Should I have held out and waited for the next project?

[Supersnot123]

I am currently an RA on a fixed term contract at Uni A. Pros: brilliant uni and research group, better pay than usual, cons: very long commute 3+ hrs, and my contract ends at the end of September.

I have just accepted another RA job to start in October, at a different uni (Uni B). Pros: quite a bit easier to get to (2hr commute!), project more suited to my interests. Cons: less prestigious uni, and I've had to take a nearly 20% pay cut.

This week the management team for my project have been discussing submitting another project proposal for when this one ends, and it sounds as if they're actually going ahead much faster than I thought. I thought there would be no place for me once this project ended, which is why I started job-hunting, but maybe there would have been.

A month or two's break wouldn't have been disastrous for me, so now I'm wondering if I should have held on and waited.... I could always turn down Uni B at the last minute, but I don't want to mess them around....

Aaargh! Anyone have any insights??

How fast does EPSRC move with grants?

20 plus years in univ here. 8 years as dept mng in RG univ. Go to New role. "Prestigious" univ not the be all. What is important is you are genuinely interested in your work. How else are you to build expertise and advance your career in the way you want. Academics know how difficult life is as postdoc- going from job to job and the sort of PI you want, in an inclusive, diverse academic culture will not judge you on working at a "less prestigious" univ. Good luck with whatever you choose and well done on getting a new job!

Thanks @Angelik ! You've basically confirmed what I was thinking before!

Today though I'd just found out that a lecturer job I interviewed for and didn't get, (in uni C, the place we live now where I did my PhD) has been re-advertised! Does this mean I was unappointable??

the new job sounds great.

First, grant applications have a v low success rate and if they haven't even submitted yet, there is no certainty there.

second, the new job sounds better suited to you

third, it is good to have a wide academic network and being in a new place will give you the chance to make new connections / learn new skills etc.

stay friends with the old team & ask them if you can keep an 'associate position' with that university. that means you keep your email address & computer access & can continue to collaborate & write up papers easily. which is especially important if you are going for lectureship positions.

I think you did the right thing - a position in hand is far better than a proposal yet to be written. EPSRC has no deadlines and a rolling system, so my understanding is a proposal will go to committee once it has garnered enough reviews, which can be quite some time (I've been asked to review for them and told them I was busy for the next two months, at which point they asked if I could make a deadline 3 months from then...). Then no guarantee of funding - EPSRC's funding rate is somewhere around 20%. Even quite good grants can get beat out.

Regarding readvertising - you can ask if it would be appropriate to apply again and what might they recommend you do to be more competitive this time. When I've been on job panels they usually ask us to identify after interview one top person and one reserve, and HR rejects the rest. If those two both reject an offer, you can't go back to the rejected people, so it has to be re-advertised. So you could have been a hair's breadth from reserve, but not know it. Best you can do is ask, and see what the reply is like.

@Supersnot123

EPSRC grant applications move incredibly slowly - six months until you get an outcome usually. Then it takes them a month or two to send out official offer letters etc, and then it will be a month or two before the uni has the grant set up and ready to start. At our uni we advise leaving one year between date of application and projected start date.

More importantly, EPSRC success rates are only ~20%, so the vast likelihood is the grant won't be successful anyway.

One in the hand is worth two in the bush, I think you've made the right choice.

Is the spec the same as when you applied? We have made a mistake with job specs before and been unable to appoint anyone as they don't tick a box, even when we have wanted them.

I don't think you have anything to lose by applying again.

Thanks for the grant info, I wasn't quite sure. They all seem to think it's got a good chance (and they're probably right) but you never know of course. But yeah even if they finished it next month there wouldn't be a job for me before Januaryish at the earliest then.

RE the lecturer job - the spec does look the same, my PhD supervisor was on the panel and is meant to be ringing me later to talk about it, so hopefully I'll find out what's going on then.
it's annoying though... I really don't want to mess Uni B around - @parietal it's not an entirely new team as it's where I did my MSc (it's all getting rather incestuous!) but definitely connections worth building!
Associate position at the current place is a really good call though thanks - I'll suggest that to my current PI.