This article outlines a concurrent complementarity, mixed methods research design to explore the careers of university professional staff through the application of a contemporary career profile framework. Two hundred and twenty-six participants from Australia and the UK completed a multi-method questionnaire. Integration occurred at three points:…

In many professions there are qualifications to gain and professional standards to achieve. Lawyers pass the bar and doctors pass their boards. In academic life the equivalent is a doctorate, closely followed by a profile of peer-reviewed publication. To hold a doctoral degree is the common requirement to become "academic" but does it…

This article shares the story of Julie Davies, who was just 29 when complications to a long-term health condition obliged her to retire from her job as a post woman. Davies has Marfan syndrome, an inherited connective tissue disorder, which affects the eyes, the heart and the skeleton. She had no definite ideas about what to do next. A series of…

This paper investigates the extent of overseas migration by British chemists over the period 1887-1971. Notwithstanding the "brain drain" alarms of the 1960s, overseas employment was characteristic of some 19% of British chemists' careers throughout our period, though its nature changed considerably. Our study examines the overseas…