The Post Doc Cycle / Fellowships - social science - honest advice needed

[ostrom]

Looking for some honest careers advice regarding the Post Doc cycle and progressing to the next level in my career.

I completed my PhD in 2015 so I am now coming up to the four year mark. On completion I was lucky enough at the time to receive a short term post doc at my then current university. Due to circumstances I took a job within HE but outside academia for 18 months to support my partner who was unemployed and I returned as a post doc last year. Naively in all this time I did not start to consider fellowship applications / next stages of academia (my own fault entirely). In my field the majority of fellowships are within 4 years of viva, so I have effectively ruled myself out of these and I am now a very expensive post doc.

Question is, for those of you higher up the career ladder can you be honest in my chance of success moving out the post doc cycle and into the next level without a Fellowship (looking for real life experiences). I have a good publication and teaching record. I am fortunate enough that I could work within a professional services role within a University and I would be happy with that. Perhaps it is time for me to accept that I didn't focus enough four years ago.

I never heard of fellowships until 15 yrs after I finished my PhD. According to MNrs there are huge numbers of fellowships out there that have no restrictions on how long ago your PhD was completed (or whether you had a maternity career break). If you do advance search on historical threads, maybe you'll find info on those fellowships.

The impression I get is that successful applications need to be blatently empire building. F-ships only get awarded to people with grand plans, who will be future leaders and will make them (the awarders) look good.

Off topic... I hate it when people treat being a research associate (assistant) as obviously only a temporary stepping stone. Not a legitimate job in its own right. Not even worthy of its own title. Rather, gets referenced by what it is not ( not doctoral research, but not anything else meritworthy in its own right, just "post" PhD). Baffling.

I'm in social sciences and so is my sister. She's mid-30s I'm mid-40s. I had a very prestigious fellowship and it helped. I did no temporary lecturing jobs, just walked straight into a permanent post with my first book contract. That said, it was the book contract that swung it for me. Little sis was apparently not so lucky. She took time out to have her first child and then got a succession of temporary jobs. She was made permanent at the last institution where she worked on a temporary contract. This was because she was REF-able. Both of us agree that publication record is what counted for both of us in getting a permanent job. As an aside, I absolutely hated my first permanent job and due to some tricky life circs ended up moving around a lot for the next decade, while she has remained at the place where she got her permanent job and is content to do so. The cycle never ends and you're only ever as good as your next grant or publishing deal (reason why you need a good work/life balance but that's a different subject). Could you give it a certain length of time and say you'll apply for academic admin if you don't get an academic job in that space of time? A lot of my postdocs make that very sensible decision.

Thanks so much BeeJayKing - that's really useful to read and sensible advice. Writing the post at the weekend helped to clarify my thoughts which I have now discussed with my current supervisor. The view was for me not to be concerned on the Fellowship aspect but to continue working on my publication record and he will support me in my application as an Associate Fellow to the HEA which will help me with lectureship applications in the coming couple of years.

I did my FHEA in a weekend. It's painless.

I got stuck on research associate for years, I moved between projects. Now I mainly teach. I missed out on lectureships because I didn't understand the system. There was no MN academics' corner in those days and my supervisor was a sexist wanker.

I actually prefer my more independent position now. I teach where I want and I publish what I like. You can make an alternative career out of it.