Section 3: Advice for Starting a New Job
Before we begin...
Starting a new role can be simultaneously exciting and uncertain. There is often an additional sense of pressure to “settle in quickly” that can be heightened by fixed-term contracts where time feels limited and expectations are unclear. Most colleagues will recognise that it takes time to settle in. There is a lot to get your head around when joining a new institution. You are likely to make mistakes and overlook things. If you do, don’t fret – people should understand. Try to ask questions if you have them.
Contents
3.1 What resources are available to you?
3.2 What should you discuss in a first meeting with your line manager?
What to expect and look out for
Tips for making the most of the meeting
3.3 What is an induction and what should you look for?
What to expect and find out about
Tips for making the most of inductions
What do people usually forget to check?
3.4 How can I build relationships inside and outside of my university?
Tips for formal departmental integration
Tips for informal departmental integration
Tips for building new social networks (inside and outside of work)
Should you join a union?
3.1 What resources are available to you?
All institutions differ and conditions are changing rapidly in the current university environment. However, it is still common to have access to the following resources from employers:
Desk Space
Nearly all employers should offer you somewhere to work with access to internet, electricity, and basic amenities. It is also a UK requirement that reasonable adjustments - such as the provision of ergonomic resources - are made by employers to accommodate existing health conditions and ensure your continued health and safety within the workplace.
Library Access
This includes access to physical library resources and online subscriptions to academic publications. In most cases, it will also include access to research databases for academic articles and historic newspaper coverage. You may also be able to request books or other kinds of library resources to be ordered in, depending upon library permissions and budgets.
Administrative Materials
Most departments will have centralised digital repositories of documents associated with the administrative life of the department. This might take the form of a dedicated Teams channel or SharePoint site. They will typically include lists of key roles and contact information, lists of line managers and mentors, workload models, sabbatical rotas, meeting minutes, and academic calendars. Make sure that you can access these and understand what’s there.
IT Equipment and Software
You should be provided with an appropriate computer to complete your work, plus standard office software. This computer should reflect the kind of work you do - if your research is computationally intensive, you should be provided with a machine sufficient to fulfil your job criteria. It may be possible to request alternative hardware or software platforms and services, if you have justification for this. If you require specialist software or licenses for your research, this may also be available upon request. You should not have to independently purchase the core tools you need to do your job.
Open Access Support
Many universities will provide financial support for covering journal fees for publishing articles open access. This usually must be applied for, but do look up your university’s policy on this. If you have research funding from an external body, they may also have requirements around open access publication and routes to accessing funds.
Timetables
Most universities have specialist timetabling software accessible via the staff pages of their websites. Staff timetables are usually also conveyed through Microsoft Outlook calendar pages.
Printing and Photocopying
All universities should provide staff with free printing and photocopying resources. However, fair use policies may be implemented.
Internal Funding
Most universities provide forms of internal funding to support research and/or teaching activities. It is important to ask your line manager about the forms of funding that are available. Common forms of funding include PhD studentships, seed corn funding, teaching innovation, EDI initiatives and some limited research budgets.
Training Schemes
Universities provide both required and optional training which covers a range of professional development areas, including teaching, EDI, leadership, grant writing, writing, knowledge exchange, media skills, and more. Make the most of these.
Teaching Materials
This can be trickier to access, as many people store their teaching materials on their own devices and may or may not be willing to share their resources. Most departments will store previous teaching materials on the pages of their virtual learning environments. Marking criteria should be centrally accessible. You can ask for examples of teaching documents such as marking rubrics, if necessary. It is always instructive to see how others approach common tasks.
3.2 What should you discuss in your first meeting with your line manager?[1]
Your first meeting with your line manager is an opportunity to learn about one another, the workplace you have joined, and for you both to develop a shared sense of purpose. It can help to approach this conversation as an opportunity to clarify expectations, discuss priorities, and identify the support you’ll need to thrive in your role. This meeting is not about proving yourself (you already have the job!) but is more about ensuring that both of you have a clear and realistic picture of what is expected of you, and what resources are available to help you succeed.
[1] Some colleagues may have a supervisor or principal investigator who is different to your formal line manager and who may oversee some of these responsibilities.
What to expect and look out for
- A friendly welcome to the department and an initial overview of the role you are stepping into.
- An outline of the support available to you, including how often you will meet with your line manager and what these meetings are intended to cover.
- Signposting to colleagues who can support different aspects of your work, including administrators, teaching coordinators, research support teams, or mentors.
- An outline of the key responsibilities and any immediate priorities for the coming weeks.
- An introduction to relevant departmental processes, such as teaching support, timetabling, or research activity.
- An introduction to key departmental resources, shared file systems, and other digital infrastructures.
- Information about any formal review processes associated with your role, such as probation or appraisal, along with any required training.
