Ten tips on getting recruited abroad

At the recent Naturejobs Career Expo in London, Michael Schneider from Imperial College London spoke about how to maximise your chances of getting recruited overseas. Schneider, currently director of Imperial's British Heart Foundation Centre of Research Excellence, studied at Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania, and Duke, followed by research training at the US National Institutes of Health (NIH). In our final follow-up to the Expo we present a summary of his advice - if you have any tips to share, please add them below.

If you're at an early stage of your science career, be aware that a strong academic record is not enough to secure a position abroad. "Posts go to those with something more [than excellent qualifications]," says Schneider.

Early research experience is the key discriminator - and it should be sustained or unusually intensive.

If you're still studying, find high-impact summer and winter research opportunities - examples that Schneider highlighted include the Erasmus student exchange programme in Europe and the Cold Spring Harbor Undergraduate Research Program (URP) in the United States.

You'll need to make personal contacts with overseas scientists - and email is generally the best way to make initial speculative enquiries with overseas labs.

Don't focus exclusively on the usual suspects - in the United States for example, Schneider says there are at least a dozen universities where mentors are as good as at prestigious institutes such as Harvard, MIT, University of California and Stanford - but there is less competition because they are less well-known.

Try to have complete research 'stories' - and be aware that for this reason completing a three-year PhD can put you at a disadvantage against those whose PhDs typically last longer, such as in the United States.

Fund yourself if possible.

Carefully check the eligibility criteria of funding opportunities - for example the US NIH only offers postdoc fellowships to US citizens, with one exception, says Schneider - the Pathway to Independence Award (K99-R00) is open to overseas applicants.

When considering a career move, vertical promotion - where you move up within the same institution - can be counter-productive, says Schneider: "Research funders typically prefer to see relocation as proof of independence."

When considering who to apply to, make sure you check where your potential superior publishes, and also where their trainees have gone afterwards.

http://blogs.nature.com/naturejobs/2011/11/02/ten-tips-on-getting-recruited-abroad?WT.ec_id=NATUREjobs-20111103