Researcher Development Programme (RDP) course timetable

This one-day course focuses on the structure of good scientific writing. Including writing exercises as an integral part of the workshop, we will look at the practical process of writing, the nature of scientific publishing, and the importance of editing. The day will finish with a group editing session in which you apply the ideas you have learnt by editing each other's work.

For the group editing session you will need to write a 300-word abstract about your work in advance, and bring it with you as a printout (see 'Prerequisites' below for details).

REGISTRATION starts at 9.00am on the day. Please ensure you arrive on time as latecomers may be refused entry.

Outcomes:

• Develop skills for producing high-quality scientific papers aimed at the world's top journals
• Understand the structure of good communication at the level of sentences, paragraphs, abstracts and entire papers
• Apply these ideas to your own work

Giving presentations is an essential skill for a researcher, be it in your deparment, at a major conference, or in your next job interview! You know your subject but sometimes issues of performance and clarity stop you being your best. Perhaps you can't project your voice, perhaps you are terrified of the Q&A, perhaps you feel your slides let you down, or perhaps you just don't know what to do to get better.

This is a highly interactive workshop that requires you to throw yourself into the activities. Everyone will be involved as we apply some of the material from the online Presentation and Performance toolkit and try it out in a safe and supportive environment.

The workshop is especially designed for those who feel less confident with the performance aspects of giving presentations. If you are comfortable standing up and talking in front of others then we recommend starting with the online materials.

When opportunities come along, do you feel confident about working with people to get what you need? This course gives you a practical insight into the application of professional communication to everyday life, learning how to persuade and influence others effectively. Improving your listening and communication skills is advantageous for both your personal and your professional life.

This workshop is led by Richard Mullender, an external trainer who formerly worked for the Metropolitan Police as a hostage negotiator, and then as Lead Trainer at the National Crisis & Hostage Negotiation Unit in Scotland Yard. By looking at everyday scenarios as well as life-or-death negotiations from his professional experience – e.g. with terrorists for the release of hostages or with someone threatening to commit suicide – Richard demonstrates how to listen for ‘levers’ that help you to persuade and influence, and to secure the best possible outcome.

Outcomes:

• Be able to use communication consciously to persuade and influence effectively
• Recognize when others are using persuasive communication techniques
• Feel more confident in presenting yourself well to others and in gaining support

Innovation & Enterprise Summer School
This year, RDP is pleased to launch an Innovation & Enterprise Summer School for PhD students, led by Dr Emma Williams of EJW Solutions.

Innovation and enterprise are essential aspects of modern research, whether in a university or commercial setting. Developing ideas and assessing their viability; finding backers and a team collaborators; securing financial support; making a plan to deliver results – these are common to research in every field, and every sector. In this summer school, you can refresh your existing skills as well as learning new insights and practical models. You can use the summer school to focus intensively on your current research, or you can use it to try out new ideas. You don’t need to have any plans for, or prior experience of, knowledge exchange and commercialisation.

The four sessions of the summer school have been designed as a pathway, but you are welcome to book for single sessions, i.e. there is no requirement to sign up for the whole programme or to have completed the preceding sessions in order to book for a later one.

Workshop 1: Ideation and evaluation - generating ideas for enterprise and research
Where do great business ideas come from? How do we know a research idea is sound?
This interactive workshop will use ideation and evaluation tools from the world of business. The morning will open up the world of enterprise and entrepreneurship whilst giving you tools to use in your research.

The other workshops in the series are:
Workshop 2: Mapping out success in research and enterprise
Workshop 3: Business plans and funding: turning ideas into reality
Workshop 4: Telling the world about your idea: pitching yourself

Innovation & Enterprise Summer School
This year, RDP is pleased to launch an Innovation & Enterprise Summer School for PhD students, led by Dr Emma Williams of EJW Solutions.

Innovation and enterprise are essential aspects of modern research, whether in a university or commercial setting. Developing ideas and assessing their viability; finding backers and a team collaborators; securing financial support; making a plan to deliver results – these are common to research in every field, and every sector. In this summer school, you can refresh your existing skills as well as learning new insights and practical models. You can use the summer school to focus intensively on your current research, or you can use it to try out new ideas. You don’t need to have any plans for, or prior experience of, knowledge exchange and commercialisation.

The four sessions of the summer school have been designed as a pathway, but you are welcome to book for single sessions, i.e. there is no requirement to sign up for the whole programme or to have completed the preceding sessions in order to book for a later one.

