DEFINITION

He is a full-time researcher in a research lab at the University. The senior researcher is a Ph.D. holder at the rank of Assistant or Associate Professor with an experience of at least five years. He must have excellent research capabilities and maturity that is essential for a research lab at the University.

SELECTION CRITERIA

The purpose of recruiting Senior Researcher is to provide additional support to lab leaders whose labs are growing and would require mature research staff to help in driving the research efforts of the lab. It can also be recruited by new and promising research labs that are lacking mature researchers to grow their research output and impact. The selection criteria to recruit senior researcher are the following:

• Ph.D. holder with a rank associate professor or research professor.
• He must have at least five years after receiving a Ph.D. degree.
• He must have at least published three journal research papers in the last year.

Additional selection criteria/indicators could be considered and provided in the justification of the lab leader request:

• How many research projects he has attracted or worked in the past?
• What is the quality of his published research papers?
• How many supervised students in Ph.D. and Master degrees?
• What are the technical strengths of the candidate needed in the research lab?
• Does he have an industrial experience?

These criteria will help to make a pre-selection of candidates.

RANK

The Senior should have the rank of associate professor or assistant professor.

INTERVIEW & RECRUITMENT

If the candidate satisfies the criteria above, he will be interviewed by the college dean and the lab leader to further investigate his contributions to PSU if he joins. The respective college assesses his application and if accepted, the college dean sends an approval request to the rector office for final approval. The request must include clear arguments that justify the need for the recruitment of the senior researcher for the specific lab and must clarify the need of the lab for the senior researcher.

TEACHING LOAD

• No teaching load.
• Can be assigned a course with the coordination with the lab leader as a part-timer.

OTHER DUTIES

• Assist the lab leader in the management of the lab.
• Perform research and development tasks.
• Mentor undergraduate and graduate students.
• Contribute to applying for research grants.
• Supervise Master, Ph.D., and Post-Doc.
• Manage research projects.
• Publish in top-ranked journals and patents.
• Research leadership activities (editorials, conference organization, training, …).

CONVERSION TO A FACULTY MEMBER

• The senior researcher can be converted to a faculty member with mutual agreement between the lab leader, the researcher and the college in case there is a mutual interest for such a conversion. In this case, the candidate will have the same teaching load and duties as other faculty members, and also the same salary package for a faculty member at the same rank.
• In this case, a request is raised from the college dean and the lab leader to the rector for the approval of the conversion to a position of a faculty member, for the same current rank of the candidate.
• In case of conversion, a new contract has to be signed between the University and the faculty member for the position of a faculty member.

VACATION

The vacation of the senior researcher is 45 days in the summer. They have 3 days of vacations for the week of inter-semester.

OUTCOMES & EVALUATION

• Number of ISI/Scopus papers.
• At least five Q1/Q2 journals every year.
• Keeping a number of citations per year no lower than 300 citations in Google Scholars and 200 citations in Scopus.
• Number of research events/training organized.
• Number of students supervised.
• Number/amount of research grants attracted.
• Industrial contracts established.
• Teaching effectiveness.