Using Narrative CVs to support you and your team's career development

 
Um, without further ado, I am gonna hand over

 
                           
to today’s speaker

 
                           
who is the wonderful Taran Bell from the University of leed

 
                           
So Taryn, I’ll hand over to you

 
                           
Brilliant  Thank you so much Kerry

 
                           
And thank you so much everyone for joining me in

 
                           
What I seem for some of you may be your lunch break,

 
                           
so hopefully you’ll find that it’s an hour

 
                           
that that is worth it

  
                           
Let me just move a few things so I can see your faces

 
                           
Otherwise, I just feel like I’m talking

  
                           
to myself for an hour

  
                           
So, um, my name is Taryn

  
                           
I work at the University of Leeds as a researcher,

  
                           
development advisor

  
                           
And, uh, my area of kind of expertise is kind of twofold

  
                           
It’s partly careers

  
                           
and it’s partly applying for research funding

  
                           
So the narrative CV is something that comes up in both

  
                           
of those areas because for a lot of you,

  
                           
if you’ve heard about narrative cvs, it’s in the context

 
                           
of applying for funding or applying for jobs

  
                           
So I am the lead on, uh, support

  
                           
for narrative CVS at the University of Leeds

  
                           
And when I used to work at the University of York,

  
                           
I developed a lot of their advice

  
                           
and support around narrative CVS as well

  
                           
So this is a fairly new initiative

  
                           
and it’s only really been used by a lot

  
                           
of the major funders in the uk, at least

  
                           
in the last two or three years

  
                           
But in that time, I have read so many narrative cvs

 
                           
I have edited so many narrative cvs

  
                           
I’ve talked with researchers about developing their own

  
                           
narrative cvs

  
                           
And over the course of all that time, I’ve come to realize

  
                           
that actually the narrative CV is a really useful tool

  
                           
for thinking about your career development

  
                           
and thinking about the career development of those

  
                           
that you work with too

  
                           
So that’s what we’re gonna cover today

  
                           
Not necessarily, you know, how to write a narrative cv,

  
                           
it’s more about how do you use them as a tool to support you

 
                           
and your team’s career development

  
                           
If you’ve never written one before, don’t worry

  
                           
I’ll cover some of the detail on

  
                           
how you actually write one as well

  
                           
Just a few bits of of housekeeping

  
                           
to help everything run smoothly

  
                           
Obviously I don’t think it’s a problem right now,

  
                           
but if, um, if you do have your mic on,

  
                           
please make sure it’s muted just

  
                           
because that can cause a bit

  
                           
of confusing background noise for people sometimes

 
                           
What I would really encourage you to do today though, is

  
                           
to get involved in the session

  
                           
There will be time for reflection, there’ll be time

  
                           
for thoughts, time for you to do some work of your own

  
                           
Um, but there’ll also be time for you to have a chat

  
                           
as well, you know, time for you

  
                           
to get involved either using the chat function in Zoom

  
                           
or verbally by turning your mic on

  
                           
What I would say is if you have any

  
                           
questions, add them in the chat

  
                           
I, you know, I’ll answer them

 
                           
I’ll try and answer them as we go

  
                           
through the session rather than all at the end

  
                           
’cause I know some people will have to rush off at the end

  
                           
to other meetings, other things

  
                           
Um, and as always, slides will be provided afterwards

  
                           
So don’t worry about having to make tons of notes

  
                           
We will make sure those slides get round

  
                           
to everyone afterwards

  
                           
So what are we gonna cover today?

  
                           
Um, well ideally by the end of this session,

  
                           
hopefully you should have improved your

 
                           
understanding of three things

  
                           
Hopefully you should have a better understanding of

  
                           
how the narrative CV aligns with what I would call the kind

  
                           
of key academic competencies in      

  
                           
Um, you should have an improved understanding of

  
                           
how you can use the narrative CV

  
                           
or NCV as a positioning tool,

  
                           
and I’ll talk about what that means later

  
                           
And you should also have a better understanding of

  
                           
how you can use narrative CVS to support the development

  
                           
of you and your team

 
                           
Many of you sat here today will be PIs, you’ll be leading,

  
                           
uh, leading teams, leading researchers, leading technicians

  
                           
And there’s often a pressure to feel like you need

  
                           
to be a careers advisor

  
                           
You do not, and I’m sure

  
                           
that’s something Kerry would agree with as well

  
                           
We want PIs to support their team’s career development,

  
                           
but we do not expect you to be an expert in careers

  
                           
That’s why platforms like Prosper exist to support you

  
                           
and to support your researchers

  
                           
Um, but what I will hopefully show you today is

 
                           
that even if you don’t have any expertise in careers

  
                           
whatsoever, the narrative CV can be a really,

   
                           
really lovely way to support your researchers

   
                           
as they think about what they’ve achieved so far

   
                           
and what they want to go onto

   
                           
However, let’s make a start with kind of reintroducing you

   
                           
to narrative cvs

   
                           
because it’s always really useful for me to get a feeling

   
                           
for, um, kind of where we sit as a group

   
                           
and also just give that kind of background knowledge

   
                           
for those of you who are complete beginners

   
                           
Um, so if you wouldn’t mind answering in the chat,

  
                           
on a scale of one to five, what would you rate your level

   
                           
of knowledge of narrative cvs?