Workshop 2: Mapping out success in research and enterprise
Wouldn’t it be great if we could explore all the aspects of our research project or start-up idea easily? Using a canvas allows you to do just that.
We will use the Successful Researcher Canvas to explore your current research. Then, after exploring the business concept of ‘value’, we will generate business ideas using the Business Model canvas. This interactive morning will provide you with a roadmap for your research whilst giving you a great grounding in what it takes to build a start-up.

The other workshops in the series are:
Workshop 1: Ideation and evaluation: generating ideas for enterprise and research
Workshop 3: Business plans and funding: turning ideas into reality
Workshop 4: Telling the world about your idea: pitching yourself

Do you get the results you want from your communication with others at work? Are you able to talk with confidence in meetings and interviews? Do you have a high level of impact when speaking in public?

This individually focused and completely confidential one-to-one coaching session will help you refine your presentation skills, help you speak more confidently as an emerging leader in your research field, and develop new approaches to your communication in a wide range of professional situations. Constructive feedback will give you insight into your speaking style, how you come across to others, and how well your ideas are communicated. Coaching will focus on your individual requirements ranging from practical points about elocution and vocal projection, to holding the attention of a room, to structuring a compelling presentation.

Do you get the results you want from your communication with others at work? Are you able to talk with confidence in meetings and interviews? Do you have a high level of impact when speaking in public?

This individually focused and completely confidential one-to-one coaching session will help you refine your presentation skills, help you speak more confidently as an emerging leader in your research field, and develop new approaches to your communication in a wide range of professional situations. Constructive feedback will give you insight into your speaking style, how you come across to others, and how well your ideas are communicated. Coaching will focus on your individual requirements ranging from practical points about elocution and vocal projection, to holding the attention of a room, to structuring a compelling presentation.

Aimed at first-year PhD students, this course is designed to get you thinking and working effectively on writing your end-of-first-year-report. How to start? What is expected? How do you make it work for you? These and many other important questions, hints and tips will be addressed in this half-day session.

Outcomes:

• Understand the standard form and function of the first year report
• Start planning the structure of your report
• Experience the benefits of editing and receiveing feedback on writing

Do you get the results you want from your communication with others at work? Are you able to talk with confidence in meetings and interviews? Do you have a high level of impact when speaking in public?

This individually focused and completely confidential one-to-one coaching session will help you refine your presentation skills, help you speak more confidently as an emerging leader in your research field, and develop new approaches to your communication in a wide range of professional situations. Constructive feedback will give you insight into your speaking style, how you come across to others, and how well your ideas are communicated. Coaching will focus on your individual requirements ranging from practical points about elocution and vocal projection, to holding the attention of a room, to structuring a compelling presentation.

Do you get the results you want from your communication with others at work? Are you able to talk with confidence in meetings and interviews? Do you have a high level of impact when speaking in public?

This individually focused and completely confidential one-to-one coaching session will help you refine your presentation skills, help you speak more confidently as an emerging leader in your research field, and develop new approaches to your communication in a wide range of professional situations. Constructive feedback will give you insight into your speaking style, how you come across to others, and how well your ideas are communicated. Coaching will focus on your individual requirements ranging from practical points about elocution and vocal projection, to holding the attention of a room, to structuring a compelling presentation.

Innovation & Enterprise Summer School
This year, RDP is pleased to launch an Innovation & Enterprise Summer School for PhD students, led by Dr Emma Williams of EJW Solutions.

Innovation and enterprise are essential aspects of modern research, whether in a university or commercial setting. Developing ideas and assessing their viability; finding backers and a team collaborators; securing financial support; making a plan to deliver results – these are common to research in every field, and every sector. In this summer school, you can refresh your existing skills as well as learning new insights and practical models. You can use the summer school to focus intensively on your current research, or you can use it to try out new ideas. You don’t need to have any plans for, or prior experience of, knowledge exchange and commercialisation.

The four sessions of the summer school have been designed as a pathway, but you are welcome to book for single sessions, i.e. there is no requirement to sign up for the whole programme or to have completed the preceding sessions in order to book for a later one.

Workshop 3: Business plans and funding: turning ideas into reality
It’s not enough to have a great idea. The idea needs a thought-out plan and some well-funded backing.
In this interactive morning, we will look at all aspects of a business plan, including how this relates to research proposals. Our focus will then switch to money: what do different funders need to know, and how we can build a team that meets their expectations? This course will be useful to those looking to gain funding in the future for research or enterprise endeavours.