- Time and space to ask questions and raise anything you are unsure about as you begin your role.
Tips for making the most of the meeting
Work Load
If your post includes both teaching and research, ask what proportion of your time is expected to be spent on each and make sure that this aligns with what is in your contract.
Key Responsibilities
If your line manager doesn’t do so, confirm the key responsibilities of your role and ask how your workload will be structured across the year. If administrative or student-focused pastoral duties are part of the role, clarify what this involves and how they are allocated.
Mentoring Support
Ask whether there is a formal mentoring scheme in the department. If so, clarify how the allocation of mentors works and if there are any guidance documents available. If you are working as a postdoctoral researcher on a project, it might be beneficial for you to have a mentor who is NOT your line manager. If there are no formal mentoring arrangements, enquire about what forms of pastoral and development support are provided across the University.
Progression Review Arrangements
Confirm how your performance or progress will be reviewed (e.g. probation, appraisal, mid-year review), what the key criteria are, when these conversations will take place, and what paperwork you will need to prepare for these meetings.
Opportunities for Professional Development
If your post is teaching-only and you aspire to develop your research in future, it can be helpful to discuss this early. Ask whether there are opportunities to stay connected with research in your department, such as attending research group seminars and departmental presentations, contributing to projects, or receiving guidance on applying for fellowships or small grants. Even small forms of encouragement or visibility can make a real difference to your longer-term plans.
Note
If your line manager doesn’t arrange an initial meeting, it’s fine to be proactive and request one yourself. A short conversation early on can make a big difference in clarifying expectations and helping you settle in. In some departments, the line manager or head of department may delegate this first meeting to another colleague, such as a deputy or assigned mentor, so don’t be surprised if this happens.
If you are unsure who to approach, check your offer letter or welcome email, which should include contact details for someone in your department or HR team who can point you in the right direction.
3.3 What is an induction and what should you look for?
An induction is the process that helps you settle into your new role and institution. It usually involves a series of meetings or activities designed to introduce you to your department, colleagues, and key sources of support. Unlike your first meeting with your line manager, which focuses on the specifics of your role, induction is about understanding the broader working environment you are joining. In some cases, your first meeting with your line manager may form part of the induction process, helping to connect departmental priorities with your individual responsibilities. Inductions are often more generic than bespoke, providing an overview of structures, policies, and procedures rather than the finer details of your position.
A well-structured induction can make a real difference in helping you feel confident and part of a community. Their scope and scale can vary; some focus on the wider institution and its structures, while others are specific to your school, department, or role. In some universities, induction is a formal process linked to probation and includes mandatory sessions on areas such as health and safety or equality, diversity and inclusion. In others, it may be more informal, centred on local introductions and meetings with colleagues. Induction processes also vary significantly in quality and clarity, so it helps to view induction as an ongoing process rather than a one-off event, taking time to revisit information and ask questions as you settle in.
What to expect and find out about
- An introduction to your working environment
This may include short tours or informal meetings that help you get to know the spaces where you will work, teach, or meet students.
- An introduction to your institution and department
This might include welcome events, presentations, or online modules outlining the university’s mission, values, and organisational structure, as well as how your department fits within it.
- Guidance on everyday practicalities
This may include things such as how to access printers and photocopiers, post and mail collection systems, room bookings, employee identity badges, email and IT account access, parking permits, or the use of shared kitchen and communal spaces.
- Mandatory training
These typically involve sessions on essential topics such as health and safety, equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI), safeguarding, data protection, and research integrity.
- Information on key systems and policies
This will likely include how to use internal systems for HR, finance, teaching, or research management. You should also be given access to staff handbooks or policy documents on matters such as leave.
- Introductions to professional services staff
These include colleagues who support teaching, research, and administration (for example, departmental administrators, HR partners, IT services, and library staff).
- Overview of available support networks and services
These include wellbeing, occupational health, or counselling services, as well as staff networks (for example, parents and carers, disability, LGBTQ+, or race equality groups).
- Details of probation or training requirements
In some universities, induction forms part of probation and may include compulsory training such as AdvanceHE teaching qualifications or research ethics modules.
Tips for making the most of inductions
- Keep copies of slides, handbooks, and induction materials to refer to later.
- Take note of who does what in your department and who to contact with practical or academic questions.
- Ask for clarification if policies, acronyms, or processes are unclear.
- Make time for informal connections through coffee breaks, departmental meetings, or social gatherings.
- Keep track of any mandatory training and note deadlines for completion.
- Identify any gaps in the information you have received and ask for further guidance where needed.
What do people usually forget to check?
Departmental Rhythms
Universities work to different rhythms across the year, and these shape when workloads intensify. It can help to look at the academic calendar early in your contract and note key points such as teaching start dates, assessment periods, exam boards, and holidays and University closures.
