Building a Scholarly Communications Career in Uncertain Times

Many well-laid plans for the individuals and organizations making up the Scholarly Communications community were upended by 2020. For early career individuals, the uncertainty is challenging. How to network, how to stand out, how to advance your career—during an era without opportunities to meet and interact with peers outside a seemingly endless cavalcade of Zoom meetings? In this interactive session, participants will meet in virtual breakout rooms to discuss individual topics focused on professional development, skill changes, and other challenges. A facilitator will be assigned to each small group to help guide the discussion on topics including tools for virtual networking, professional development opportunities, and interviewing for and starting a new job remotely. The facilitators will then present their group's key points and ideas to the entire session before returning to the breakout rooms to discuss another topic—with the expectation that the groups will rotate through several topics before the session concludes. A final readout synthesizing the issues and potential approaches will be shared with attendees following the session. These materials will then be packaged and will be made available as an enduring resource on SSP's Early Career Professionals website available to the ScholComm community. The intention is to allow early and mid-career members of the community to meet and discuss issues they've been facing this year and the strategies they've used to move forward. Attendees can expect an opportunity to meet and share ideas with their peers and learn from their collective experiences. Learning Level: Foundational