Postdoctoral positions as preparation for desired careers: a narrative approach to understanding postdoctoral experience

Abstract

Doing a ‘postdoc’ following a doctorate is becoming more and more common worldwide as the pre-tenure job market continues shrinking in relation to the number of PhD graduates. Yet, behind statistics and descriptions of collective experience, how individuals experience the postdoctoral period is largely unknown, especially how they use this phase as preparation for future employment. Drawing on longitudinal data, this paper provides a close look at how seven postdoctoral scholars in life sciences from two Canadian universities intentionally prepared for their desired careers through day-to-day activities. The participants’ daily activities were situated in three ways: intellectual, networking and institutional. It was found that they were all agentive in preparing for the future; yet, agency was exercised differently due to different institutional and personal contexts. The personal was found to be a significant factor that influenced their career preparations and decisions. This study addresses the gap in the literature regarding postdoctoral experiences and enriches our understanding about postdoctoral experience and training.

Keywords:

• agency
• career preparation
• identity-trajectory
• narrative
• postdoctoral experience

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Greg Hum and Dr Esma Emmioğlu for their participation in data collection and feedback on earlier versions of the paper, and the two anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions.

Notes

1. In this paper, a postdoctoral position refers to ‘a temporary position primarily for gaining additional education and training in research, usually in academia, industry, or government. … . [Postdocs] are considered trainees rather than employees … . and may be funded through a salary, a stipend or sponsorship award’ (Desjardins & King, 2012, p. 20). Note that according to Mendoza, Resko, De Luca, Mendenhall, and Early (2013), there are ‘postdoctoral teaching fellows’ at some Canadian universities.

2. In Canada, ‘faculty members’ refers to assistant, associate and full professors who teach and conduct academic research at universities.

3. All pseudonyms were chosen by the participants.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada [grant number 410-2010-1117].