I am Senior Lecturer in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Strathclyde. Prior this to I was a Lecturer at the University of Glasgow having first joined on a Research Fellowship and have held roles in R&D and Project Management (Renishaw plc; TWI Ltd).

The ability to build effective networks has always been essential to a successful academic career. However, an increasing focus on multidisciplinarity and the need to demonstrate international and industrial impact at all career levels to secure funding and promotion has underlined the importance of being able to develop and sustain collaborative working practices. As co-Program Director on VisNET I am keen to pioneer new and more effective approaches to networking, capable of providing greater opportunity for meaningful, multidisciplinary collaboration, less influenced by personal circumstance.

As a mother to 3 young children I may not have the same freedom to travel as some of my colleagues but I feel I’ve managed to mitigate this to some extent by using remote networking tools and carefully planning whatever travel I do undertake to have as much impact as possible. The collaborations I have built have brought with them new ideas, a broader outlook and funding success, as well as the rewards of meeting new and interesting people and visiting new places.

First published: 7 May 2019

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