The other workshops in the series are:
Workshop 1: Ideation and evaluation: generating ideas for enterprise and research
Workshop 2: Mapping out success in research and enterprise
Workshop 4: Telling the world about your idea: pitching yourself

Innovation & Enterprise Summer School
This year, RDP is pleased to launch an Innovation & Enterprise Summer School for PhD students, led by Dr Emma Williams of EJW Solutions.

Innovation and enterprise are essential aspects of modern research, whether in a university or commercial setting. Developing ideas and assessing their viability; finding backers and a team collaborators; securing financial support; making a plan to deliver results – these are common to research in every field, and every sector. In this summer school, you can refresh your existing skills as well as learning new insights and practical models. You can use the summer school to focus intensively on your current research, or you can use it to try out new ideas. You don’t need to have any plans for, or prior experience of, knowledge exchange and commercialisation.

The four sessions of the summer school have been designed as a pathway, but you are welcome to book for single sessions, i.e. there is no requirement to sign up for the whole programme or to have completed the preceding sessions in order to book for a later one.

Workshop 4: Telling the world about your idea - pitching yourself
Great ideas or business plans will not gain you fame or fortune. Being able to pitch your research for a grant, your idea for business funding or even yourself for a personal fellowship or job are essential.
In this interactive morning, we will practise some great techniques from the world of pitching whilst learning the who, what and how of presenting an idea to funders. Tools from business will inform research and vice versa.

The other workshops in the series are:
Workshop 1: Ideation and evaluation: generating ideas for enterprise and research
Workshop 2: Mapping out success in research and enterprise
Workshop 3: Business plans and funding: turning ideas into reality

The time has come to start writing your thesis, but you may still be in the lab finishing experiments and/or writing papers for publication. How are you going to start writing your thesis and submit on time? This half day workshop is designed to get you thinking and planning your thesis writing, as well as discuss other important factors, which need to be considered when writing up.

Do you know how to write a successful research grant application? This course is designed for postdocs with little or no experience of getting their research funded. It will explore the current research environment and impact agenda and help you understand how research is funded. You will also experience the process of reviewing applications and gain valuable and timely knowledge about how to get research funded.

Outcomes:

• Learn tips and strategies to help you to get your current & future projects funded
• Understand how proposals are assessed by funders
• Gain experience of reviewing funding applications
• Gain information about translational research funding and support available to post-docs

Feedback:

“Both the online resources presented, and the focused training sessions were well structured and passed through the importance of well-structured proposal, and often overlooked issues such as impact.”

“[I liked] seeing a grant from another discipline, to realise that a well-written grant (even if not perfect) can be understood also by people external to the field.”

This is the first of two workshops designed to develop your understanding of the technicalities and the process of getting your research published.

In this workshop, we examine the technical aspects of writing up your research in a format appropriate for publication. You will learn about the importance of following journal guidelines and house style, and the value of using a clear structure to frame your paper. You will also receive guidance on how to produce clear writing in a register appropriate for the readership.

It is possible to attend this course as an individual workshop, although we would encourage you to attend the second workshop in the series Getting published II: Impact and Peer-review.

Please note: The course does not offer bespoke or 1-1 support for manuscript preparation.

Do you get the results you want from your communication with others at work? Are you able to talk with confidence in meetings and interviews? Do you have a high level of impact when speaking in public?

This individually focused and completely confidential one-to-one coaching session will help you refine your presentation skills, help you speak more confidently as an emerging leader in your research field, and develop new approaches to your communication in a wide range of professional situations. Constructive feedback will give you insight into your speaking style, how you come across to others, and how well your ideas are communicated. Coaching will focus on your individual requirements ranging from practical points about elocution and vocal projection, to holding the attention of a room, to structuring a compelling presentation.

This course will cover how to use Social Media tools for Public Engagement. The course will be delivered by the Social Media and AV team.

Do you get the results you want from your communication with others at work? Are you able to talk with confidence in meetings and interviews? Do you have a high level of impact when speaking in public?

This individually focused and completely confidential one-to-one coaching session will help you refine your presentation skills, help you speak more confidently as an emerging leader in your research field, and develop new approaches to your communication in a wide range of professional situations. Constructive feedback will give you insight into your speaking style, how you come across to others, and how well your ideas are communicated. Coaching will focus on your individual requirements ranging from practical points about elocution and vocal projection, to holding the attention of a room, to structuring a compelling presentation.