   
                           
One being, you know, nothing, five being,

   
                           
you know, everything

   
                           
So I’m seeing lots of ones

   
                           
and twos, couple of threes a four overall

   
                           
erring on the side of, we’ve got,

   
                           
we’ve got a couple of fives I think

   
                           
I think I saw one five yet, Darcy, I’m not surprised at all

   
                           
Susan, I’m not surprised, uh, either by that

   
                           
Um, I wouldn’t say there are that many people

  
                           
who consider themselves an expert in narrative cvs

   
                           
because as, as a field it’s moving quite quickly

   
                           
Um, and it doesn’t really surprise me that most

   
                           
of the people in the room are kind of hovering around one,

   
                           
two, or three, that area

   
                           
So what I’m gonna do, uh,

   
                           
and this is really for the benefit of, um, that is really

   
                           
for the benefit of those of you who are kind of hovering at

   
                           
that one to two, uh, part

   
                           
of the scale is we are gonna start thinking, uh,

   
                           
what is the narrative cv?

  
                           
Just a really quick reintroduction

   
                           
So if you ask national funders what a narrative CV is,

   
                           
they’ll, they’ll say something along the lines

   
                           
of the narrative CV is a short form narrative format

   
                           
to help assess researchers track records

   
                           
But what do they actually mean by that?

   
                           
Um, essentially what they’re asking you

   
                           
to do is write about your contributions

   
                           
to a number of different areas

   
                           
I was at meeting a couple of weeks ago

   
                           
where we actually said the term narrative CVS

  
                           
is so confusing

   
                           
It’s more of a structured personal statement than it is

   
                           
a traditional cv

   
                           
And for many people it’s more like a cross

   
                           
between a CV and a cover letter

   
                           
Um, the most common template though is one that is used

   
                           
by UK RI or UK Research

   
                           
and Innovation who are one

   
                           
of our national funders here in the uk

   
                           
Um, and they came up with, and, um, apologies

   
                           
because I’m gonna use a bunch of acronyms

  
                           
Um, they came up with a version that they call the resume

   
                           
for research and innovation, which they refer to

   
                           
as the R four ri

   
                           
That’s the most common template

   
                           
and that’s the one I’m gonna walk, walk you through today

   
                           
Essentially, the narrative cv, uh,

   
                           
or the R four RI asks you to demonstrate your contributions

   
                           
to four separate areas

   
                           
And those areas are the generation of new ideas,

   
                           
hypotheses, tools, or knowledge

   
                           
So does anyone want to tell me what they think

  
                           
you are gonna put in that area?

   
                           
What, what are we talking about when we talk about

   
                           
contributions to the generation of new ideas and so on?

   
                           
Any ideas? Anything in the chat?

   
                           
Research grants, Julie? Yep  Absolutely

   
                           
That can often be generating new ideas, research grants

   
                           
Anything else? Anyone have any other

   
                           
suggestions for what can go in there?

   
                           
Publications, published outputs, data sets? Yes

   
                           
All very valid

   
                           
And really what these are examples of

  
                           
are original innovative research that is essentially

   
                           
that first question, how have you contributed

   
                           
to producing original innovative research?

   
                           
Hopefully for most researchers,

   
                           
that should not be too much of a problem

   
                           
That one, that one print should be pretty straightforward

   
                           
What do we think about that second one?

   
                           
The one in green, the development of others

   
                           
and the maintenance of effective working relationships

   
                           
What do we think we might be talking about there?

   
                           
Mentoring? Yeah, absolutely

  
                           
Classic example of developing others

   
                           
Service maka

   
                           
What do you mean by service collegiality?

   
                           
Collaboration, summer schools

   
                           
and teaching, delivering workshops

   
                           
Community management  Yes

   
                           
All loads of, yeah, loads of really good examples

   
                           
Yeah, essentially the second part  Yep  Supervision

   
                           
We, we’ve got ’em coming in quite, quite quickly now

   
                           
Uh, this next one is about what do you do to support others?

   
                           
What do you do to work in a team or what do you do to lead?

  
                           
Or a combination of all three of these

  
                           
I kind of treat this like the nice person test

   
                           
How are you a nice person to work with

   
                           
and how do you support the other people who work

   
                           
directly around you?

   
                           
Which is a super impart important part

   
                           
of being an academic today

   
                           
The last two get a little bit more vague

   
                           
So the third one is, how have you contributed to the wider

   
                           
research and innovation community?

   
                           
What do we think is going on there? Any ideas?

   
                           
And I realize this is a bit more vague, this one

  
                           
and Andrea’s mentioning peer review, Jenny, EDI, Paula,

   
                           
peer review, participation in associations

   
                           
Julie, Julie research question

   
                           
We’ve got all the experts we need in the room right here

   
                           
Absolutely  That third section is really about, um,

   
                           
the impact of your work on the research community

   
                           
So as I’ll talk about a little bit later, this is, this kind

   
                           
of for me takes two forms

   
                           
It’s either any work that you are doing

   
                           
beyond your school or institution

   
                           
For example, international work, insti,

  
                           
inter-institutional work, work

   
                           
with people from other disciplines,

   
                           
or it’s the work that you do

   
                           
to support the research community with things like research,

   
                           
culture, equality, diversity and inclusion

   
                           
All of those various things that kind

   
                           
of make the research community a better place to be

   
                           
And that final one is contributions

   
                           
to broader users and audiences

   
                           
and towards wider societal benefit

   
                           
What kinds of stuff is going in there?

