The NIHR Leaders Support and Development Programme seeks to maintain and improve the quality of leadership in health and social care research. We aim to do this by meeting the development needs of current leaders and early to mid-career researchers within the NIHR, whose focus is aligned with the strategic priorities of the NIHR.
Our programme embodies in its design, structure, and approach the NIHR’s commitment to equality, diversity, and inclusion. We are continually developing our provision to meet the evolving needs of our leadership communities. Provision currently includes:
The NIHR Academy provides postdoctoral Academy Members with career development support through its mentoring programme.
The refreshed NIHR Academy programme supports postdoctoral Academy Members from a broad range of professional and disciplinary contexts across our diverse health and social care communities to mentor others and to seek a mentor. It builds on the NIHR Academy mentoring programme that was previously delivered with the Academy of Medical Sciences.
This programme will not impact on the programme delivered by our partnership with Health Education England, supporting researchers who are in receipt of an Integrated Clinical Academic award.
The programme has been developed and guided by a Steering Group whose membership is representative of Academy Members.
The programme aims to support the academic and career development of our postdoctoral communities by:
Mentors and mentees will be supported throughout their participation in the programme through regular professional development events and resources. They will also have access to a mentoring platform to support and guide their mentoring relationships.
“Thank you for the opportunity of being matched, this has been really helpful and something I would have struggled with without the NIHR assistance” - Mentee
“Mentoring others can create useful reflections on my own development” - Mentor
Potential mentors and mentees will be able to express their interest in joining the programme at any time, however matching of mentors and mentees will take place at several intervals during 2022.
To join the programme as a mentee, you should be an NIHR Academy Member and hold an NIHR award at postdoctoral level and/or hold a postdoctoral position and be based in NIHR Infrastructure (e.g. BRC) or in an NIHR School.
To join the programme as a mentor, you will be an NIHR research leader, or established as a leader in an NIHR research priority area or NIHR stakeholder group. You may be an NIHR Academy Member or Associate Member, for example a NIHR research professor or senior investigator, or a NIHR postdoctoral researcher with significant postdoctoral experience (typically, at least 5 years). You may be contributing to NIHR's work at a senior leadership level, for example, as an awarding panel member, or a senior leader in the NIHR including its Centres, Infrastructure and Schools. As we expand and diversify our research, we are also keen to welcome mentors from disciplines, professions and demographics that are currently under-represented in the NIHR such as social care.
Once enrolled in the mentoring programme, mentees will be matched with a mentor from our mentor pool.
Due to the high level of interest in our mentoring programme, we cannot guarantee that applicants will be selected to the cohort for which they apply. We will be prioritising under-represented groups and those groups that have not historically had access to a mentoring programme. We will move unsuccessful applications forward into a later cohort and inform you accordingly.
| 2022 Cohorts | Cohort applications open | Orientation event | Mentoring begins |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cohort 2 -2022 | 4 April - 9 May | June | June |
| Cohort 3 -2022 | September - October | October / November | November |
The NIHR Academy Mentoring Programme is a valuable development opportunity for postdoctoral researchers looking for a mentor. Mentees benefit from one-to-one support for their career development and time for personal growth and reflection.
Mentorship can be rewarding for mentors too, who are contributing to the development of our future research leaders. Both parties can gain new perspectives and fresh ideas, and expand their professional networks.
To help you learn about the value of mentoring and find mentorship support, you can read the following article:
For further information about the NIHR Mentoring Programme, please contact the NIHR Development and Support team developmentandsupport@nihr.ac.uk
We provide a suite of online learning resources to support NIHR Academy Members who wish to enhance their leadership and management skills. The modules are also available to health and care researchers within the NIHR.
The Leadership Lab resources are delivered as individual modules. You can work through the modules as a series, as standalone topics, or use them as flexible resources to dip into as and when you need them.
Each module includes practical activities to reinforce your learning and encourage reflection, with additional resources and further reading being signposted throughout each module.
Visit Leadership Lab online learning resources module descriptions to find out about the content of each module. The following modules are currently available online:
To access the Leadership Lab modules, log into the NIHR’s online learning platform NIHR Learn and select Leadership Development. To register with NIHR Learn, visit Accessing NIHR Learn.
We regularly host webinars designed to support your leadership and management development. All of our modular resources have webinars associated with them, such as ‘Compassionate and inclusive leadership’ along with additional webinars covering a wide variety of topics such as ‘Coaching for success’ and ‘Optimising your energy for peak performance’.
To learn about forthcoming webinars, you will find them promoted on the Events page of the NIHR website. You can access the previous webinars on our Development and Support playlist on the NIHR YouTube channel.
Our leadership workshops have been designed to support the development of your leadership skills. Each workshop will offer you the chance to share, learn, and try practical tools and techniques to help you to become the leader you would like to be.
Details of forthcoming workshops are detailed on the Events page of the NIHR website.
Each year we host a conference for Academy Members. In 2021 the conference theme was “Improving the lives of people with multiple long-term conditions through research” and included a series of workshops that included topics such as resources and toolkits for better use of patient reported outcomes, interactions between physical health and mental health, the use of big data and effective patient and public involvement. You can access the replay of the keynote, panel and workshops delivered at the conference website.
For more information about any of the leaders development resources please contact the NIHR Development and Support team developmentandsupport@nihr.ac.uk
The new Future-Focused Leadership Programme enables you to develop your capabilities and effectiveness as a leader by identifying and reflecting on your strengths and areas for development.
The programme is arranged into two streams, targeting distinct groups of Leaders:
The Future-Focused Leadership Programme has been developed specifically for the NIHR following an in-depth analysis to understand what makes a successful leader. The programme offers you the opportunity to explore new thinking on how to lead in the 21st century. We have created the programme with reference to years of research in the fields of occupational psychology and applied positive psychology.
The programme is designed around exploring Leading Yourself, Leading Others and Leading Beyond Authority.
The Future-Focused Leadership Programme extends over a period of twelve months and incorporates three residential workshops, webinars and online modules. You will be able to apply the insights you uncover and the new skills you learn to your current role throughout the year and will be encouraged to network and share your experience and learning with fellow delegates.
An overview of the Future-Focused Leadership Programme outlines the course structure. Please note that due to Covid restrictions all modules are currently being delivered online. The programme is continually reviewed so that we can return to in-person delivery when appropriate.
Places on our current programmes have been allocated. We will reopen applications at the end of summer 2022 and the programme dates will be announced on this page.
For further information about the Future-Focused Leadership Programme please email the NIHR Academy Development and Support team at developmentandsupport@nihr.ac.uk
NIHR Researchfish Update 2021
NIHR Leadership Lab is a suite of online resources for self-directed leadership and management training
Resource to support the Academy postdoctoral mentoring programme, advice on beginning the mentoring relationship
Resource to support the Academy postdoctoral mentoring programme, outline of phases of the mentoring relationship
Background and course structure for NIHR Future Focused Leadership Programme