Do you get the results you want from your communication with others at work? Are you able to talk with confidence in meetings and interviews? Do you have a high level of impact when speaking in public?

This individually focused and completely confidential one-to-one coaching session will help you refine your presentation skills, help you speak more confidently as an emerging leader in your research field, and develop new approaches to your communication in a wide range of professional situations. Constructive feedback will give you insight into your speaking style, how you come across to others, and how well your ideas are communicated. Coaching will focus on your individual requirements ranging from practical points about elocution and vocal projection, to holding the attention of a room, to structuring a compelling presentation.

Do you get the results you want from your communication with others at work? Are you able to talk with confidence in meetings and interviews? Do you have a high level of impact when speaking in public?

This individually focused and completely confidential one-to-one coaching session will help you refine your presentation skills, help you speak more confidently as an emerging leader in your research field, and develop new approaches to your communication in a wide range of professional situations. Constructive feedback will give you insight into your speaking style, how you come across to others, and how well your ideas are communicated. Coaching will focus on your individual requirements ranging from practical points about elocution and vocal projection, to holding the attention of a room, to structuring a compelling presentation.

Do you get the results you want from your communication with others at work? Are you able to talk with confidence in meetings and interviews? Do you have a high level of impact when speaking in public?

This individually focused and completely confidential one-to-one coaching session will help you refine your presentation skills, help you speak more confidently as an emerging leader in your research field, and develop new approaches to your communication in a wide range of professional situations. Constructive feedback will give you insight into your speaking style, how you come across to others, and how well your ideas are communicated. Coaching will focus on your individual requirements ranging from practical points about elocution and vocal projection, to holding the attention of a room, to structuring a compelling presentation.

Do you get the results you want from your communication with others at work? Are you able to talk with confidence in meetings and interviews? Do you have a high level of impact when speaking in public?

This individually focused and completely confidential one-to-one coaching session will help you refine your presentation skills, help you speak more confidently as an emerging leader in your research field, and develop new approaches to your communication in a wide range of professional situations. Constructive feedback will give you insight into your speaking style, how you come across to others, and how well your ideas are communicated. Coaching will focus on your individual requirements ranging from practical points about elocution and vocal projection, to holding the attention of a room, to structuring a compelling presentation.

How can you make the most of your postdoc years at Cambridge? What does a strategic postdoc look like? What could you be doing now to be more strategic, intentional and agentive during your time at Cambridge?
This workshop explores how to navigate the research landscape, how to think and act strategically, and how to develop mental and emotional discipline for coping with the demands of the competitive research environment. We will explore the career journeys of former postdocs and see that there’s no one recipe for success, but there are common ingredients. This workshop is for postdoctoral researchers who want to get to and be prepared for the next step in their careers, whether that’s within academia or beyond.

Outcomes:

• Begin to take charge of your own career path
• Understand the many actions you could be taking now to achieve a career within or beyond academia
• Consider the important link between mental and emotional health and career advancement

Feedback:

“It encouraged an overall view of thinking about my career and what I want out of it and what I am good at. It also covered examples of people who stayed in academia as well as those who did not, so that I was able to consider the pros and cons of more than just one route.”

“I'm right at the start of my post-doc and it helped me to think about what I wanted to get out of the next few years in terms of my career.”

How is it that we all have the same amount of time in the day, yet some postgraduate research students seem to achieve so much more than others? How can we deal with those people and tasks that seem to drain away our time and energy? How can we make sure that we maintain an effective balance in our work and home life, yet still progress towards our career aims? Managing your research project and time effectively are key skills to develop, and will lead you to be a more effective researcher. This will be useful in your future career whatever direction it takes.

This course provides the tools and techniques required to improve your time and project planning.

Please not that these courses are only for University of Cambridge students (undergraduate and postgraduate), who are affiliated to a Cambridge college.

This is one of four "Mindfulness Workshop" sessions. You can attend one - four of these sessions as you wish, in any order. Although not designed as a course, the four sessions are complimentary and cover different aspects of mindfulness.

Please do not book on to the same session twice.

View complete timetable here

The other sessions are as follows:
Mindfulness for Exams 2: Improving Attention
Mindfulness for Exams 3: Better Sleep
Mindfulness for Exams 4: Productive Decisions