Arqus PhD Week for Careers outside Academia
Background and aim
The Arqus Action Line 6 Research Support and Early Stage Researcher Development has developed initiatives to support doctoral candidates and doctorate holders in making their skills and knowledge available to employers outside the university context. One of these initiatives is the Arqus PhD Week for Careers outside Academia.
This event will take place on the premises of the Center for Knowledge and Innovation Transfer (ZWI) on the campus of the University of Graz from October 13 to 15, 2021.
Around 60 participants - doctoral researchers, PhD graduates and career development experts - from the seven universities of the Arqus alliance will meet with local entrepreneurs to work together. In case of travel restrictions, there will be an online version of the event.
In addition to cooperating in an international and multicultural environment, the main aims of the PhD Career Week are to train doctoral researchers and PhD graduates to develop skills for careers outside academia. Participants will become aware of their competencies, be empowered to make them explicit to others, learn to develop entrepreneurial (and intrapreneurial) projects and will be trained in opening up professional opportunities and increasing their employability.
Application form for participants
Doctoral researchers and early postdocs from the Arqus partner universities can apply for a travel and accommodation fund at their home universities after they have been selected for participation.
To apply, please fill in this form of Application form for participation.
Deadline for the application is May 19, 2021. You will be notified of a successful application in June. Applicants Vilnius university should email the application form to the coordinator at VU Vida Lapinskaitė.
Programme of the event
The full programme for PhD/postdoc workshop will be published in due time. Among the contents of the Career Week are:
• Mapping the skills acquired during doctoral training
• Entrepreneurship creativity workshop
• Preparing international job applications
• Meet and greet at Centre for Knowledge and Innovation Transfer, University of Graz
• Pitching competition
• Career dinner
In addition to the workshops and activities aimed at helping the participants in securing a career outside academia, the workshops related to entrepreneurship and creativity will allow doctoral researchers and early postdocs to become aware of what entrepreneurial spirit and behavior means. For example, participants will improve their compentence in working with others, problem solving, communicating, becoming self-aware and recognizing personal competencies.
Participants will also learn to recognize and explore entrepreneurial opportunities by being creative, identifying an opportunity and developing it, identifying its value proposition and pitching it.
Relevant Materials
• Information about the ZWI
• More about Graz – City Maps by Graz Tourismus
• See a list of university affiliated hotels here
• More usefull information can be found here.
The Arqus European University Alliance is a cooperation between the Universities of Bergen, Granada, Graz, Leipzig, Lyon, Padua, and Vilnius. It is funded by the European Commission.