Highlighting these in your diary can make it easier to anticipate busy weeks and plan your time with more confidence. It can also help to ensure you take your paid leave.
Key Contacts
Administrators, programme leaders, timetabling teams, finance officers, and other professional services colleagues often hold essential knowledge about day-to-day processes. Introducing yourself, even briefly, and noting who manages what can save you a lot of time.
Many colleagues find it useful to keep a simple list of “who to contact for which query” as they settle in.
Attendance Expectations
You do not always have to be physically present in the office, and some colleagues found it beneficial to work from home when their presence was not required (however, this does assume access to an appropriate home workspace and equipment). Many universities do operate flexible working arrangements, and it is completely reasonable to clarify what this looks like in your department. You might find it helpful to ask:
- which days colleagues tend to be on campus,
- when in-person presence is expected,
- and how people usually balance home and on-campus working.
Understanding this can help you settle into a healthy routine and avoid feeling pressure to be visible for its own sake.
Email Culture
Email practices vary across departments, so it can be helpful to get a sense of how colleagues tend to communicate. You might ask whether the department has any shared expectations around response times, use of group lists, or managing email during busy teaching periods.
Some colleagues find it useful to follow conscientious email practices, such as the Email Charter by Chris Anderson and Jane Wulf, which encourages clarity, kindness, and realistic expectations. You may wish to use an out of office email response to communicate specific working arrangements.
Digital Platforms
Every university uses its own digital systems for managing various activities such as storing teaching content (often known as a Virtual Learning Environment or VLE) to booking meeting rooms. These systems can take time to learn. It can be helpful to block out small amounts of time in your first few weeks to explore one system at a time. Asking a colleague to walk you through how they use a system can also make it easier to understand. There are often also specific training courses available to support you getting started with a range of platforms (e.g. Blackboard or Moodle for hosting teaching materials).
If you are teaching, team-taught modules can be a particularly helpful way to learn these systems in practice. Asking the module convenor to show you how they use them is often one of the quickest ways to understand what you need to do.
3.4 How can I build relationships inside and outside of my university?
We hope that your department makes you feel welcome and that your new colleagues reach out to you. Our research highlighted that some colleagues and departments are good at this, but others might neglect this process or not realise the significance of welcoming new colleagues. It’s therefore worth looking out for opportunities to connect with your colleagues. This is important for several reasons, including learning about how your department works, finding out about the local area, developing new research collaborations, and learning from more experienced colleagues about how they ‘do’ academia at your new institution.
Tips for formal departmental integration
Check with your line manager that you have been added to all relevant mailing lists
This is something that can dramatically influence your experience of integrating into a new work environment and your recognition by colleagues.
Unfortunately, it is also something that is easy for colleagues to overlook – often because mailing lists are not always centrally controlled.
Making sure that you are added to networks is always a sensible move.
Attend departmental events
Keep an eye out for departmental meetings, research seminars, and teaching related activities and go along to what you can.
Beyond being an opportunity to get to know people, their work, and get stuck in with departmental life, being present raises your visibility and others’ awareness of your presence in the workplace.
If your department has a departmental calendar, this can also be a useful way to get a sense of key activities over the year.
Discuss opportunities for contributing to the department with your mentor
Whilst you’re coming into a new working environment, remember that your experiences and research are important and you have much to contribute, whilst also building up your own skillset and CV. Discuss what this might look like with a trusted mentor.
You might, for example, look out (and ask for) opportunities to present your research, and consider whether participating in relevant committee work would be helpful to you.
Make sure you are mindful (where it is in your control) of workload and prioritise skills-building that best contributes to your own career development.
Engage with wider university networks
Finally, it can be helpful to engage with wider university networks that are relevant to you. These can usually be found on the staff intranet or communicated through newsletters - it might take some digging.
They could include cross departmental research groups, and staff networks (e.g. for Women, LGBTQ+, disabled, BAME staff and others).
These can be a fantastic way to meet new people and build community beyond your department/school.
Tips for informal departmental integration
Whilst it can feel daunting and for some people it may not be possible, if you can, try to:
Approach colleagues working in similar areas
Invite them for a coffee or virtual chat. This can be a great excuse to get to know people, as well as being a way to develop new research connections and explore opportunities for future collaborations.
Find out from your line manager or mentor what informal structures for socialising exist
Your department/school may hold social events, coffee and cake meetings and reading groups. These kinds of informal events can be a fantastic way to get to know your colleagues beyond ‘work’ and help you to feel more connected in your new role.
Try to find others in similar situations
Identify and reach out to other fixed-term and/or early career colleagues. Alongside getting to know members of your team, you might consider suggesting mutual peer support (e.g. swapping draft materials for feedback, listening to presentations).