  
                           
Yeah, Julie’s got it all

   
                           
CPD impact, knowledge exchange, public engagement

   
                           
That pretty much covers it all  It’s pretty simple

   
                           
This one, it’s all about how do you engage

   
                           
with non-academics, uh, whether you are doing research

   
                           
with them, communicating with them, learning from them,

   
                           
participating with them, all of these kinds of things

   
                           
Okay, so I asked you at the beginning,

   
                           
how much do you know about cvs?

   
                           
I’m gonna ask a slightly different question  Again

   
                           
I want us to use a one to five scale in the chat

  
                           
How much do you engage with cvs?

   
                           
Now you can by engage, you can take that

   
                           
to mean whatever you want

   
                           
How much do you engage with CVS on a regular basis?

   
                           
Is it that you never, in which case you’d put a one

   
                           
or are you dealing with them all the time?

   
                           
This five would probably be me

   
                           
I’m working on narrative CVS all the time

   
                           
as a, as a, yeah, pretty unsurprising, pretty

   
                           
low number

   
                           
Susan, you’re a five,

  
                           
but Susan, I know you’re in the same boat as me

   
                           
You’re working on this regularly  Uh, yeah, couple of three

   
                           
So generally we’re not dealing with them too often

   
                           
Um, when you are, those of you who, who are dealing

   
                           
with them, when you are dealing with them,

   
                           
how do you engage with them?

   
                           
In, in what manner are you engaging with narrative cvs?

   
                           
What are you using them for?

   
                           
Writing them for reading them for

   
                           
So Hannah’s using it to update their own cv

   
                           
Laura’s assessing grants and fellowships

  
                           
Yeah, applying for grants, fellowship applications

   
                           
Lots of funding stuff there  Yeah

   
                           
Is anyone applying for jobs with them?

   
                           
Sheely’s got a, a new a grant

   
                           
to introduce an NCV approach for appraisals

   
                           
Oh, interesting  I’d love to hear more about that

   
                           
That sounds really interesting

   
                           
Firstly, for most of us it’s funding

   
                           
And that’s not terribly surprising actually

   
                           
because for the most part, narrative CVS were developed

   
                           
by funders in the UK originally

  
                           
Um, and now there are a lot of funders both in the UK

   
                           
and internationally who are using them

   
                           
or are going to start using them soon

   
                           
This is not just a UK thing by the way

   
                           
There you can see on the screen here, plenty of different,

   
                           
uh, plenty of different international funders

   
                           
That’s the Dutch Research Council  Canadian

   
                           
We’ve got Irish, Swiss Luxembourg, we’ve got all kinds

   
                           
of international funders using these two

   
                           
But they’re not just used

   
                           
for assessing your track record for funding

  
                           
Um, there are increasingly a number of organizations

   
                           
where they’re using them for academic job

   
                           
applications and promotions

   
                           
This is is few and far between right now

   
                           
I know there are a few universities which are started

   
                           
to use them generally

   
                           
Most cel last for traditional academic cv though hopefully,

   
                           
as you’ll see from some of the stuff we do later,

   
                           
there’s not actually that much difference between a,

   
                           
a narrative CV and the way that you have to apply

   
                           
for jobs in many universities anyway

  
                           
If you think, again to

  
                           
what I said earlier about a narrative CV being more like a

   
                           
structured personal statement

   
                           
Actually a lot of the things that when I work

   
                           
with researchers writing a narrative CV

   
                           
and writing a promotion application, there’s not actually

   
                           
that much difference in kind

   
                           
of the way that you are writing

   
                           
So it’s not necessarily like it’s anything brand new,

   
                           
but it can take a little bit of time to get

   
                           
to get your head round

   
                           
Um, but the key message I want you

  
                           
to take away from today is

   
                           
that narrative CVS aren’t just useful for jobs

   
                           
or funding applications

   
                           
They’re also really useful for helping you support your team

   
                           
and in thinking about your own career development as well

   
                           
So let’s first think about how you can use the narrative CV

   
                           
to understand academic careers

   
                           
Let’s come back to those four modules

   
                           
What I’d like you to do just really quickly is start

   
                           
to think what parts of your role fit into each section

   
                           
So if you feel comfortable doing so

  
                           
So feel free to add into the chat an example of something

   
                           
that you do that would be classed

   
                           
as original innovative research

   
                           
Anything in the chat that we’re gonna think as

   
                           
and as an example of an original innovative research

   
                           
We talked about these a little bit earlier

   
                           
Some people mentioned publications, for example,

   
                           
some people mentioned data sets,

   
                           
software, anything like that?

   
                           
No, we’re not gonna put them into the chat

   
                           
That’s absolutely fine  Yeah

  
                           
Sophie writing and publishing papers  Yeah  Publications

   
                           
Yeah  For many of you, the stuff

   
                           
that you are putting in this top one is probably

   
                           
going to be publications

   
                           
’cause that’s a lot of how we get

   
                           
that original innovative research out

   
                           
Um, but as cha has put there, patents as well

   
                           
If you, if you are patenting your work, then you can add

   
                           
that kind of stuff in as well

   
                           
Hannah protocols yet, yet what, what it,

   
                           
what original innovative research looks like looks different

  
                           
depending on what you you’re doing

   
                           
There’s so much that you could mention

   
                           
For many of you, it’s going to be publications

   
                           
or conference papers, data sets, all of that kind of thing

   
                           
Um, for some of you it’ll be things like software you’ve

   
                           
developed or maybe an exhibition you developed or a product

   
                           
Uh, you’ve made what those outputs really depend on

   
                           
You know, it really, really depends on

   
                           
what you’re doing in your research

   
                           
You can also talk about things like the development

   
                           
of methods or tools or resources

  
                           
You know, maybe you’ve generated a new idea or hypothesis,

   
                           
but you can also mention things like the funding

   
                           
and the awards and the prizes that you’ve mentioned too

   
                           
Two, what kinds of things

   
                           
that you do on a day-to-day basis then would you mention in

   
                           
supporting others?

