Endocrine Abstracts

It’s crowded at the top of the academic pyramid. A large percentage of doctoral graduates and research staff will not gain tenure in academic research positions. Universities now provide career advice for graduate students and post-doctoral researchers, usually regarding careers outside of academia, be that in research or otherwise. What, then, for those of us that are still passionate about science and working within academia? A career in science administration may not be as dull as it sounds; it can be a great way to keep you at the forefront of cutting edge science, but it relies heavily on networking to get into and succeed. Simply playing an active role within this Society can help you here. There is a growing field within universities offering opportunities to work both in administration (research funding, clinical trials, project management, contracts and technology transfer, for example) or in research facilitation, directly with academic researchers (administering grant applications, providing advice to potential applicants, organising peer review of grants applications and so on). Research experience is usually a requirement, especially for roles which involve developing and maintaining contacts within the research community, for instance, university departments, funding bodies and Government departments. As medical schools are aligned to NHS partners, opportunities arise to work directly for the NHS whilst supporting honorary lecturers within the University setting. The work involves many of the skills that will have been honed during your years as a PhD student or post-doc and, with the right coaching, it is relatively easy to turn you and your CV into a credible candidate for one of these positions. Don’t think that research stops once you’ve left the lab. In the right position, you can forge opportunities to undertake research projects to drive science policy within your institutions or in collaboration with funding bodies.