We are both academics – Jo’s a Senior Lecturer in Organization Studies at the Business School, Birmingham University and Laurie’s Professor of Organization Studies at the Business School, Loughborough University.

Although we’re not scientists ourselves, for several years now we’ve been doing some research into the organization of science (the joy of doing organization studies is that you can look at how all sorts of things are organized!).

We’ve spoken to lots of scientists - in universities, government institutes, small entrepreneurial firms and multi-national companies, and heard countless fascinating stories.

We’ve also learned a lot about scientific careers, and about the advice and information – or lack of it – that scientists have had along the way. One thing almost everyone said is that they wished they’d had more guidance at the point when they were making decisions about university courses.

With this in mind, we decided to create this website to provide a bit of the guidance and information people said they were looking for.

It’s not meant to be exhaustive, with every single detail you’ll ever need. Rather, our idea is to give you a flavour of what having a career in science might be like. Also, we’ve tried not to just give you the rose-tinted picture, but also to highlight some of the challenges and dilemmas that have faced along their diverse paths.