Developing a postdoc career development plan
Being in a postdoctoral research position has a lot of opportunities and challenges. As a postdoc, your position is time-limited (sometimes as short as one year), leaving minimal time to learn the ins and outs of a new research lab or project. This makes it all the more important to be intentional and purposeful in developing a career development plan to make the most of your time, stay aligned with your values, and help you achieve your goals.
In my work as a coach, I’ve helped postdocs create plans to best utilize their limited time in their positions. Below I outline several takeaways and things to consider as you develop your postdoc career development plan.
What would you like to have accomplished at the end of your postdoc? Whether you’re in a postdoc for one year or more, it’s important to consider what you’d like to have accomplished by the end of that time. One strategy to visualize that is to practice writing the cover letter you’d like to be able to write at the end of your postdoc. What projects will you have spent your time on? What will you have achieved?
What will be your next career step after your postdoc? Consider your long-term career goals. Are you interested in a tenure-track role at research-focused university or at a small college focused on teaching? Are you considering pursuing a career outside of academia? Consider how you might pursue opportunities that will help you achieve these long-term career goals.
What bucket areas do you want to focus your time on? There are a number of different “buckets” that might factor into developing your career plan, including research, teaching, professional development, family, health, etc. Consider all aspects of your life and all areas that are important in creating your plan.
What stories are you telling yourself about this time? We all tell ourselves stories about what we can and can’t do. Unfortunately, sometimes these can be limiting beliefs that prevent us from accomplishing things or lead to negative self-talk. Phrases like “I have to…” or “I can’t”… can be clues that you’re telling yourself a story. Consider whether there are any stories you’re telling yourself about this time - like, “I have to publish 6 manuscripts in 2 years in order to be marketable.” or “I can’t build out my research portfolio and explore non-academic careers at the same time.” Reflect on whether those stories are really true and how they may or may not serve you.
What opportunities are available to you right now? Being in a postdoc can be a unique time in that opportunities may be available to you that won’t be available in the same way in the future. For instance, your research mentor may have access to a large data set that you can analyze and write multiple manuscripts on, building out your research portfolio. Later when you’re in a faculty role and starting your own lab, you’ll feel grateful to your past self for having taken advantage of that opportunity!
What would you like to learn more about? Consider any areas of professional development that may aid you later on in the future. Perhaps you want experience working on a large grant proposal, or want to learn more about a particular data analysis technique. Maybe you’re interested in a non-academic career working at a non-profit - you might begin volunteering with a local organization to learn more about what grant writing looks like from their perspective. Factor those professional development experiences into your plan.
Once you’ve spent some time reflecting on these questions, you might chart out your projects and goals in a table by year, quarter, semester, bucket area, and any other categories that feel meaningful to you. This plan can be a living document where you track your progress, change your goals as they evolve, and note any future opportunities that you want to pursue as they arise.
Above all, be flexible and be kind to yourself. It’s not possible for you to cram 5 years of work into a 1-2 year postdoc. You can’t do it all (and that’s okay!), but you can be intentional in making meaningful progress towards your goals.
If you want additional planning support, I highly recommend downloading a copy of my free PDF workbook “Plan with Purpose: A Quarterly Planning and Goal-Setting Workbook for Academics.” This workbook walks you through my step-by-step planning process and provides structure in purposefully planning to achieve your goals.
