selected published articles from the journal are being discussed highlighting relevant points of interest that inform the writing process.

These sessions allow PGRs to deliver an upcoming presentation to an internal audience in order that their presentation skills and style of slides can be critiqued before they go off and deliver it "for real" Each participant is recorded to DVD and is given verbal and written feedback. Primarily about their presentation skills and style, but also about the style of their slides and, if the appropriate academics are in attendance - about the academic content of the presentation.

Our Loughborough Local GRADschool is now well established and ready to increase in size. We run a three day, non-residential model. This gives us a good balance between sustainability and impact. It is held open primarily for third year research students and has a real empahsis on what happens next after the PhD.

Online induction package for First Year Doctoral Researchers. DR Essentials is a stand-alone online course placed on the self-registration area of WebCT . Doctoral Researchers can access it by adding it to their university online profiles. The course contains five separate modules covering key stages of the incipient doctoral research career. Each module combines content with a number of embedded talking heads that capture the views of Doctoral Researchers and Supervisors across the institution. At the end of each module there is a check list of tasks that should be completed. DR Essentials in its original version was developed at the University of Melbourne in Australia. The version used at the University of Birmingham has been developed by a team of experts from the Centre for Learning and Academic Development (CLAD) and the University Graduate School to meet the needs of researchers at Birmingham. The course is self-paced and users can dip into or work through in its entirety as they may need.

In one intensive three-hour session gives participants a general understanding of the media, including how journalists work, how to get coverage, how to prepare for interviews, and how to manage expectations. This is followed by individual coaching and mentoring in interview techniques, during which the participant is interviewed twice with video playback and analysis afterwards.

An ePortfolio is an external facing website owned and maintained by a research student.

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.