Research & Innovation Services

 Pathfinder - your career, your way

Pathfinder is the name for all University of Glasgow initiatives, activities and events supporting researchers with career awareness, options, planning, and transition.

• We recognise the complexity of career trajectories and expectations. We understand that career aspirations and career realities change over time and in light of new information, the availability of opportunities, and changing life demands.
• We know that moving from academic research work into the thousands of fulfilling career pathways for researchers, is not always linear. It's a process of discovery that takes time to process, and involves emotional as well as mental transitions.
• We also recognise that not all university careers are the same; different institutions, with different missions, different structures, and different opportunities create different demands. Moving through an academic career also involves significant professional and often geographical transitions, that all require planning and support.
• Pathfinder is data driven, we collect data on next career destinations, and career transitions, to underpin this work.

Led by the Research Culture and Researcher Development Team in the Research Services Directorate, Pathfinder is a collaboration between specialist developers, careers professionals, academics, alumni, and employers, and aims to ensure the best support is available to you, as you navigate your career, your way.

Access all of the Pathfinder opportunities here

Developing Principal Investigators (PIs)

Principal Investigators have a high degree of responsibility for building a positive, collegial and engaging research culture. We support their success.

We have launched a bespoke development strategy for PIs as the Managers of Researchers. Our approach places collegiality at its core, and works in tandem with our supervisor development strategy, to create a holistic approach.

• Research Leaders' Lunchtime Workshop Series
• People Make Research
• The InFrame Project
• The Glasgow Talent Lab

The Talent Lab houses a suite University of Glasgow initiatives that focus on developing leadership in research, and researchers as leaders. It recognises the power of each of us to influence the research environment and the research culture in which we operate, and to create a place to work in which we can all thrive.  Talent Lab takes a cohort model of career-stage peers, offering structured development opportunities to explore research leadership, to undertake reflective practice that accelerates career development, and to foster mentoring and networking relationships.

Research Professional Staff Development

We build connection, recognition, visibility and career development for research professionals.

The Research Professional Staff Network is our delivery mechanism for this work. The network connects Research Professionals across the university and offers opportunities where they can come together to share the experiences, knowledge and expertise that enable them to work together as a collective.

'Research Professionals' are colleagues whose role directly or indirectly supports research activities at the University of Glasgow, including those for whom this forms only part of their role. The network is for any member of staff whose role involves providing a professional service, expert guidance, system or support for research or researchers, at any point in the research journey. We are open and inclusive, encouraging membership from across the entire research ecology. 

We have worked collaboratively across the Colleges and Central Service Directorates to define the remit and aims for the network, to:

• Connect Research Professional Staff 
• Give Research Professional Staff a greater sense of community and identity
• Support Research Professional Staff to align their work across different areas and functions of the university
• Provide Research Professionals with a space to share their career development needs and journeys

Read more about the network, and join it here

Engaging with our colleagues

We create opportunities for consultation, agency and feedback through enabling structures communities and platforms

We are paying close attention to PGR and Research Staff Engagement and working to create a coherent end-to-end researcher experience at the University of Glasgow. This has so far seen a focus on tailored induction to exit support for all researchers.

We lead a number of communities tailored for all at University of Glasgow, PGRs, Researchers, Research Leaders, Research Professionals, Supervisors and PIs.

We additionally create dialogue, build trust and learn from each other by bringing researchers, academics, and Research Professional Staff together via:

• Researcher Concordat Groups (led by the Deans of Research) in each of the four Colleges
• Research Staff Networks in each of the four Colleges 
• The Research Staff Assembly
• Cross-university Research Staff Induction
• A refreshed PGR Induction Week
• The Research Culture Commons
• The Research Professional Staff Network (Research Professional Staff Induction coming in 2024)
• The Lab for Academic Culture. The Lab provides a connecting structure for relevant projects across University Services and strategies and offers ongoing challenge and critique.

Research Integrity

We are committed to providing an environment that ensures our research is conducted to the highest quality standards.

The Research Integrity Team lead on training, Research Misconduct investigations and the promotion of good research practice.

Current projects include:

• Continuous improvement of the Research Misconduct policy to ensure efficiency, accuracy and care for all those involved in an investigation. To include legal review, data protection and decision frameworks.
• New training provision: extended induction for our Research Integrity Champions and Advisers; training for panels for research misconduct investigations.
• Addressing the link between Research misconduct and bullying by ensuring that support for, and reporting of, bullying is clearly signposted alongside research misconduct processes and training.
• Develop support for whistleblowing: a new anonymous reporting form and a renewed focus on, and promotion of, our Integrity Champions and Advisers network
• Maximize the value of our Research Integrity training: obtain ethical approval so we can analyse our staff Research Integrity training responses in depth and share what we learn.
• Promote good research practice, both through a rolling annual campaign linked to the Code of Good Practice in Research, and improving resources on our web pages.

Open Research

We make it easy to share research early and widely throughout the different stages of the research process.

The Research Information Management Team Lead on Open Research projects including training, resource sharing, and one-to-one support. The benefits of open research (including but not limited to Open Access) include improved visibility of research, greater transparency and reproducibility, enhanced opportunities for collaboration, earlier claim to ideas, and improved public confidence in research.

• We are supporting transparency, openness, verification, and reproducibility by facilitating early and open sharing of research data, software, code, methods, preprints, open educational resources and materials with a wide range of audiences.
• We place value on a wide range of different research output types across the whole lifecycle of research – improving value to the public as well as to other researchers.

To find out more you can watch this Video Introduction to Open Research at Glasgow