Course outlines 2 - Specialist and technical skills
Career development
Learn how to secure a good job, by selling yourself properly via your CV and application forms, interviews and assessment centres. Discuss what's happening in the jobs market right now and understand how to beat the competition. Consider your strengths and development needs and start to plan for a satisfying career.
Policy making for researchers
Learn how research is used to inform key policy decisions in the UK. We'll look at who the key players are, how the policy making process works and how researchers can contribute. We'll explore some policy case studies and get you thinking like a policy maker, so you can engage more effectively with them.
Problem solving and critical thinking
Learn new skills and tools to improve your problem solving skills. We will work together to define and analyse real work problems, try out different, creative methods for generating solutions, and also discuss how we make decisions. We will also look at your thinking style and how that affects the way you approach problems.
Project management
Learn about effectively planning and management in a project, and the benefits for you and the project. We'll explore how to plan effectively and practise creating a sensible project plan. Then we'll look at how you monitor progress and the budget, and manage stakeholders, problems and risks. We'll finish with evaluating success.
Change management
Learn how to manage change at work. We'll look at the reasons why change often fails and how to avoid those. We'll explore different types of change and how people's feelings affect implementation. Well practise with different tools such as creating a vision and roadmap, defining metrics, mobilising the change team and so on.
Contract management and procurement
Learn how to manage procurement of goods or services and then manage the contract. Using a realistic case study, we'll look at the role and responsibilities of a contract manager and practise different parts of the process, including effective troubleshooting when things go wrong.