   
                           
Teamwork and leadership  We had, um, I think it was,

   
                           
Julie mentioned mentoring earlier

   
                           
That’s absolutely something that would go in there

   
                           
That’s a classic example of supporting others

   
                           
What other kinds of things do we think are going in there?

  
                           
But what do you do on a day-to-day basis

   
                           
that you’d put in that second bit?

   
                           
Yeah, PhD supervision  Classic example

   
                           
Really common example of how we support other people

   
                           
Yeah, other people saying supervision

   
                           
Yeah, that’s often a big one in narrative cvs

   
                           
People tend to put their supervision in there

   
                           
Hannah establishing collaborations yet

   
                           
Good one about teamwork

   
                           
Marlin line management yet leadership contributions

   
                           
to research centers and groups

  
                           
Yeah, that’s all the kind of stuff that you’d go in there

   
                           
So while the innovative research is thinking about

   
                           
what you are doing, we then you are then moving on

   
                           
to think about the people around you

   
                           
So you could talk about supervision teaching

   
                           
that you do mentoring, teamwork, um, as Hannah mentioned,

   
                           
any work you do establishing

   
                           
and maintaining collaborations you’d put in there

   
                           
That’s a classic example

   
                           
And any leadership positions you’ve held

   
                           
When we come to the part on the research community

  
                           
beyond your school and institution,

   
                           
I mentioned this one earlier

   
                           
This one tends to throw people a little bit this third bit

   
                           
But I, I would generally split

   
                           
what you can fit in here into two areas

   
                           
Firstly, any work, any research work that you are doing with

   
                           
researchers from other disciplines, other institutions or,

   
                           
or maybe researchers in other countries,

   
                           
because that’s thinking about the wider research community

   
                           
But actually what most people put in this section is

   
                           
what we’ve traditionally referred to

  
                           
as academic citizenship

  
                           
So things like any editing

   
                           
or reviewing that you’ve done, maybe that’s for either

   
                           
for a journal or for a funding body

   
                           
Any positions that you hold on committees

   
                           
or professional bodies

   
                           
and any activities

   
                           
that you do which benefit the research community as a whole

   
                           
So that’s quite a, a broad one there

   
                           
And then let’s be honest, this last one is, is pretty simple

   
                           
and I think Julie put about every example

   
                           
that we could possibly think of in the chat

  
                           
So we already know what that one is

   
                           
Any work you are doing beyond academia, knowledge exchange,

   
                           
policy engagement, any partnerships

   
                           
with non-research organizations or,

   
                           
or non-academic research organizations

   
                           
Things like public engagement may be participatory research

   
                           
if you’re in the health sciences

   
                           
Um, anything that you do in patient

   
                           
and public involvement that could all go in there as well

   
                           
And actually if you look at all of these, you might notice

   
                           
that actually all of the complex

  
                           
and di very varying work that you do

   
                           
as an academic maps across all four of these areas

   
                           
are traditional view

   
                           
of academic careers has really focused on that first one,

   
                           
that original, uh, original innovative research

   
                           
But the point of the narrative CV is

   
                           
to get us thinking about actually all of the things

   
                           
that you do to contribute to both academia

   
                           
and the world beyond

   
                           
So for me, when you are thinking about

   
                           
how you support new researchers, for example, your PhD

  
                           
students, PhD researchers,

   
                           
or your early career researchers,

   
                           
I would really encourage you to use the narrative CV

   
                           
as a framework for one-to-one discussions

   
                           
It really is your job

   
                           
You know, we don’t expect you to be a careers expert,

   
                           
but it is your job to make sure

   
                           
that your team know what’s involved in an academic career

   
                           
If what’s that? If, if that’s what they’re working towards

   
                           
You know, I recommend using this as early

   
                           
as possible in one-to-one discussions with your teams

  
                           
Um, I know it leads, some

   
                           
of our supervisors have been taking the narrative CV

   
                           
and using it as a discussion with their p their PhD

   
                           
researchers right from the beginning about the differing

   
                           
skills that they need to develop

   
                           
over the course of their PhD

   
                           
Essentially what this does is it kind of lays the groundwork

   
                           
for yeah, you are thinking about your research,

   
                           
but remember that you are gonna need to develop in all

   
                           
of these different areas because we know,

   
                           
and I know this from speaking to postdocs regularly, some

  
                           
research leaders fall into the trap

   
                           
of just encouraging their team to publish, publish, publish

   
                           
And then what realistically happens is

   
                           
that those same researchers come

   
                           
to their first fellowship application

   
                           
or their first grant application or a lectureship

   
                           
and they don’t have the breadth of experience that funders

   
                           
and employers are looking for

   
                           
So when you’re thinking about the narrative CV

   
                           
and using it with your researchers, it’s really helpful

   
                           
for understanding what’s required in a modern academic

  
                           
career beyond just publications

   
                           
And it can also be a really useful way for, for you

   
                           
to help your, your team think about where they’re leading

   
                           
beyond formal leadership positions

   
                           
Because again, ECRs early career researchers often think

   
                           
that leadership means holding a leadership position,

   
                           
but the narrative CV can be a useful way for them

   
                           
to think about how are they leading in these different areas

   
                           
of their working life

   
                           
Or, you know, how are you leading individual projects?

