Talent Track - a push towards excellence
By Kristin B. Munksgaard, Vice Dean for Funding and External Relations
We know talent development from other industries around us, and we see it as an investment that is backed by our quality agenda both at the university and at SDU BSS, where strengthening the competitiveness of researchers at ERC and other elite programmes is key.
We have a call for new talent every spring, and we develop researchers who have special potential. We have several years of experience with Talent Track (2020), and although the investment is smaller in the overall research budget, it really means a lot for the individual researcher to get a financial boost.
Requirements and progression towards top grants
What is special for researchers admitted to the Talent Track is the development of an individual career plan that sets requirements for how you as a researcher develop. We require you to show the progression needed to reach a goal of obtaining prestigious grants like an ERC one day. There may be steps along the way, such as obtaining grants such as Sapere Aude, Marie Curie or the Carlsberg Foundation.
We can see that many are working on a path that can bring them to the goal. You need to work hard to get close to grants from the EU's foremost body for funding excellent basic research. The concrete benefits for you as a researcher are that you get a boost to your CV also in terms of an international network, you gain a deeper knowledge of funding by getting a "front pocket" for research support, and you get feedback that is tailored to your particular research track. You can also be mentored by a senior researcher who has a particularly strong international profile.
Our experience over the years shows that it varies how individual talents utilise the fact that they now have a special label on their neck. Some get involved in DIAS, for example, and participate in activities through it. It is also individual whether the researchers use each other in the Talent Track programme, but there is an opportunity to get together when it makes sense.
Several paths to talent development
There are several types of talent that are worth developing. Talent Track is one example of a classic excellence track, but there are several types of career paths. Other researcher talents, for example, focus on engaging with companies, developing international networks in a niche field or with an interdisciplinary focus and putting themselves into play in the networks they build.
We are continuously exploring how researchers have developed their careers in ways other than the classic path of excellence. In particular, our Think Tank and Research Support are involved in exploring how we at SDU BSS can target support to what is important by thinking impact more broadly than just focusing on the excellence track.