About this site
Welcome to Beyond the PhD. Finishing up and moving on from an arts and humanities PhD is so often a double-edged experience. As the summit comes into view, the thought of reaching it is exhilarating, but it can also be unnerving when we don't know what the world beyond it will look like for us.
The familiar task of writing the thesis will be replaced by something else – but exactly what isn't always clear. Will it be postdoctoral research, university teaching, or something outside academia? If you are ready to explore the possibilities of life beyond the PhD, or just want some motivation, we hope that you will find this website a useful starting point.
Beyond the PhD was conceived and developed by people with arts and humanities PhDs in collaboration with careers professionals. It brings together a desire to make visible what happens to postgraduate researchers after they graduate and an ambition to avoid easy prescriptions of 'getting your perfect job'.
We are interested in the emotions, the stories and the unexpected events which lead to unforeseen outcomes. How do people reach the decision to pursue an academic career or to explore other options? How do those with a clear sense of direction get to where they want to be? What is the impact on an individual's career direction when they don't get shortlisted for the first few jobs they apply for? How long do people cleave to long-held career aspirations in the face of pragmatic pressures like paying the bills? When people decide to take a job outside academia, how do they reconcile that with the academic identity that has been under construction during the years of postgraduate study?
Discussing career hopes and fears with others and seeking an objective perspective on our individual situation can be essential to working out what we want to do in life, when we are going to do it, and how we are going to go about doing it. Tapping into the experiences of those in the know is also very important, although often easier said than done.
What Beyond the PhD offers is a rare opportunity to listen in on the experiences of a range of different people from different backgrounds, ages and stages of life who have been through the PhD in an arts and humanities discipline and made the transition into a variety of work beyond it. Their candid personal reflections on facing challenges, responding to opportunities and reaching decisions are captured in segments of audio-interview.
Interviewees describe their PhD experience; the period of transition from their final year of writing-up to their subsequent employment; the contexts in which they currently work, and how the PhD has equipped them for their role. As well as responding to specific questions about, for example, the practical career-building activities they have engaged in, interviewees also reflect on more philosophical questions surrounding personal identity in relation to both work and the PhD.
We anticipate that you will recognise yourself and your own situation in some of the recollections you listen to, but you shouldn't expect to find an interviewee with a profile that exactly fits your own – the point of this site is rather that you explore the material with an open mind and garner some insights into other people's experiences, which might in turn throw light on your own.
In addition to autobiographical material, this site also features articles that offer personal perspectives on issues that are relevant to PhD researchers and their career development. How, for example, do we 'narrate' our past histories and future possible careers? How can we interpret the statistical data pertaining to the career destinations of arts and humanities PhDs? Do employers outside academia perceive PhD researchers in the arts and humanities as being over-educated but under-qualified? And, if so, how can this perception be challenged? How has the PhD as a course of study changed in recent years? And how has this affected its cultural and economic value?
The site also features a collection of video clips of small group discussions about similar issues from a professional perspective. In the careers advisers discussion, the topics covered in the clips include: the nature of career guidance and what PhD researchers might expect to gain from it; the range of work that arts and humanities postgraduates are drawn into; how the PhD thesis can be reframed, and the postgraduate experience translated, in applications for non-academic jobs.
In a further group discussion between academic skills trainers from different higher education institutions, the topics covered include: the government agenda for skills training for postgraduates in the arts and humanities and how this is being realised in universities; the particular limits and challenges of skills training in arts and humanities disciplines; the role of supervisors in equipping postgraduates for academic careers, and the growing professionalisation of academia.
Beyond the PhD is a good place to explore possible career paths within and outside academia, but it aims to complement rather than replace the existing support for PhD researchers; a select list of online and print resources is available via our links page. There are a range of perspectives represented on this site – some of which may conflict with each other, and your own – it is for you to evaluate what you hear and decide what to take from it.
2009 Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services (AGCAS) ICT Award - commended
Acknowledgements
Beyond the PhD has been developed by Shauna Concannon, Julia Horn, Jessica March, Finbar Mulholland, Catherine Reynolds and Rachel Stewart at the Centre for Career Management Skills (CCMS) a HEFCE-funded Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning at the University of Reading. Others closely involved in the development of this site include: Glued, the CCMS postgraduate Group, Cindy Becker, Janet Metcalfe at Vitae, Jo Moyle and Sally Pawlik. We would like to thank the postgraduate researchers at the University of Reading and the University of Sussex who have contributed to surveys, focus groups and user-testing during the development of this site. We are also enormously grateful to those who have written articles and participated in videoed discussions, but most especially to those who have generously given their time to be interviewed.