   
                           
How are you leading in your research area

  
                           
and so on and so forth

   
                           
Let’s be honest, we are not reinventing the wheel here

   
                           
I just think the narrative CV is a really succinct way

   
                           
of summing up what it means to be an academic in the     s

   
                           
and being realistic with our, our researchers

   
                           
and those we work with about

   
                           
what is involved in an academic career

   
                           
If you’re a slightly more senior researcher,

   
                           
you can also use the narrative CV as a way

   
                           
to think about your spheres of influence as a researcher

   
                           
So I kind of see those four questions

  
                           
as getting progressively wider

   
                           
You start off thinking about the research you are doing,

   
                           
then you think about the people working around you,

   
                           
then the broader research community,

   
                           
then the non-academic community

   
                           
Over the course of an academic career,

   
                           
your influence is likely to spread

   
                           
You’re likely to to move further out into

   
                           
those spheres of influence

   
                           
And, and it can help to use the narrative CV as a tool

   
                           
to think about how your influences widened over time

  
                           
And so if you’re a bit more senior,

  
                           
you can almost use the narrative CV as a kind

   
                           
of positioning piece,

   
                           
which you can use in things like promotion applications

   
                           
or funding applications to, to think about

   
                           
where you were in the past, the distance you’ve traveled

   
                           
and, and where you are today

   
                           
So just using the narrative CV itself

   
                           
as a framework can be really useful in helping you

   
                           
understand what’s required

   
                           
and thinking about the impact that you are having

   
                           
outside just, just of your research specifically

  
                           
And then when you’ve taken the time to think about

   
                           
what an academic career is and, and, and, and you and,

   
                           
and kind of what’s involved in being an academic today,

   
                           
you can then bring this all together to start to make

   
                           
what I would refer to as the case for you

   
                           
I often work with researchers who really struggle

   
                           
to articulate what they bring to the table

   
                           
and how they can set themselves apart

   
                           
from others in their field

   
                           
So I think the next thing that you can do

   
                           
with the narrative CV is to use it

  
                           
to help them figure out their, their unique selling point

   
                           
Learn to position themselves

   
                           
and learn to communicate what they bring to the table

   
                           
So the way I tend to do this with research is at Leeds, um,

   
                           
is we start

   
                           
by mapping those achievements out against those four areas

   
                           
and, and taking stock

   
                           
Um, this is something I do a lot

   
                           
with our postdocs when they’re just,

   
                           
or when they’re preparing to submit a funding proposal

   
                           
or submit or preparing to apply for lectureships

  
                           
Um, Kerry should have emailed you, um, a template,

   
                           
a narrative CV template

   
                           
If you haven’t got that to hand, don’t worry, you don’t,

   
                           
you know, just, just take a piece of paper

   
                           
or use a Word document somewhere, um, to do this

   
                           
But what I’m gonna do now is I’m gonna give you five minutes

   
                           
to try doing this yourself

   
                           
Think about, for example,

   
                           
what you’ve achieved over the last five or    years

   
                           
How does this map against those four areas and try

   
                           
and have, if possible, at least one example in every area

  
                           
So I’m just gonna give you five minutes

   
                           
and I’ll write this instruction

   
                           
Uh, I’ll write this instruction in the chat for you as well

   
                           
Five minutes to try mapping out your own achievements

   
                           
against the narrative cv

   
                           
Okay, so I’ve given you about five minutes there

   
                           
I’m not expecting you to have written everything you’ve done

   
                           
there ’cause that’s not very much time to go through this,

   
                           
but this might be something after the session

   
                           
You want to come back and kind of keep populating, uh,

   
                           
this entire structure with everything that you’ve done

  
                           
So, so this is also a really useful thing

   
                           
to do when you’re supporting your team

   
                           
Um, so I would really encourage you

   
                           
to take    minutes at the end of a one-to-one with one

   
                           
of your team next time you’re meeting with one of them

   
                           
and discuss one of these modules with them

   
                           
and do this act of sitting down

   
                           
and trying to map as much as possible

   
                           
and think that that’s much as they’ve done

   
                           
for one of those sections

   
                           
That’s what I mean by modules, one of those sections, um,

  
                           
each time and then over the course of a number

   
                           
of one-to-ones, you’re starting to build up

   
                           
for them a really clear map of what it is

   
                           
that they’ve achieved so far

   
                           
What I often find is that when we work with postdocs on this

   
                           
and they write the entire narrative, CVL,

   
                           
they map all those achievements out

   
                           
They go, oh wow, actually,

   
                           
I didn’t realize how much I’ve done

   
                           
And so it’s a really nice way for them to take stock

   
                           
and realize all these things that they’ve done so far

  
                           
The challenge is though,

   
                           
is the narrative CV is not just about listing everything

   
                           
you’ve ever done like a traditional cv

   
                           
It’s about bringing out the detail

   
                           
that’s he hence the narrative name

   
                           
Bringing out the detail in what you’ve done, explaining

   
                           
how you did it and why it matters

   
                           
So the next thing that I tend to do

   
                           
with researchers is once they’ve got these things mapped

   
                           
out, we take some of the highlights

   
                           
and we bring that narrative out

  
                           
And we do this using car stories

   
                           
Um, so if you’ve ever applied for a civil service job,

   
                           
you might know this is the star method,

   
                           
but at least we tend to recommend a car

   
                           
Very simple  It’s context action results

   
                           
So if you’ve mapped an achievement, you think about, okay,

   
                           
what was the situation?

