REFLEX · Responsive and Flexible: Living and learning researcher career development framework

Systematic and focused career development is becoming increasingly important for both researchers and their employers. Variety of career management tools is currently available to help them with this challenge. Although many of these tools are very effective in certain contexts they are not simply transferable to another. REFLEX project will try to address this problem through bottom-up approach based on direct involvement of researchers, HR departments, EURAXESS Service Centres and other relevant stakeholders in the design and implementation of flexible, living and learning career development framework adaptable to variety of national and institutional backgrounds. The pool of different career development tools and practices will be collected and analysed. Scenario workshops with researchers and other local stakeholders reflecting on identified factors influencing researcher’s career will be organised in every project country to learn about the country specific situations. A set of modules will be defined describing the particular practices, procedures and skills, which will be combined into the common framework and its country specific mutations. Pilot implementation process will be carried out within the project partners’ institutions/countries. National training models focusing on the development of career management skills for researchers as well as potential future coaches/facilitators will be created and pilot tested. Mutual learning and feedback activities will be carried out to ensure the coherence and continuous improvement of all project outcomes. In order to increase the transferability of the framework to other national and institutional contexts, European level workshop will also be organised before the end of the project. Special EURAXESS training model scheme implementation guide will be produced to help navigate EURAXESS Service Centres through modular framework in the adaptability of the training scheme to their capacities, needs and possibilities.