Plug in to your local union branch
This may be accompanied by WhatsApp groups and regular meetings and can be a great way to meet people both in and beyond your department. In troubling times in HE, solidarity is more important than ever. Information on joining the UCU: https://www.ucu.org.uk/join
Note: Unions charge membership fees. There are often different rates depending on career stage and income.
Tips for building new social networks (inside and outside of work)
Many respondents emphasised the importance of social networks inside and outside of work for improving their resilience to precarious forms of employment. However, building new social networks from scratch is a hard task, especially if you are naturally more introverted. Several respondents also noted that it problematically constitutes unpaid ‘work’ (emotional and physical labour), whereby individuals must assume further responsibility for mitigating the feelings of precarity that are created through their employment. Not all of the tips below will be possible or appropriate for everyone; here are a few suggestions of things you can do to increase the likelihood of making friends in a new location.
- Try to say ‘yes’ to social events and opportunities
You don’t need to go to everything but if you can, try to say ‘yes’ to invitations to social situations – especially in the first weeks of a new contract when people are most aware of your ‘newness’.
- Try to be socially proactive
If social invitations aren’t forthcoming, it will typically be because of oversight, rather than unkindness. Could you try to go out of your comfort zone and ask colleagues whether they would like to do something? You could also try to think creatively about ways of making new contacts - could you join a club or society, or volunteer for a local cause? The initial leap of putting yourself out there can be scary, but it can pay dividends.
- Try to let people know that you are new
Most people want to help others settle in. Simply letting people know that you are new to an area can make a big difference. Even colleagues who technically know that you are new won’t necessarily realise that they can help you to find your feet until you tell them. Joining a new club and doing something entirely different can also boost this effect and give you easy entry points into conversations.
- Try to utilise existing contacts
If you are lucky enough to have friends of friends in a new location, why not ask them for introductions? If they are friends of your friends, there is a good chance you will share commonalities. They may also be able to provide more nuanced advice that will help you settle in.
- Try to join weekly special interest clubs (e.g. sports teams, language classes)
This not only gives you repeated opportunities to make connections, but it also lowers the barriers to conversation.
- Try to create and maintain regular routines
Consistency is often key to friendships. Friendship rarely forms through dramatic gestures but often evolves through frequency and ease. Going to the department, gym, a cafe, or bar at approximately the same time and day of the week increases your chances of becoming familiar with people who use these places at the same times as you.
- Be friendly
If you have the energy, asking people questions or providing warm follow ups to conversations (e.g. it was great chatting last week) can indicate you are open to friendship and make it easier for friendships to form organically.
Should you join a union?
In the UK, trade unions are independent organisations that represent and support employees. By joining a union, you become part of a collective body that works to protect fair working conditions, provide advice and advocacy, and enable staff to raise concerns through recognised channels. A local UCU, or relevant trade union branch, can offer confidential advice on issues such as contracts, workload, grievances, and working conditions. Many branches also host social events, reading groups, or newcomer meetings, which can be a helpful way to build connections and feel part of a wider community.
A common misconception is that being a union member means that you must take part in industrial action, if it is initiated. This is not true. While colleagues would value and appreciate solidarity (on the picket line, as part of action short of a strike, or marking boycotts), this is often accompanied by an understanding that many people, particularly those on fixed-term contracts or work visas, can feel vulnerable about this aspect of membership. It is completely reasonable to ask questions about any forms of industrial action taking place and then decide how to participate in a way that feels right for you.
If you are an international member of staff, you can also join a trade union and access the support that membership provides. However, you should still check whether union activity affects your visa conditions, or whether you are more vulnerable to employer actions than others. The UCU’s migrant member’s page is a good place to start (it provides guidance on the forms of legal support offered to migrant members) but you can also seek tailored advice from your local branch representatives.
Respondent A
"Appraisal meetings, wider staff meetings and geog departmental workshops etc. I would say that I have made a conscious effort to involve myself and embed myself as a member of faculty, even before I had a permanent post. I always tried to attend social coffees, writing groups, departmental meetings. I also sought internal funding to run a small writing workshop for the department, but in doing this I got to meet a lot of other faculty who I didn't know until then, and who are all supportive and very engaged too, but I think part of this is in being proactive to get myself out there"
Employment status: Fixed Term Contract
Age: Under 30
Gender: Female
Respondent B
"There is a representative for post-doctoral researchers and research fellows who can speak on behalf of the community in school discussions […] And I have been made to feel welcome and part of the research culture"
Employment status: Fixed Term Contract
Age: Under 30
Gender: Female
Respondent C
"Colleagues have invited me to research group meetings and away days (despite being on an education only contract). Individual colleagues have offered career advice. I was nominated (by a colleague) and won an award from my Faculty. Individual colleagues have praised my work with students"
Employment status: Fixed Term Contract
Age: 30-39
Gender: Female
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