   
                           
What was the role? What was the thing I had to do?

   
                           
What actually did I do?

   
                           
What skills did I use if I was working in a team,

   
                           
what was my individual contribution?

  
                           
And then finally, what was the result?

  
                           
What was the impact of it all?

   
                           
And by actually writing out these accomplishments in this

   
                           
level of detail, their explaining more clearly

   
                           
how they did it and why it matters

   
                           
And this teaches both you

   
                           
and them to communicate those achievements

   
                           
And this is gonna be so useful

   
                           
because this is something that,

   
                           
uh, researchers often struggle with

   
                           
How do you communicate the skills you’ve developed?

   
                           
And this is going to help them, uh, prepare

  
                           
for funding applications, job applications, cvs,

   
                           
job interviews, the lot

   
                           
So by providing just doing these very simple tasks

   
                           
with them, you are providing them with very

   
                           
valuable support

   
                           
Jenny’s noted in the chat,

   
                           
is it worth adding a reflection element to cast

   
                           
so they can show what they learned

   
                           
and what they do now as a result?

   
                           
Absolutely  I often refer to these as Carl stories

   
                           
So after that, r you’ve got learning

  
                           
Um, what I would say is when you are writing them up

   
                           
for funding applications, you often don’t have space for

   
                           
that reflection bit that will go

   
                           
elsewhere in their application

   
                           
But yes, when you are doing this for

   
                           
to support career development,

   
                           
that learning is really useful

   
                           
Um, I also,

   
                           
I you can even stretch it out even further if you’re

   
                           
applying for a job called them Carla Stories

   
                           
where you go from learning to application, this is

  
                           
how I would apply those skills to the job I’m applying for

   
                           
It gets, it, it, these stories

   
                           
can get even longer and longer

   
                           
But at heart,

   
                           
even just doing these car stories is incredibly useful in

   
                           
teaching them to bring out that level of detail

   
                           
Because this is the kinds of things that they will need

   
                           
to do when they’re applying for funding,

   
                           
when they’re applying for, for job applications

   
                           
They will need to know how to do this

   
                           
So I’m just gonna give you a quick example

  
                           
What does it actually look like?

   
                           
Um, something I often see in drafts

   
                           
of narrative CVS is the simple sentence

   
                           
I’ve supervised X number of master students

   
                           
and X number of PhD students and that’s it

   
                           
And what I always say to researchers is that,

   
                           
doesn’t doesn’t mean you are good at it

   
                           
You know, you might be supervising,

   
                           
but I need you to convince me that you supervise well

   
                           
So how do we bring the detail out in a way

   
                           
that showcases the skills a little bit more?

  
                           
Um, let’s give an example  The context is pretty simple

   
                           
I’ve successfully supervised four master students

   
                           
and two PhD researchers

   
                           
I support my supervisees with both their research

   
                           
and their career development,

   
                           
developing tailored development plans,

   
                           
incorporating time at one-to-one meetings

   
                           
to discuss their careers

   
                           
and giving them protected time

   
                           
to pursue their own interests

   
                           
So can you see how many actions are in there?

  
                           
How much specific detail, how much it pulls out the skills

   
                           
that you have as a research leader

   
                           
And then we lead onto the result,

   
                           
which is a testimonial from one of your researchers

   
                           
One of my PhD researchers said

   
                           
that my support gave me confidence to explore a range

   
                           
of careers beyond academia

   
                           
This student has since progressed to a role in in industry

   
                           
This is what the narrative CV is about

   
                           
It’s about quality over quantity

   
                           
Rather than listing everything you ever do,

  
                           
it’s about picking out those individual career highlights,

   
                           
which really demonstrate the, the, the variety of skills

   
                           
and competencies that you have

   
                           
What I’m going to do is I’m gonna give you about five

   
                           
minutes to try turning one of those achievements

   
                           
that you’ve just written down into a car story

   
                           
So I’ll go back to the slide beforehand

   
                           
I’d like you to take a few minutes to take one of those,

   
                           
those achievements and think about how am I going

   
                           
to bring the detail out in that how am I, you know,

   
                           
how am I gonna show the actions that I took

  
                           
and the results that they had

   
                           
So again, I’ll write the instructions, um, in the chat

   
                           
and we’ll come back in five minutes

   
                           
Okay? This is, this is the challenging bit I think

   
                           
with narrative cvs

   
                           
I’m just gonna address a couple of questions

   
                           
that have come up in the chat

   
                           
while you were working on that

   
                           
Um, the first bit is, uh, someone mentioned

   
                           
that some people mentioned that the evidence is missing

   
                           
by which I think they mean, um, they don’t have any evidence

  
                           
that there was an impact

  
                           
This can be difficult

   
                           
Um, and I’ll link to a Padlet with lots of, uh, examples

   
                           
and, and, and uh, resources

   
                           
where you can find out more about this

   
                           
Um, but ideally when you are writing these things,

   
                           
you should be able to evidence in some way that

   
                           
what you’ve done was impactful

   
                           
And for some people, say for example, you’ve,

   
                           
you’ve worked in a collaboration

   
                           
or something like that, it might be something,

   
                           
there might be a job there for you to go back

  
                           
to those collaborators and say, how was it working with me?

