University Scientific Research

University scientists usually do a combination of research, teaching and some administration. Scientists usually start as phd students and work their way up to lecturers, professors and some to senior management positions.

We interviewed a good deal of scientists who worked in universities. 

Sometimes they worked as contract researchers – in other words they were employed on a short term contract to do a particular piece of research.  Others were lecturers or professors who worked full time at the university undertaking teaching research and administration. 

The benefits that people generally saw from a university environment was the freedom to pursue their interests and autonomy so that they were able to work alone or in teams with other like-minded people and were not constrained by the need for commercial viability or even having to work normal business hours.  Many academics worked with people form different countries and developed a network across the world.   It was generally thought that universities were the best place to do long term, conceptual, blue skies research which did not have any obvious commercial potential.  Academics generally felt they were able to be at the forefront of new ideas. 

Many of the contract researchers we interviewed expressed frustration with their positions.  These were generally people who held a doctorate and had been in Higher education for a minimum of six years.  They often had short term contracts of one or possibly two years and felt a great deal of job insecurity as their positions depended upon the generation of research income. 

Academics on the other had had a great deal of job security.  However they were increasingly expected to find funding for their research and there was a perception that this was becoming more difficult.

Some academics loved teaching, although others complained about increasing student numbers.  All of the academics we interviewed complained about University rules and regulations and the increasing administration load they felt they were expected to undertake.