The familiar task of writing the thesis will be replaced by something else – but exactly what isn't always clear. Will it be postdoctoral research, university teaching, or something outside academia? If you are ready to explore the possibilities of life beyond the PhD, or just want some motivation, we hope that you will find this website a useful starting point.
Beyond the PhD was conceived and developed by people with arts and humanities PhDs in collaboration with careers professionals. It brings together a desire to make visible what happens to postgraduate researchers after they graduate and an ambition to avoid easy prescriptions of 'getting your perfect job'.
We are interested in the emotions, the stories and the unexpected events which lead to unforeseen outcomes. How do people reach the decision to pursue an academic career or to explore other options? How do those with a clear sense of direction get to where they want to be? What is the impact on an individual's career direction when they don't get shortlisted for the first few jobs they apply for? How long do people cleave to long-held career aspirations in the face of pragmatic pressures like paying the bills? When people decide to take a job outside academia, how do they reconcile that with the academic identity that has been under construction during the years of postgraduate study?
Discussing career hopes and fears with others and seeking an objective perspective on our individual situation can be essential to working out what we want to do in life, when we are going to do it, and how we are going to go about doing it. Tapping into the experiences of those in the know is also very important, although often easier said than done.
What Beyond the PhD offers is a rare opportunity to listen in on the experiences of a range of different people from different backgrounds, ages and stages of life who have been through the PhD in an arts and humanities discipline and made the transition into a variety of work beyond it. Their candid personal reflections on facing challenges, responding to opportunities and reaching decisions are captured in segments of audio-interview.
Interviewees describe their PhD experience; the period of transition from their final year of writing-up to their subsequent employment; the contexts in which they currently work, and how the PhD has equipped them for their role. As well as responding to specific questions about, for example, the practical career-building activities they have engaged in, interviewees also reflect on more philosophical questions surrounding personal identity in relation to both work and the PhD.
We anticipate that you will recognise yourself and your own situation in some of the recollections you listen to, but you shouldn't expect to find an interviewee with a profile that exactly fits your own – the point of this site is rather that you explore the material with an open mind and garner some insights into other people's experiences, which might in turn throw light on your own.
In addition to autobiographical material, this site also features articles that offer personal perspectives on issues that are relevant to PhD researchers and their career development. How, for example, do we 'narrate' our past histories and future possible careers? How can we interpret the statistical data pertaining to the career destinations of arts and humanities PhDs? Do employers outside academia perceive PhD researchers in the arts and humanities as being over-educated but under-qualified? And, if so, how can this perception be challenged? How has the PhD as a course of study changed in recent years? And how has this affected its cultural and economic value?
The site also features a collection of video clips of small group discussions about similar issues from a professional perspective. In the careers advisers discussion, the topics covered in the clips include: the nature of career guidance and what PhD researchers might expect to gain from it; the range of work that arts and humanities postgraduates are drawn into; how the PhD thesis can be reframed, and the postgraduate experience translated, in applications for non-academic jobs.
In a further group discussion between academic skills trainers from different higher education institutions, the topics covered include: the government agenda for skills training for postgraduates in the arts and humanities and how this is being realised in universities; the particular limits and challenges of skills training in arts and humanities disciplines; the role of supervisors in equipping postgraduates for academic careers, and the growing professionalisation of academia.
Beyond the PhD is a good place to explore possible career paths within and outside academia, but it aims to complement rather than replace the existing support for PhD researchers; a select list of online and print resources is available via our links page. There are a range of perspectives represented on this site – some of which may conflict with each other, and your own – it is for you to evaluate what you hear and decide what to take from it.
Awards
2009 Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services (AGCAS) ICT Award - commended
2009 Times Higher Education ICT Initiative of the Year - shortlisted
Acknowledgements
Beyond the PhD has been developed by Shauna Concannon, Julia Horn, Jessica March, Finbar Mulholland, Catherine Reynolds and Rachel Stewart at the Centre for Career Management Skills (CCMS) a HEFCE-funded Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning at the University of Reading. Others closely involved in the development of this site include: Glued, the CCMS postgraduate Group, Cindy Becker, Janet Metcalfe at Vitae, Jo Moyle and Sally Pawlik. We would like to thank the postgraduate researchers at the University of Reading and the University of Sussex who have contributed to surveys, focus groups and user-testing during the development of this site. We are also enormously grateful to those who have written articles and participated in videoed discussions, but most especially to those who have generously given their time to be interviewed.