   
                           
What impact did I have in seeking that evidence out?

   
                           
And that can be really helpful

   
                           
Um, that can be challenging though

   
                           
And, and I will, um, forward on a slide with a bunch

   
                           
of evidence of kind of what, what what we count as evidence,

   
                           
what we count as impact, the kinds of things that,

   
                           
that you can give as examples, um, to show that

   
                           
what you are doing has had some impact

   
                           
The, the other thing that comes through the other,

   
                           
the other question that came through,

  
                           
which is a very common one is that, well,

   
                           
sometimes the word limit doesn’t give you the

   
                           
opportunity to expand

   
                           
And this is where a narrative CV is really different

   
                           
to a traditional CV

   
                           
because a narrative CV is not a historical document,

   
                           
it is not a list of everything you’ve ever done

   
                           
It’s almost like a highlight reel of the things

   
                           
that you have done that you are really proud of,

   
                           
that have been impactful, that have had an effect

   
                           
And importantly, when you’re applying for funding

  
                           
or applying for a job, they’re the examples

   
                           
that best illustrate you can do that thing

   
                           
So if you’re applying for a particular type of funding,

   
                           
you need to de you need to use your narrative CV

   
                           
to demonstrate that you have the specific skills

   
                           
to do that funding

   
                           
What that means is you are then left in a,

   
                           
in an uncomfortable kind of situation, um,

   
                           
where sometimes it means you have to leave some things out

   
                           
Um, because realistically in a narrative cv for example,

   
                           
the UKRI uh, version,

  
                           
you only have  ,    words

   
                           
to cover all four of these elements

   
                           
I don’t mean each, I mean all four as a total,

   
                           
just over a thousand words

   
                           
So really in practice what this tends to mean is

   
                           
that most people can only cover maybe three

   
                           
at most car stories per section

   
                           
So this really does mean picking out those highlights

   
                           
So how do you use this to support your team?

   
                           
If we come back to thinking about career development,

   
                           
what I’d really encourage you to do is,

  
                           
is encourage your team to write up accomplishments

   
                           
as car stories for later use

   
                           
You know, when you are working with them on their narrative

   
                           
cv, get them to turn some

   
                           
of these accomplishments into car stories

   
                           
or if they’ve achieved something recently, say to them,

   
                           
make sure you write this up because it’s so easy

   
                           
With academic careers being so varied

   
                           
and busy, it’s really easy to forget what we’ve done,

   
                           
how we’ve done it, and what the impact was

   
                           
So encourage them to keep a record of this,

  
                           
keep a document somewhere on their computer with all

   
                           
of these different cast stories of all of the things

   
                           
that they have done

   
                           
And what this really helps is to build up that narrative

   
                           
of who you are and what you’ve achieved

   
                           
You can then bring this all together

   
                           
to understand their unique selling point

   
                           
’cause the lovely thing about narrative CVS is

   
                           
that no two narrative CVS look alike

   
                           
The beauty of the narrative cv,

   
                           
and I say this as someone who reads a lot of them, is

  
                           
that they bring out the individual researcher from the

   
                           
accomplishments and it allows researchers

   
                           
to craft a really unique narrative of what they bring

   
                           
to the table and how they do their research

   
                           
as much as what they do

   
                           
And this is so useful for positioning themselves,

   
                           
for thinking about what makes them unique when applying for

   
                           
that big job or that fellowship

   
                           
And you can also use this

   
                           
to start having those conversations about

   
                           
what they would like their USP to be

  
                           
So you can also think about, okay,

   
                           
what would the narrative CV your,

   
                           
your ideal narrative CV look like in    years?

   
                           
Okay, what do we need to do to get you from now to there?

   
                           
So use that narrative cv

   
                           
Once they’ve had a chance to map out

   
                           
and bring some more detail out of those accomplishments, use

   
                           
that as a tool to think about positioning themselves

   
                           
for upcoming opportunities, for understanding

   
                           
what makes them unique

   
                           
What this really nicely leads onto is thinking about

  
                           
how we use the narrative CV to support career development

  
                           
So I’m gonna start off again here

   
                           
by doing a quick exercise with you all

   
                           
This should be a pretty simple one

   
                           
We are doing a one to five scale as

   
                           
before is look at those four modules

   
                           
Um, don’t worry, you don’t need

   
                           
to write this one in the chat

   
                           
Um, but look at those four modules

   
                           
and for each module I’d like

   
                           
to rate yourself outta five For someone at

   
                           
your career stage

  
                           
Are you one relative, beginner, not much experience in

   
                           
that area at all, or are you five expert way above

   
                           
where someone would expect to be at that career stage?

   
                           
So go through each of those four modules,

   
                           
just take    seconds

   
                           
to score yourself against each module

   
                           
And now I’m gonna ask you a slightly different question

   
                           
Think about a career goal of yours

   
                           
or think about something that you are working towards

   
                           
or maybe think about a set number of years in the future

   
                           
Think about where do you need to be in one

  
                           
or five or    years?

   
                           
What scores do you need to be at in one or    or five years?

