Increased public investment in PhD education to drive innovation has led to a recent rapid growth in the number of PhD graduates. Academic labour markets have not developed at the same pace. An ever-larger share of the graduates is finding employment in industry. The transition from academia to industry is not always easy. The present study aims to provide insights into the role played by PhDs’ networks in the job search after graduation. Our data comprise interviews with industry-employed doctoral graduates in STEM disciplines from Sweden, Norway and the UK. Our findings show that PhDs’ autonomously built personal networks can help match their specific scientific expertise with labour market demands. We distinguish country-specific patterns and characteristics of the transition, in which regional career paths are more (Scandinavia) or less (the UK) noticeable. The study has practical implications, in particular for PhD students and graduates, related to their career orientation.

Doctoral education was primarily designed to answer the human resources needs of academia. However, nowadays, increasing numbers of doctorate holders seek employment outside academia. Accordingly, doctoral education can be one of the means by which universities take part in the development of industry in their regions. This study explores whether and how doctoral-level skills are being adapted to the needs of local industrial employers in two different contexts. Two research and science parks situated next to research-intensive universities in Sweden and Spain were chosen as cases for an exploratory and comparative study. In these parks, local industrial employers conduct R&D activities that make them potentially attractive destinations for doctoral graduates. Similarities in the cases were found regarding the process of adaptation of doctoral education at the adjacent universities to meet the industrial employers’ needs in the parks. Discrepancies are also highlighted regarding stages of development, institutional settings, geography and culture. Implications for several stakeholders are formulated to improve the process analysed in the study concerning better alignment of doctoral education with industrial employers’ need for generic skills.

This article proposes a heuristic theoretical framework for identifying the main areas of policy improvement needed to enhance the engagement of doctoral researchers with industry. A critical realist approach is adopted in order to identify the factors underlying collaborations of doctoral researchers with industry. Following the initial three steps proposed by Danermark et al.’s Explanatory Model of Social Sciences, these factors are first identified at one level of abstraction and based on the findings of previous scholarly works on the external engagement of academics. They are comprised of academic disciplinary and contextual (regulatory and organizational) elements. After reviewing the prominent literature on each factor, a critical realist evaluation framework known as context–mechanism–outcome is implemented to integrate these underlying factors into an integrative and heuristic theoretical framework. Finally, the article discusses the research and policy implications of an interactive relationship between the disciplinary and contextual mechanisms that can shape different configurations for policy intervention to boost learning outcomes from collaboration.

This book is the result of a European Union funded Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Innovative Training Network on the Role of Universities in Innovation and Regional Development (RUNIN). The network received funding from 2016 to 2020 and supported 14 early-career researchers who undertook their doctoral training in the network. It builds on the collaboration between the universities in the European Consortium for Innovative Universities (ECIU), of which six of the participant teams are members. The universities in the ECIU share an ambition to promote innovation and to work closely with their regions. The RUNIN programme brings together scholars working on higher education, innovation and regions in order to study how the universities realise this ambition. The project aims to provide new knowledge for other universities and policy-makers on how universities can contribute to innovation in their regions. The programme includes a university and a regional development agency in each region as partners in order to examine the relationship between universities and their regions from both perspectives.The programme involved international mobility both before and during the programme. All early-career researchers moved from abroad to the university and region in which they were employed. The 14 researchers in the programme came from 12 different countries on four continents. They could thus bring an outsider’s perspective on the universities and the regions. This book presents those perspectives. It includes seven case studies authored by the early-career researchers working at each university, in which they analyse the relationship between the university and its surrounding region.The case studies show the wide array of roles which universities can take in their regions. Even though the universities share the same ambition and, as members of the ECIU, have similar profiles, the regional and national contexts in which they find themselves have implications for the types of activities which they do, the effects of these activities, and the way in which they are received both at the university and in the surrounding region.Work on this book started during the first training week of the project, hosted by the University of Lincoln in March 2017, when the researchers had started their PhDs only weeks or even days before. It ends as the programme draws to a conclusion, following an extensive programme of training weeks in all seven regions, several conference special sessions, joint publications, exchanges and successful PhD defences. It has been an honour to work with such a great group of promising researchers and inspiring supervisors through the process. The scholars in the RUNIN programme share an interest in studying universities and regions, but also in actively engaging with stakeholders, in communicating their research in new ways, and in contributing to the betterment of society. During the course of the programme, the network has evolved into deep collaboration and close friendships, where all participants have contributed to a supportive atmosphere.We hope this book will reflect that collaboration and will be of use to university managers, policymakers, academics and students who want to know how universities can contribute to their regions. The universities and regions presented here are all, in their unique ways, interesting examples of the multi-faceted nature of this relationship.