This is a term you
won't find explained in a Dictionary. It is imported from
international terminology and describes the next stage in a research
career after doctoral studies. Thus, a postdoc is not another stage
of your studies but represents a job.
A research career
cannot begin without completing your doctoral studies. Once you have
obtained your PhD diploma, you will naturally be in a position to
look for a job, a job where values your skills. And since jobs
aren't growing on the street, it would be frustrating to waste the
experience you have just accumulated during your doctoral school.
This is why the concept of a postdoc emerged. Most often, postdoc
positions are available where a project director wants to build a
research team and needs people with proven experience. If you have
just graduated, all you need to do is look for these types of
offers. The disadvantage is that you will be integrated into a team
working in the direction set by the project, and the data you manage
belongs to the project, so you often won't work on the exact topics
you dreamed of. The big advantage is that you have a team and
usually well-established leadership, you will have secured funding
for investigations and your salary, and success is almost
guaranteed.
Another way to start in the field of research is to write and win
your own postdoc project. In Romania, UEFISCDI offers this type of
competition through the
Human Resources program, under the
subprogram "Start in Research – Postdoctoral
Research Projects". This time, you have the opportunity to
capitalize on your ideas by proposing a project exactly as you wish.
All you need to do is convince a mentor with the appropriate
expertise for the topic you want to follow in your project proposal
(ideally, you should have collaborated previously). If your project
proposal is convincing enough to be accepted for funding, these
types of projects will be conducted in an institution (university,
research institute) but according to the work plan you devised and
exclusively from the financial resources you have acquired. I am
convinced that any research institution in Romania will welcome you.
This is the big advantage of this type of project – the opportunity
to actually create your job defining your path for the first two
years of your career. However, during this time, it would be wise to
already be working on your next project, aiming for the "Young
Teams" competition. Well, I am almost sure that if you
win this one too, not only will your CV look excellent, but you will
also find that the institution where you have just implemented these
projects will do everything possible to keep you close for long
time.
