We have been asked by Dr Rachel Middlemass to advertise a 12-month AHRC/Zinc Research & Development Fellowship for an early career researcher within their team at Zinc. Applicants can have a background in any AHRC discipline but should have a strong interest in Zinc’s current mission focus on improving mental health for children and young people. No previous commercial experience is required to apply for this post.
Zinc builds brand-new companies from scratch to develop products and services that respond to urgent societal challenges. They have four overarching mission areas around: mental health, healthy ageing, the future of work in contexts of automation and globalisation, and the environment. Each venture-builder programme has a sharp focus on a specific aspect of one of those missions. Over the course of the programme, founders are helped to understand the unmet needs and identify the underserved communities within that specific area, and to develop new, commercially scalable products and services that respond to them.
The AHRC has provided pilot funding to allow an ambitious ECR to join Zinc for a 12-month Research & Development Fellowship, working alongside the new intake of founders in the next venture-builder starting in October. This is an exciting opportunity for a researcher interested in learning more about the world of mission-focused start-ups to get a very different type of ‘industry’ experience. They’ll join our in-house R&D team and work directly with start-up founders in a supportive, research-focused commercial environment. The R&D Fellow will gain particular understanding and significant hands-on experience of research in the context of early-stage innovation.
Applications are welcome from arts and humanities PhD students who are expecting to complete their viva before October and/or ECRs who are considering their next move and interested in innovation. More information about this opportunity and the application process can be found here. Deadline for applications is 18:00 on Monday 30th August 2021.
Rachel is happy to discuss the opportunity with any researchers interested in learning more and can be contacted at rachelm@zinc.vc.