Isabelle SkakniUniversity of Applied Sciences and Arts Western Switzerland · Rectorate
Isabelle Skakni
PhD
About
26
Publications
12,186
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222
Citations
Citations since 2017
Publications
Publications (26)
This study examines the extent to which career competencies (knowledge, skills, and abilities necessary to manage one's own work and learning experiences to achieve the desired career progression) are prevalent amongst early career researchers (ECRs). We adapted the Career Competencies Questionnaire (Akkermans et al., 2013). Competencies to ECRs' t...
Purpose
This paper aims to identify the documented effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on early career researcher (ECR) activity, development, career prospects and well-being.
Design/methodology/approach
This is a systematic literature review of English language peer-reviewed studies published between 2020 and 2021, which provided empirical evidence...
This chapter proposes a reflection on the identity of the responsible researcher in education, as considered through the prism of the responsible research and innovation (RRI) framework. In a context in which new ways of governing and conducting research are sought to ensure more respectful, democratic, and impactful outputs in terms of societal we...
The 21st century and its many challenges (invasion of digital technology, climate change, health crises, political crises, etc.) alert us that we need new educational responses, led by new education professionals.
Research has shown that for these professionals to change in a substantial and profound way, they must change their identity, that is, t...
Over the past two decades, identity has emerged as a concept framing studies of early career researcher experience. Yet, identity is an amorphous concept, understood and used in a range of ways. This systematic review aimed to unpack the underpinnings of the notion of researcher identity. The final sample consisted of 38 empirical articles publishe...
This paper addresses the subjective experiences of PhD holders from Switzerland and the UK who pursue careers beyond academia. Drawing on the concepts of organisational culture and culture shock, we examined the challenges that characterise this passage from academia to non-academic workplaces. With an exploratory aim, we analysed 32 semi-structure...
More than half of PhD graduates work outside academia. Yet we know little of the nature of their post-PhD careers and the conditions influencing them. Further, research to date tends to focus on either individual factors (e.g., graduate perceptions of PhD skills used) or structural factors (e.g., organizational interest in hiring PhDs). Few studies...
Purpose
Teamwork has long featured in social science research. Further, with research increasingly “cross-national,” communication becomes more complex, for instance, involving different cultures, languages and modes of communication. Yet, studies examining team communicative processes that can facilitate or constrain collaboration are rare. As a c...
Early career researchers’ journey (i.e. doctoral researchers and post-PhDs) is increasingly challenging, but little is known about how they live and interpret their significant experiences, that is how they attribute meaning to these experiences and their associated feelings. Moreover, research about how doctoral researchers and post-PhDs deal diff...
Prior studies have reported high levels of PhD stress resulting in
exhaustion and cynicism related to negative institutional factors. Yet, we
know little of the possible influence of personal lives on exhaustion/
cynicism. This mixed-methods study examines the interrelation. We
drew on exhaustion, cynicism, life-work relation scales and free-write...
This study examines the impact of career uncertainty on post-PhD researchers’ experiences. Drawing on an identity-trajectory approach and a qualitative design, we analysed experiences of post-PhDs from the UK and Switzerland. Our findings show that in the course of their work experiences, career uncertainty takes two different forms: intellectual u...
Purpose
This study aims to examine how PhD students with diverse profiles, intentions and expectations manage to navigate their doctoral paths within the same academic context under similar institutional conditions. Drawing on Giddens’ theory of structuration, this study explores how their primary reasons, motives and motivations for engaging in do...
Intellectual abilities alone are not sufficient to successfully progress through doctoral studies. Research indicates that modes of training and the context and conditions in which doctoral studies take place also have a significant impact on the process. However, few studies examine how taken-for-granted and self-evident practices in academia like...
Purpose – This study aims to examine how post-PhD researchers construct their identities through
significant work experiences as they endeavour to develop their research independence and a distinct
scholarly profile. The authors were especially interested in how they made meaning of their important work
experiences, the ones that were emotionally s...
Dans un contexte où les carrières scientifiques se sont diversifiées et précarisées, il est de plus en plus difficile pour les chercheures en début de parcours d’anticiper leur avenir professionnel et de s’y préparer. Si de nombreuses études ont été réalisées jusqu’ici afin de mieux comprendre les enjeux de la formation et de l’insertion profession...
Based on a psychosocial perspective of identity and career transitions, this paper presents the results of a study on the occupational identity construction during the school-to-work transition. The analysis of 48 semi-structured interviews with vocational and technical training graduates in the province of Québec highlights the existence of five t...
Based on a psychosocial perspective of identity and career transitions, this paper presents the results of a study on the occupational identity construction during the school-to-work transition. The analysis of 48 semi-structured interviews with vocational and technical training graduates in the province of Québec highlights the existence of five t...
Ce cinquième numéro d'INITIO est consacré aux effets de genre susceptibles d'être observés en contextes éducationnel et professionnel. Appréhendée ici comme une bicatégorisation hiérarchisée entre les sexes (homme/femme), la notion de genre renvoie d'emblée aux valeurs et aux représentations de ce qui est considéré comme étant masculin ou féminin (...
La question des minorités en éducation et dans le monde du travail constitue le thème de ce quatrième numéro régulier de la revue INITIO. Bien que sa signification tende à différer selon les contextes (Plasseraud, 2012), nous entendons ici par minorité un groupe de personnes distinct occupant une position d'infériorité par rapport à un groupe domin...
C’est sous le thème de l’innovation que se déploie ce second numéro de la revue INITIO. Bien qu’il soit généralement associé à l’idée de progrès technologique, le concept d’innovation revêt une dimension fondamentalement sociale. En effet, au-delà des visées de l’innovation technologique qui reposent généralement sur « une logique de marché, de con...
The welcome and integration session: a new access path to higher education in Quebec
The welcome and integration session established in 1993 is a new access path to Quebecan higher education. The students who take this path have presumably faced learning difficulties in secondary education or are undecided as to their academic options. The paper fo...
Questions
Questions (2)
Hello,
What do you consider to be the best methodological handbooks (covering both quali & quanti) for beginning researchers in the humanities and social sciences?
The views of doctoral students are particularly welcome :)
Many thanks in advance for your help!
Hello,
I'm looking for good examples of mixed-methods studies with a qualitative focus. I'm especially interested in the explanatory sequential design "case-selection" variant / preliminary quantitative input design
Many thanks in advance!
Projects
Projects (7)
The aim of this project is threefold: 1) to define the profiles of PhD holders pursuing careers beyond academia in Switzerland; 2) to explore and map individual and contextual factors that influence their career trajectories and work experiences; and 3) to examine the relevance and usefulness of PhD degrees for careers beyond academia.
PI: Isabelle Skakni
The project is funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (Funding number: 100019_200910/1)
As part of the Researchers’ Identity Development project (RID) (PI: Montserrat Castello Badia), this mixed-methods study was conducted in western Switzerland to examine 1) what challenges characterise the doctoral training and postdoctoral positions in this region 2) how Swiss junior researchers negotiate and construct their researcher’ identity throughout their academic experiences and 3) how the types of support received–or not–within their academic environments and research networks influence their identity development.
This project aims to better understand how early career researchers from around the world perceive and deal with their current and future career challenges. It is also an opportunity to validate an adapted version of the Career Competencies Questionnaire (Akkermans et al., 2013).
If you are a doctoral student or a PhD holder who graduated within the past 8 years, you are kindly invited to complete our 20-minute online survey: https://fr.surveymonkey.com/r/CCQ_ERCs
Many thanks for your participation!
