Researcher development through practical mastery

This stance was strongly anchored in the doing of science, the experimenting, the physicality of scientific practice perceived as the most significant element for researcher development, the core scientific act, the source of research output, the basis for building scientific capital. This was expressed through a variety of terms: having a go, trying things out, taking risks or being

experimentally adventurous. For example:

people who are really good are in fact the people who are happy to just go in there, sometimes quite literally get their hands dirty, and feel a very close relationship to the science, which is completely different from reading it. [Clara]

This corresponded to a stance where researchers were told to be “utterly focused” on the science, or “immersing yourself in it” [Clara] in order to be successful; they were advised to manage distraction to keep themselves on track, in order to avoid losing momentum and drive:

I don’t know whether people who can somehow compartmentalise their thoughts better are more able to get to the end of something and

they end up being very fragmented and therefore it’s much harder for them to get to the end of something. And some people are much more easily distracted. I mean it’s hard to get a set of experiments done unless you’re really focused [Clara]

PIs saw their role as providing a framework for researchers to engage

intensively in the scientific practice. This stance focused on the production of research output above all else, not considering other forms of capital until enough research capital has been acquired. Researcher development equates, in this stance, to a straightforward alignment between doing good science and publishing well:

I think there’s a lot of people create long stories around it, but they’re just trying to kid themselves because they haven’t got the four big papers. If you had the four big papers you wouldn’t need any of the other stories or anything else… To learn to be a better scientist and do good science, and the way you demonstrate good science is that you publish in the best places. And so for me, researcher development is to try to… I try to teach and help people to be good scientists. [Theo] Problematically in this stance, the boundary of what is enough research output, before considering any other types of capital, might be less simple than

presented here.

This stance could lead to a form of technification, representing an approach where a PI perceives researchers as technical skill sets and not agents in transitions within the field. The careers and successes of PIs are intertwined with the ability of researchers to produce successful experimental work. PIs often say that a Postdoc can make or kill a project. Some academics may be keen to keep their good experimentalists in their laboratory. Even when they know that, it may not be so good for the researchers themselves:

It can be difficult where you have people with very particular skills that you don’t want to lose. I think a lot of academics hang on to people because they’ve got those specific skills but ultimately I think in terms of development as a scientist a postdoc position really should be

something you do for a limited period of time. [Gareth]

The PI-Postdoc relationship can lead to symbolic violence being exercised because of the dependency of some PIs on the technical expertise held by some researchers:

I know of a colleague who, he told me, he had a postdoc for a few years and the postdoc applied for one of these teaching-only fellowships at a

teaching-only positions at another university, and I can’t remember his words exactly but he basically said he wouldn’t write him a reference, or wouldn’t write him a good reference because he didn’t want to lose him as a postdoc. Well that’s awful actually – you should not do that. But I’m sure that’s not…you know, I hope it’s uncommon but I’m sure it’s not a unique example. [Daniel]

Technification was exercised in the employment of highly skilled researchers, employed as Postdocs on temporary research contracts, but in reality working as “service technicians”. Murray felt that considerations of development for this category of researchers was particularly challenging, as their positions could not be stepping stones towards academic careers and, at the same time, no permanent career structures currently exists for such researchers. Querying his perception about the fairness of such a funding structure, Murray was reluctant to consider that these positions might be transformed into more permanent technical positions. He evaluated these researchers as “may not have been the best researchers” and assessed that they were often not very happy, losing motivations, and experiencing increasing frustration within these positions. He perceived a flow through these posts as an appropriate strategy for knowledge production, to ensure the maintenance of a motivated work force. In contrast, others felt uncomfortable with the use of researchers on temporary contracts, and attempted to maintain their employment through multiple rounds of grants, placing value on their technical skills and expertise.

Some PIs described working with “weak” Postdocs or Postdocs who had made the decision not to become PIs. In some instances, their approach was to try to get as much as they could from the employment of someone, even if a

researcher would not transit within the field. Fruitfulness of research outcomes for a research project could require industrious inputs from PIs: “I’ve had to work with them quite closely to try and get anything useful out of them” [Simon]. But academics did not seem to consider what could represent development during the period of a research contract for researchers who were unlikely to transit to academic posts. Academics rarely considered the criticality of

accessing a broader range of capital; participation and contribution to teaching, scholarly and administrative activities that could be of use to researchers

outside of the field of postdoctoral research, particularly for Postdocs unlikely to transit further in research.

9.5.2 Researcher development through assessing and advising