How can MIT Career Advising and Professional Development (CAPD) help you? We empower PhD and Master’s students to explore their life and career goals by helping them to develop core competencies and build professional networks.
Advising and professional development, tailored for advanced trainees.
Tailored services for MIT graduate students are provided by CAPD’s Graduate Student Professional Development and Career Advising wings.
Advising & on-demand resources for graduate students
Career advising
Visit CAPD for a one-on-one conversation that fits your unique situation. You can discuss how to articulate your skills, review job documents, plan for industry and academic job searches, prepare for interviews or job offer negotiations, and more.
Whether you decide to pursue a career in academia, industry, or beyond, CAPD is ready to support you.
We know PhDs and postdocs have a lot to think about when it comes to employment and life after MIT. Transitions are exciting and sometimes a little nerve-wracking, and CAPD is here to help.
Make preparation for your job search easier with new resources that will guide you through the process of creating all the documents you might need to take your next steps into industry or academe.
These resources have been designed by CAPD staff to work for you on your schedule, and we are excited to see what we can empower you to accomplish next.
Graduate studies can feel a lot like chaos. There’s a lot going on between research, teaching, clubs, and activities. How can you stay focused and centered with so much going on? Will you ever have time to reflect on how you got here? How can you plan your next steps while taking on so much?
These are important questions, and C.H.A.O.S. can help! C.H.A.O.S. is a tool developed at MIT for MIT graduate students. It’s an acronym for a non-linear design thinking process that will help you find patterns and order within the chaos. You can use it now to take stock of how things are going, reflect on the past, or think ahead and plan for what comes next.
Leverage an opportunity to complete short term experiential learning opportunities outside of academia! This grant enables you to explore potential jobs in industry, build your professional network, and develop professionally.
The Graduate Student Career Exploration Grant awards a small grant ($1,000 or $1,500) to help graduate students cover the cost of completing a one-month underfunded domestic internship over IAP in a career field they would like to explore further.
Career development and decision-making is a multi-step and dynamic process. Our expert advisors have developed and curated resources to support you in your life-long career journey, organized by stage – from exploring your options to negotiating offers.
Professional development
Graduate professional development is skills-based training complementary to your academic coursework that will augment any career path you decide to follow, within and beyond academe.
MIT provides professional development resources to help you deepen your skills and knowledge in seven areas: career advancement, communication, interpersonal skills, leadership and mentoring, personal development, social responsibility, and teaching.
Honing these competencies will give you the confidence to thrive and contribute as a researcher, educator, industry leader, and citizen.
While at MIT, we hope that you will see the importance your core values, appreciate how people’s different values, interests, and skills can influence their behavior in professional settings, and use your understanding of values to guide your professional and personal decision-making.
As you move throughout your program and your career, you will also have the opportunity to establish a habit of self-assessing, learning, and honing or improving your (non-technical) professional and personal skills.
In the midst of your graduate studies, your career may be at the forefront of your thinking, or it may feel very far away. You may be planning for a faculty career, envisioning an industry career path outside of academia, or both. Wherever you are in your program, now is the right time to carve out some space for career exploration and advancement.
The way we communicate to and connect with others has a powerful impact — not just on our research, but also on our own fulfillment at work.
In your time at MIT, explore opportunities to to effectively communicate your work and tailor your message to a non-specialist audience, including its potential positive and negative impacts. You will see the variety of impacts that mentorship can play on your professional development, and begin to think strategically about your own mentoring and mentoring network. And you will appreciate the ways in which leadership, collaboration, and interpersonal skills enable you to work productively in a range of professional situations.
In any field you decide to enter, in any capacity, professional success depends not only on your technical skills and talent but also on your ability to work effectively with others at different levels of your organization. When you develop strong and authentic interpersonal skills, you will be poised to build collaborative, genuine relationships and contribute to the teams you join.
Created for PhD students and postdocs aiming for tenure-track roles in academia or research-supporting roles in industry, the grant-writing training certificate program provides training in the principles of grant writing and the grant submission process.
The research mentorship certificate program is designed for PhDs and postdocs who wish to develop their mentoring skills and grow their practice of productive and inclusive research mentoring.
Individual development plans, or IDPs, are a key professional development tool used within both academia and industry to establish priorities, set goals, and track progress. You can create your own tailored Individual Development Plan to guide you in self-assessment, exploration, goal setting, implementation, recording milestones, and reflection.
By creating and using an IDP, you can optimize your PhD years by planning experiences that will help you build the competencies and skills you need not only to finish your degree but to keep rising throughout your career.
Signature events and programs
The Graduate Student Mentoring Circles is an initiative created by Career Advising and Professional Development (CAPD) and the Office of Graduate Education (OGE). The Mentoring Circles connect current graduate students with alumni who provide relevant perspectives on pathways to academic and industry careers.
The Path of Professorship workshop is an annual multi-day workshop preparing MIT graduate students and post-doctoral researchers to enter careers in academia. The event is designed for attendees who identify as or support the unique experiences of women. Women and non-binary professors from MIT and a diverse range of colleges and universities share about their experiences in academia in an exciting and informative weekend.
The workshop is open to individuals who identify and or support the unique experiences of women and other underrepresented gender groups. Its aim is to provide information about academic scientific careers and the application process.
At these small-scale, limited-enrollment events, join in a conversation with an alumni leader over (iced) tea and cookies. Each of the “Spilling the Tea” parties takes an important topic as its theme, such as women and leadership, women and communication, women and balance, and more.
Don’t miss this unique opportunity to benefit from mentorship and community alongside fellow MIT graduate students.
The Faculty Job Search Series (FJSS) supports graduate students and postdocs who are preparing for the faculty job market. Build a strong application informed by experts across the Institute via overviews, faculty panels, deep dives, and hands-on-workshops aligned with the timeline of the faculty job search.
The program brings together expertise from around the Institute, including faculty, CAPD, the Writing and Communication Center, the Teaching and Learning Lab, the OGE, and the Engineering Communication Labs.
The Path of Professorship workshop is an annual multi-day workshop preparing MIT graduate students and post-doctoral researchers to enter careers in academia. The event is designed for attendees who identify as or support the unique experiences of women. Women and non-binary professors from MIT and a diverse range of colleges and universities share about their experiences in academia in an exciting and informative weekend.
The workshop is open to individuals who identify and or support the unique experiences of women and other underrepresented gender groups. Its aim is to provide information about academic scientific careers and the application process.
The Industry Bound Career Series (IBCS) is open to any PhD & postdoc interested in transitioning into a non-academic career. We offer workshops such as how to translate your CV into a resume, core networking and interviewing skills, and how to negotiate, just to name a few.
Don’t forget that individual advising, as well as events spotlighting different industries, are also available to you through CAPD!
Biennially, CAPD and the Office of Graduate Education (OGE) honors a cohort of Graduate Students of Excellence alongside a celebration of excellence in faculty mentorship.
The MIT Graduate Students of Excellence (GSE) initiative honors honor graduate students through a nomination process that focuses upon leadership and service contributions to the Institute, dedication to mentoring, and drive to improve the graduate student experience.
