My Experience with the Prosper Project

When I joined the Prosper Project, it was running as a pilot for two years—a large, multidisciplinary, multi-institutional initiative. Due to the nature of its funding, the project had seen high turnover, and in that time, the team had organically developed a rich repository of website resources. I stepped into the project as a group coach for the first two Prosper cohorts at Liverpool, while also contributing to its resources as a consultant. From the very beginning, I knew I loved this project.

Advocating for Postdocs

Having worked with postdocs for many years as a coach, I deeply understood how underserved they are. Individually, I had been delivering career workshops, 1-to-1 coaching, and development sessions tailored to postdocs. But across institutions, I could see a pattern—support for postdocs was fragmented at best, and in some cases, there was no dedicated service at all.

The experience of being a postdoc is unique and complex. It requires a level of support that is rooted in deep understanding and empathy—not just generic career advice. Without this, the deeper layers of what postdocs navigate—their resilience, uncertainty, and need to expand their career horizons—can be misunderstood or neglected. I became a passionate advocate for ensuring that postdocs receive the kind of thoughtful, structured support that enables them to see and seize their full potential.

Why Prosper Was the Perfect Fit

I was looking to expand my coaching experience when I came across Prosper—and I immediately knew it was a perfect fit. One of the things that made this project stand out was the team-based coaching approach. I worked alongside four other brilliant coaches for two years, and together, we provided ongoing insights to the project team.

As someone who generates a million ideas a minute, working directly with postdocs on their career journeys was a goldmine of learning and innovation. Their experiences, questions, and explorations constantly sparked new ideas, which I was able to feed into Prosper’s quarterly learning meetings. Being part of a peer group of coaches also made the experience particularly rewarding—we learned from each other as much as we contributed, which is always one of my favorite ways to work and grow.

From Coaching to Instructional Design

When an opportunity arose within Prosper for an instructional designer, I jumped at the chance. Throughout my time on the project, I had been keenly aware of the Prosper portal—a substantial and high-value repository of resources built by subject matter experts. However, as with many agile projects, the content had grown organically, resulting in a structure that felt a little Heath Robinson—functional but in need of refinement.

What made Prosper stand out was its commitment to rigorous user feedback. The team had actively gathered insights from postdocs, academics, and professionals, ensuring that the resources were shaped by real-world needs. My role as an instructional designer allowed me to bring together my expertise in coaching, content design, and research culture to refine and enhance these resources—helping to create a seamless, structured, and engaging learning experience for postdocs navigating their next career steps.

I developed tools, structured content, and designed frameworks that helped postdocs move beyond uncertainty and take tangible steps towards career clarity.

I have spent years immersed in conversations with researchers about their identities, aspirations, and struggles. I know what it feels like to hear someone say, "I have no idea what else I could do." I also know that, most of the time, that’s not true. The issue isn’t a lack of skills or options—it’s a lack of structured reflection, clarity, and permission to explore without fear of failure.

At Prosper, I transformed this insight into structured development resources that guided postdocs through the messy, often emotional process of reimagining their careers.

Distilling Complexity Without Dilution

One of my favourite aspects of this project was conceptualising how to make complex career transitions feel structured and navigable. I thrive on taking large, intricate systems and distilling them into coherent, actionable models—without losing their nuance. My approach was to take the mass of detail, identify the most crucial messages for postdocs, and sequence them into a clear, intuitive framework.

The first thing I did was organise the Prosper career development model into a structured journey—breaking it down into phases. This approach:

✔ Provided postdocs with a clear entry point, helping them understand where to start.
✔ Transformed an overwhelming amount of information into digestible, step-by-step guidance.
✔ Ensured that each resource was mapped to a specific stage of the career journey, making it easier to apply.

This kind of deep content strategy work is what I love most—bringing clarity to complexity while maintaining depth.

Building Development Tools That Resonate

A key part of my work was designing resources that felt human—not just impersonal career advice, but tools that acknowledged the emotional and psychological aspects of career change.

🔹 The Career Audit: A reflective framework helping postdocs assess their current career status, challenges, and future possibilities.
🔹 The Career Genogram: A tool for unpacking the unconscious influences shaping career decisions, adapted from family therapy models to help researchers understand how upbringing and academic culture impact their sense of career identity.
🔹 The Career Mindset Tool: A structured exercise encouraging postdocs to analyse how colleagues, supervisors, and institutions have shaped their career assumptions—helping them challenge inherited beliefs and rewrite their own narrative.
🔹 Limiting Beliefs Framework: A practical tool that guided postdocs through balancing their thinking, challenging fears about career transitions, and replacing self-limiting narratives with more balanced perspectives.

These resources didn’t just present information; they facilitated real, internal shifts in how postdocs saw themselves and their potential.

From Thought Pieces to Actionable Change

In addition to development tools, I contributed to Prosper’s thought leadership by writing reflective career guides and narrative-driven resources. These weren’t generic career pieces—they were deeply informed by real conversations, real struggles, and real turning points in the careers of postdocs I worked with.

📖 Overcoming Limiting Beliefs in Academic Careers → A deep dive into the unspoken fears that keep postdocs from exploring non-academic paths.
📖 Reframing Career Identity → A guide to understanding career change not as an endpoint, but as a dynamic, iterative process.
📖 The Role of Reflection in Career Development → A structured approach to using self-awareness as a career strategy, rather than an afterthought.

Each of these pieces was shaped by my direct experience working with researchers, giving them a depth and nuance that generic career development materials often lack.

Impact & Lasting Change

By integrating structured development tools with reflective thought pieces, my work with Prosper empowered postdocs to engage with career development in a way that felt meaningful, personal, and achievable.