Managing your career

The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can't find them, make them.
- George Bernard Shaw

You are under pressure to: deliver your research on time, to write papers, to be published, to present at conferences; to network; to supervise students, the list goes on and on. The last thing you have time for is to plan your career. However if you have the ambition to make it to the top in research then you need to plan your career in advance. If you aren't sure that academia is your future, you need to plan a change of career at least a year before your contract ends. This section gives you some options to help you manage your career.

The University's process for career management, Staff Development Review (SDR), is available to you. Engaging in your SDR can be a valuable component in your career thinking, it can form the basis of your personal career plan. We suggest that researchers have their SDR once a year.

The many skills you develop in your work as a University researcher are valuable for your future employability. You can document new skills as you acquire them, and seek out new training and development opportunities. The University has developed a Professional Development Record (PDF - 84KB) to help you to do this.

A wide range of information on planning your career can be found on the SEECC web site.  There is also further information on the Vitae website; including details on building a career plan, investigating your career options and effective networking.