Research independence can create career uncertainty. Credit: molchanovdmitry/iStock via Getty

Early-career researchers are well aware of the uncertainties that an academic career can bring. Nevertheless, many expect that if they remain in academia, their careers will progress in a relatively familiar way: after completing a doctorate, they will move into a postdoctoral position, establish research independence, obtain a permanent post and, eventually, enter a more settled stage of academic life.

The conversations that my colleagues and I have had with established researchers while working on the White Rose Established Researchers project — a collaboration between the UK universities of Leeds, Sheffield and York that aims to support career development — suggest that career progression is often much less linear.

Research independence, which is characterized as a researcher’s ability to lead and sustain an original programme of research, is typically associated with the mid-career stage in academia.…