   
                           
And maybe write that in bracket next to your original score

   
                           
Just take    seconds again

   
                           
So this is a, a really useful way to think,

   
                           
to help you think strategically about

   
                           
what your priorities are

   
                           
Because say for example, engagement

   
                           
with non-academics is your weakest area,

   
                           
but actually your say a theoretical physicist engagement

   
                           
with non-academics is not particularly important

  
                           
for your career and your career trajectory right now

   
                           
That’s not really going to be your priority

   
                           
So I think comparing these two scores is a more useful way

   
                           
of doing this task because rather than just working on your

   
                           
weakest area, you really need to target

   
                           
what are your development priorities?

   
                           
Where’s the biggest gap between where you are now

   
                           
and where you want to be in the future?

   
                           
So once your researchers, once your team has thought about

   
                           
what they’ve done so far, you can then do this exercise

   
                           
with them to get them thinking about

  
                           
where their priority areas for development are

   
                           
And this is really useful for you as a PI too

   
                           
because it can help you to understand

   
                           
where your team currently are and where they’re going

   
                           
and what their plans are too

   
                           
So my final piece of advice today is to use

   
                           
that narrative CV to help your early career researchers

   
                           
to identify their priority areas for development

   
                           
And this is gonna help them plan ahead, uh,

   
                           
and start doing those activities that they need to do now

   
                           
that they may not thought about doing

  
                           
until they’re a little bit more senior in their career

   
                           
Like I said, it also helps you

   
                           
to better understand the support they need

   
                           
and the opportunities that you could signpost them

   
                           
to or create for them

   
                           
And importantly for your researchers, it helps ’em to be

   
                           
strategic about what they say yes to

   
                           
We all know in academia you are constantly getting

   
                           
exciting opportunities thrown at you left, right,

   
                           
and center happens all the time

   
                           
And it is so tempting as an early career researcher

  
                           
to say yes to everything

   
                           
But that is not wise

   
                           
because that way lies burnout that way lies over work

   
                           
And what we want is our researchers to be strategic

   
                           
about their development

   
                           
and take up the opportunities that are gonna,

   
                           
that are gonna help them to get where they need to be

   
                           
In other words, it helps your researchers answer the

   
                           
question, what’s going to add the most value to my career?

   
                           
So I’d really encourage you to use this as a tool

   
                           
for discussion with your team

  
                           
Um, it’s not just about giving them the tools

   
                           
and letting them get on with it

   
                           
It’s about being aware of what they need

   
                           
and how you can help and,

   
                           
and thinking about what’s coming up for them in the future

   
                           
So we’ve thought today about what the narrative CV is

   
                           
and we’ve started to think about

   
                           
how it can help support both your development

   
                           
and the development of your team too

   
                           
And actually a lot of what you’ve done today is,

   
                           
is a is tasks that you can do with your team members

  
                           
Maybe it’s taking five

   
                           
or    minutes at the end of a scheduled one-to-one to work

   
                           
through one of the sections

   
                           
Maybe it’s having a discussion about with,

   
                           
with a new post grad student,

   
                           
about what’s involved in an academic career

   
                           
and what skills they’re going to need

   
                           
to develop down the line

   
                           
Maybe it’s thinking for them about what are their, um,

   
                           
what are the opportunities open to them that they’re,

   
                           
that are gonna help them kind of bridge that gulf between

  
                           
where they are now and where they want to be

  
                           
The narrative CV is such a nice simple, useful framework

   
                           
and by helping your researchers engage

   
                           
with the narrative cv, now when they come

   
                           
to write a job application or a promotion application

   
                           
or apply for funding, they’re not going to think,

   
                           
oh my goodness, I’ve never seen this before

   
                           
Where do I begin?

   
                           
So there are so many benefits to using this as a structure

   
                           
for supporting your team

   
                           
and I hope, as I’ve shown today, supporting you

   
                           
as research leaders too

  
                           
We’ve only scraped the surface of what narrative CVS are

   
                           
and what they can do

   
                           
Um, but what I’ve done is I’ve put together an open access

   
                           
Padlet with basically every resource I can find online about

   
                           
narrative cvs, including some stuff I’ve written

   
                           
on them myself

   
                           
There’s lots of open access resources on there

   
                           
that you can access either

   
                           
through scanning the QR code on the screen

   
                           
or using that bit like link that is on uh, the screen too

   
                           
But don’t worry if you don’t capture this right now,

  
                           
as I said before, those slides will go out at the end

   
                           
Um, do feel free if you find other resources to also add to

   
                           
that Padlet ’cause I’m constantly trying to, trying

   
                           
to find new and updated advice

   
                           
Um, but hopefully you should find

   
                           
that a really useful source of guidance

   
                           
Um, Kerry, would you mind putting that link in the chat

   
                           
for Veta if that’s helpful

   
                           
and then we can make sure that goes out via email too

   
                           
Okay  Thank you so much all for being involved, uh,

   
                           
in this today and taking time out of your day

  
                           
to think about supporting your own development

   
                           
and that of your teams too

   
                           
Um, I will stay around for a few minutes to ask, uh,

   
                           
to answer any questions that you have

   
                           
Um, but do feel free to get in touch as well

   
                           
Drop me an email  I may be the slightly strange person

   
                           
who absolutely loves talking about narrative cvs

   
                           
So do get in touch if you have any questions, thoughts,

   
                           
or ideas of your own

   
                           
Thank you so much for listening

   
                           
and have a lovely rest of your week