MONDAY, MARCH 16, 14:00 - 16:00 CET
Research Skills and Career Development Programme
A Masterclass for Early Career Faculty Women (defined as having obtained their PhDs between 2021-2026)
Instructor: Professor Almudena Sevilla (London School of Economics)
Early and Mid-career faculty — especially women — don’t lack expertise. What they lack is time. Delegation is essential for sustaining research productivity and supporting the next generation. This masterclass provides a clear, teachable framework to help early career faculty women define their research question, articulate their contribution, and understand their value added. The goal is to turn what you already do instinctively into a process that can be taught and transferred. By making this part of research explicit, you can mentor more efficiently, strengthen your students’ independence, and focus your time on the parts of research where you add the most value.
Why this Masterclass now?:
There is no shortage of well-established advice on how to do research, much of which has long benefited the academic community. This guidance lays out what good research looks like in general terms such as what questions matter, what makes a contribution, what a strong paper includes. But much of what makes a paper publishable is tacit knowledge, i.e., unwritten rules, informal judgments, and field-specific expectations that are hard to explain and even harder to teach. This reflects Polanyi’s paradox: “we know more than we can tell.” Those who have this knowledge often do not realise they are applying it, and those who need it rarely know what to ask for. The result is slower learning, weaker mentoring, and deeper inequality in the profession that results in a loss of talent and research quality across the discipline. This workshop is designed to close that gap. It makes tacit knowledge visible and usable. It offers a clear and repeatable method for identifying the key elements of a paper’s contribution and value added. It is structured. It is teachable. It works.
Now is the time to act.
The persistent lack of diversity in the Economics profession has led to a growing recognition in the last decade that the economics profession must become more inclusive to maximize talent allocation, improve research quality, and strengthen the profession's relevance in addressing real-world challenges. Concrete steps have followed. The American Economic Association has expanded its mentoring programs through CSWEP and launched new formats like AEApp and AEA Insights to broaden access to publication. The Royal Economic Society has introduced initiatives through its Women’s Committee and Diversity & Inclusion Network, and the European Economic Association’s WinE Committee now plays a central role in mentoring and outreach at its annual congress. These are not isolated efforts. They are backed by long-term funding and strategic plans to expand. To build on this momentum, we must address the more subtle barriers to inclusion. Much of what it takes to succeed, like framing a paper’s contribution, remains part of the hidden curriculum. Making this tacit knowledge explicit is a practical next step. It will strengthen current initiatives, support the next generation, and make economics more open, equitable, and rigorous.
Almudena Sevilla
For over two decades, Prof. Almudena Sevilla has led internationally influential research on women in economics and in the economy, transforming understanding of gender inequality in labour markets, time use, education, and public policy, while actively advancing women’s participation and leadership in the economics profession; in recognition of these contributions, she was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 2025 for services to economics and the advancement of women in the discipline.