Professional Development Pilot Program

Program Overview

The Guarini School of Graduate and Advanced Studies has partnered with Dartmouth Engineering to pilot a series of in-person workshops designed to support professional development for students and postdocs across disciplines. These workshops focus on enhancing key skills and strategies to support your future career. We will be surveying students after the sessions to get feedback and incorporate it into future offerings.

Open to all Dartmouth graduate students and postdocs, these sessions are tailored to provide actionable insights and tools to help you excel in academia, industry, or early-stage ventures.

Each workshop is free, but registration is required. Engineering students participate in these workshops as part of the required course ENG 197.1. These workshops are not required for Guarini students or postdocs, but you can sign up for your spot by clicking the sign-up links below.

Why Attend?

Enhance your professional development with targeted, actionable workshops.
Build skills that will serve you in academia, industry, and beyond.
Network with peers and professionals at Dartmouth.

Jan. 22, 2025 Workshop: Differences in Positioning Your Work - Get Your Audience's Attention!

When: January 22, 12:00 PM

Where: ECSC B01 Holekamp Conference Room

Description: How do you communicate your work to different audiences? In this workshop, we will outline the hierarchy of elements needed to communicate to audiences with different agendas. Over the hour, we will build the scaffolding for each type of communication. This workshop is the primer for opportunities presented later in the year that allow you to put these thoughts into practice and build out communications for your own research and discoveries. Sign up.

Jan. 23, 2025 Workshop: What Portfolio to Build, Why, and How to Use it for Success in Interviews and Future Project Work

When: January 23, 12:30 PM

Where: ECSC B01 Holekamp Conference Room

Description: "I'm good at research and science and have proof of that. Isn't that enough?" This seems like a reasonable question, but being able to articulate how all the pieces of who you are and how you choose to spend your time fit together is equally as important as the science in which you excel. In this workshop, we will explore how you can bring the elements of you together in a form that showcase your excellence in ways that get the notice of recruiters, interviewers, and future bosses.

If you begin to build the structure for your portfolio early in your PhD program, you will end up with a robust and integrated set of examples of your work and your abilities including science, communication, writing, team leadership, and positioning skills - all important to succeeding in your next step post-PhD.

This workshop is about setting up a structure that you populate over time. There will workshops later in the year that go into more detail about building the content. You can choose that ones that fit the structure you create. Sign up.

Jan. 24, 2025 Workshop: Using the Experience Framework to Maximize Your Time in Your PhD and Eventually Align Efforts With Expectations in Your Career Choice (Academia, Industry, or Early-Stage)

When: January 24, 12:00 PM

Where: ECSC B01 Holekamp Conference Room

Description: Knowing what to focus on - in addition to your science - in order to be positioned well for your post-PhD life is often challenging. You don't know what you don't know. In this workshop, we will work on a framework that helps you organize the work you are doing in the context of skills and experience. The output is a working document that you can iterate and expend as you learn more about your career interests and the expectations of different opportunities.

It is never too early to get started with the framework, but it is most immediately helpful for students who are contemplating internships and/or are within two years of completing their PhD. Sign up.

Feb. 5, 2025: Best Practices Session: Aligning Your Goals and Expectations and Coming Prepared for Conversations about Progress (lunch provided)

When : February 5, 12:00-1:00 PM

Where: ECSC B01 Holekamp Conference Room

Description: Interested in a primer on best practices for setting up actionable goals and managing expectations as you progress in your PhD? In this session, we will talk about how to establish reachable goals and how to adjust and pivot over time. Part of the conversation will address how to manage expectations when your goals or your lab's goals change and how to use check-ins and progress updates to address challenges before they become problematic. Sign up.

Feb. 6, 2025 Workshop: Developing a Time-Saving Contract and Project Plan

When: February 6th, 12:00-1:00

Where: ECSC B01 Holekamp Conference Room

Description: Do you want exposure to developing a contract and progress plan to help you meet expectations and manage a project? This workshop will give you examples of key criteria to establish in your contract and include in your working progress plan. The goal of the workshop is to give you the tools to implement with your own (or your faculty's) work style and how to apply them for maximum success. Sign up.