What's involved?

The cohort runs for a total of 6 months, spending 2 months each on Reflect, Explore and Act topics.

We anticipate cohort members spending around 6 to 7 hours (approximately one working day) per month, for six months focusing on their Prosper cohort career development. This is well within the University’s commitment for all research staff to spend a minimum of 10 days per year pro rata on their career development.

The details

• Applications are open from Monday 28 October 2024 and close on 23.59 on Monday 16 Dec 2024.
• There are a total of 30 cohort places available.
• Applicants will be informed of the decision via email the week beginning 20 January 2025.
• The cohort runs from February 2025 to July 2025.

As a cohort member you get the opportunity to get involved with distinct but interrelated types of activity:

• Group career coaching – we’ve engaged three professional career coaches to facilitate career coaching groups. A career coach is someone who supports you to clarify your goals and work towards them. They are a keen questioner who will enable you to fully explore your options and ideas. Experiencing career coaching in a group allows for shared experiences, peer support and collaborative learning. It’s a great opportunity to gain diverse perspectives and build a supportive network. (Your coach will not be advising or counselling you, and coaching and mentoring are different things).
• Career development sessions – delivered by external facilitators and the Prosper team around specific topics. The themes of the topics are linked to the three sections on the Prosper portal, spending two-months on each of the Reflect, Explore and Act sections. A number of these sessions have an additional optional 30 minutes after the session end for those who want the protected time to get started on their actions from the session immediately.
• Career sculpting sessions – for the cohort only, optional time for you to take tools introduced in the development sessions and make them work for you, sculpting your unique career with the tools given. No new content will be delivered in these sessions, it’s protected time for you to focus on your actions with other members of the cohort.
• Accountability buddy scheme – opt-in for cohort only, opportunity to meet with several other postdocs on the cohort who are focused on their career development and encourage each other on!

Being a cohort member means being part of a supportive community of likeminded postdocs. Postdocs from the 2024 cohort said that Prosper has provided them with a “great sense of community and people striving together to help each other reach the same end goal – career satisfaction and a sense of fulfilment”. 

To support you as a community you’ll be added to a dedicated MS teams channel to keep you updated and where you can share and discuss topics with other cohort members. Additionally, we’ll send you a monthly email to round-up what’s happened and highlight what’s coming.

From you we ask that you engage with your career development. This means that you pick sessions that are pertinent for you. You then take the tool, approach or strategy presented and apply it to your situation, making it useful for you. Ultimately, we provide the tools, you provide the specificity and personal context. 

We expect that you engage in cohort activities, as this will support your own and your peers career development experience. Cohort members are expected to attend the majority (70%) of the career development sessions on offer (this doesn't include the optional career sculpting sessions).

Please note for the sessions open to all University of Liverpool postdocs, as cohort members you will get priority registration.

*All sessions indicated with an asterisk (*) have an additional optional 30 minutes after the session end, for those who wish to make a start on their actions from the session.

Reflections from the Prosper pilot

Reflections from the first cohort

Read more on our blog from 3 participants on the first cohort at the University of Liverpool

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