Planning my research and scholarly pathway
Where do I see myself in 5 years’ time?
What kind of career pathway do I wish to follow?
In professional life moving up the career pathway takes time, effort and motivation. As part of your annual review or appraisal, you may wish to discuss your longer-term goals.
For those just starting out in research and innovation careers, or wanting to have a look what opportunities are out there, jobs.ac.uk and NHS England provide a really useful guide to moving up the academic or clinical academic career ladder.
There are many different research and innovation pathways which include innovator/inventor, researcher, expert in my field and innovator in teaching and learning or clinical practice. The following information provides a snapshot of these opportunities.
Innovator Inventor
Innovation has the power to transform health and social care/systems. That’s because, in assessing a patient/service user or a problem, registrants use critical thinking to define a problem and combine objective data with on-the-ground experience and teamwork to create solutions that make sure every person receives the best possible treatment.
It’s not just about developing a new gadget, it could be a new model of care, safety practices, more efficient processes — and even innovations that tackle social challenges to improve outcomes. Here is a link to student nurse who developed the Neo-Slip.
Researcher
The results of nursing, midwifery and allied health professionals research helps build the knowledge base and provide the evidence to guide interventions by health and care workers. Your career pathway may be to become a lead research nurse/midwife/AHP developing capability and capacity of others to enable highly qualified professionals to compete against others for research funding.
Expert in the field
Expert professionals are characterised by their leadership, supervision and ability to manage change, as well as their communication and relational skills. professors of nursing, midwifery, allied health professionals are registrants with advanced degrees who work to educate the future generation of learners or advance practice. Their day-to-day consists of teaching and researching at universities or in practice. They stay up to date with health and social care practices and teaching techniques to prepare learners and other registrants to be effective in the field.
Innovation in teaching and learning (T&L)
In nursing, midwifery and allied health professionals education, academics prepare learners to change environments and practice in new environments, a need for innovation always exists. Therefore, new strategies must be used in nursing, midwifery and AHP education. Nurse, midwifery and allied health professional researchers can progress to assistant professor and professors by having diverse interests in creating learning environments that empower learners to be agents of health and social care change.
Download resource
Download, share, and use them as often as you like. We’re here to support you every step of the way!
