Finding employment after a PhD

Seeking opportunities within academia and beyond

The academic sector is very competitive – you need to be highly motivated and committed to be successful in gaining a post. There are few permanent research posts available so your application needs to be as strong as possible. For more information look at Your PhD on Prospects website.

Academic vacancies

• Try the websites listed in the Resources for PhD researchers section to identify vacancies.
• Use your networking skills to keep in touch with academics in your field: let them know you will be looking for a job and when you are due to finish. They may have a vacancy coming up, or they may be applying for funding that provides an opportunity in their research group. This kind of informal approach is very common in academia.
• Make sure you have an up-to-date, academic CV with full details of your research, publications and teaching.
• Give copies of your CV to your referees to inform any reference they provide for you.
• Email a copy of your CV to other academics in your field that may be looking for research assistants in the near future.
• Be clear about who you are approaching and how your knowledge and experience fits in with the expertise of their department.

Jobs outside academia

You can of course apply for jobs outside your field of academic expertise: 70% of graduate jobs are open to applicants of any discipline. More than 50% of PhD graduates work outside the higher education sector after gaining their research degree.

Think about

• the skills and knowledge you want to use in a job
• what interests you
• the type of organisation you might want to work for.

Look at Exploring your career options to help identify the types of job that appeal to you and why. Use the resources on our Job seeking pages to help find vacancies. You can also make speculative applications directly to employers you would like to work for.

Jobs on Toast is a blog written by a former PhD researcher who has made a career outside academia. It gives useful insights into how to plan your career outside academia and market yourself to potential employers.

If you want to work outside academia, you will need to re-focus your applications. Make your CV a shorter, ‘non-specialist’ document which highlights your transferable skills, and limit the length to a maximum of two sides of A4.

Look at our CV pages for more information about different types of CV.