Guidelines for mentoring of assistant professors and postdocs
January 2026
At the Department of Political Science, Aarhus University, all postdocs/assistant professors will be offered a mentor. The mentors will support postdocs/assistant professors in their professional development as researchers and teachers, as well as their integration in the department.
The mentor should be a senior member of the department’s academic staff. For postdocs financed by external funds, the project owner can be mentor, but other senior staff members are also available. The vice head of department helps postdocs/assistant professors find mentors and approves them.
A mentor has two main functions:
- Supporting the academic development of the postdoc/assistant professor.
- Mentoring in matters related to personal development.
The nature of the mentoring will depend on the exact employment of the postdocs/assistant professors in terms of how many teaching obligations they have and whether they are employed in an externally funded project.
The academic development:
Supervising academic development comprises both research and teaching. For research, this relates to advice on publication strategies, plans, and choices. For teaching, it relates to planning teaching activities, advice on teaching practices, and reflections on evaluations.
The personal development:
Mentoring personal development may include introducing postdocs/assistant professors who are new to the department to relevant colleagues and informing about relevant activities, providing guidance on career opportunities, or offering input to work-related issues that may come up.
Not the mentor's job
The deputy head of department is responsible for the overall well-being of the group of postdocs/assistant professors, including staff development talks. Any major problems and challenges should be referred to her. This includes:
- Major personal issues concerning, for instance, illness or stress.
- Problems related to the organization and division or labor in research projects in which the postdoc/assistant professor is involved/employed.
- Major challenges regarding planning and execution of teaching.
For postdocs, the project leader has the main responsibility for supporting planning of teaching, organizing work, and integrating postdocs into the department and relevant sections and workshops. The mentor supplements with additional input when relevant and serves as an additional point of integration.
The mentor is not responsible for the postdoc/assistant professor in the way a PhD supervisor is responsible for PhD students. There is no reporting obligations or expectations of reading or commenting on draft papers. The mentor and the postdoc/assistant professor are mutually responsible for arranging a suitable mode of dialogue. However, mentoring is an offer to postdocs/assistant professors and should be driven by their needs and interests; this includes the frequency of meetings.
A mentor should be found as soon as possible after the postdocs/assistant professor has started at the department, and a first meeting should take place within the first weeks thereafter.
