Title:
More questions than answers: How can we effectively support the careers and employability of research staff and students?
Author:
Gabi Binnie
Published:
Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI), 16 July 2020
https://www.hepi.ac.uk/2020/07/16/more-questions-than-answers-how-can-we-effectively-support-the-careers-and-employability-of-research-staff-and-students/
From the blog post:
There is a clear difference between PhD students’ career ambitions and their career outcomes. Bethan Cornell’s policy note PhD students and their careers suggests that research (PhD) students have a clear preference for pursuing a career in academic research, yet 70 per cent had left academia after three and a half years. There is, therefore, a need for careers and employability support to help researchers understand and access careers outside academia. Indeed, the Concordat on the Development of Researchers stated that institutions must ‘ensure that researchers have access to professional advice on career management, across a breadth of careers’. Yet only 31 per cent of postgraduate research (PhD) students surveyed in the 2019 Postgraduate Research Experience Survey (PRES) reported receiving advice on their career options.