Career Development Working Group: Professional Support Staff

The Professional Support Staff Career Development Working Group (PSS WG) is committed to creating a supportive and inclusive environment for all PSS colleagues. We aim to promote career development, collaboration, and recognition across the department. Our working groups sit underneath the People and Culture committee and we meet termly.

PROFESSIONAL SUPPORT STAFF WORKING GROUP MEMBERS

Wendy Howard is lead of the group.

The Department has approx. 90 Professional & Support Staff (PSS) who provide a key role supporting the department’s research and teaching activities. 

The definition of PSS and academic support is wide-ranging – whether you are a Trial Manager, Project Manager, Theme Co-Ordinator, Research Administrator, one of our core functions (HR, IT, Finance etc.), technician or more!

Some key career development resources of particular relevance to PSS staff can be found at the People and Organisational Development (POD) unit.

POD houses a huge amount of supportive detail including apprenticeships; mentoring and networks; self-development and management, as well as learning and development opportunities for professional services staff.

ACTION PLAN

Our group aims to provide support in a number of ways:

• Signposting events at the University and/or Division levels – there are lots of events/programs happening, but sometimes they are hard to keep track of.
• Increasing awareness of different career paths.
• Signpost resources for career development training & applying for a new job.
• Encourage staff to think about career development on a regular basis, so you are ready when a new job opportunity arises.
• Carrying out actions identified in the Athena Swan Action Plan and feedback from the Staff Experience Surveys.
• Encourage and support PSS staff to engage in networking opportunities with other PSS colleagues, fostering collaboration, peer support, and shared learning.

resources

'10 DAYS CAMPAIGN' PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT TIME

All Staff, including PSS, are entitled to engage in a minimum of 10-days of professional development pro rata per year.  The Department of Psychiatry supports the development of staff in any chosen subject field or topic of professional development, whether directly or indirectly related to an employee’s job role.  For more information, including applying to the Staff Development Fund, please see the Department's Sharepoint page.

Recently, the Department organised a ‘10 DAYS CAMPAIGN’ to highlight the 10 days of career development outlined in the Concordat to Support the Career Development of Researchers. Here, you can learn more about each ‘day’ of the campaign (SSO required).

ACTIVITIES

PSS Career Journey Talks - October 2025

Three Psychiatry senior PSS/academic support staff presented their inspiring career journeys.

Our fantastic speakers included:

• Rachel Shaw – Trial Manager, Precision Psychiatry group
• Simon Young – Senior Programme Manager, DPUK group
• Lynn Clee – Athena Swan Facilitator, Former Head of Administration and Finance

PSS 'Speed dating' - July 2025

The Professional Support Staff (PSS) Career Development working group held a ‘speed-dating’ for work event aiming to informally connect PSS colleagues within our department; a chance to strike up a conversation with colleagues that you might not otherwise have had a chance to meet with.

We provided a set of 'prompt' questions to break the ice. There were questions about peoples’ current role (e.g. “Describe your current role in 3 adjectives; What are your favourite and least favourite tasks of your job?”); general work-related questions (e.g. “What has been the best training session you have attended? How much have you embraced AI in the workplace?”) and more ‘fun’ questions (e.g. “If you won the lottery, would you stay in your current job?”).

Colleagues were sat in pairs and they had 2 minutes to ask each other questions before a bell rang and everyone swapped partners. Attendees were very chatty and it was great to see that people wanted to stay on after the event to carry on their conversations!

Feedback included:

  “Thank you for organising such a lovely session.  It was both enjoyable and very useful 😊”

  “It was great.  Best event I’ve been to in terms of putting in and getting out.”

PSS & Career Development month - June 2024

In June 2024 we held a 'PSS & Career development' themed month. This involved a number of activities aimed to support & guide both current PSS staff and researchers/students that may be considering moving to a PSS role. We organised a session on coaching: “Coaching: what, who, when?" delivered by Dr Jane Walker. On the 26th we held a “PSS Career Journeys” seminar where our very own David Hyland, Lisa Jones, Val West & Pamela Reid spoke about how they got to where they are today, including all the ups and downs!  A “Career Strategy & Planning” Career’s service training session was also delivered by Susan Black (for Academics and PSS).