People development

Policy Leeds supports the following personal development opportunities for University of Leeds researchers, to help them engage more effectively with policy. 

Policy engagement kickstart

Policy engagement kickstart is a policy engagement development programme developed by the Institute for Government, in conjunction with Policy Leeds, Organisational Development and Professional Learning (OD&PL) and Leeds Social Science Institute (LSSI). 

The programme is aimed at those who are new, or relatively new, to policy engagement and provides practical steps to getting started.

It is open to researchers (including postgraduate researchers) and research support professionals, and consists of four modules covering the following areas:

• the landscape of government and policy making
• policy making, evidence and engagement
• developing networks and building your profile
• communicating your research.

The next course will start in October 2024 and run online. This will be followed by an in-person programme in spring 2025.

Sign-up for the autumn Policy Engagement Kickstart course, or find out more about the spring Policy Engagement Kickstart course.

Please email the Policy Leeds team at policyleeds@leeds.ac.uk if you have any other questions about the programme.

Developing your research impact and engagement

For other research impact professional development opportunities and resources, please see the OD&PL Developing your research impact resources page.

In addition, the Engaged Research Microsoft Team is our digital space to bring together everyone who is involved in or interested in engagement with research at the University of Leeds. 

The team:

• shares research engagement news, opportunities, support and training
• provides a one-stop shop for support and resources on research engagement
• brings people together from across the University around engagement with research (public, policy and third sector engagement, and patient involvement)
• provides regular networking and events related to engagement.

University of Leeds members can join the Engaged Research Team by opening Microsoft Teams, selecting ‘Join or create a team’, and entering the code fc84jre. If you have any difficulties please email Policy Leeds at policyleeds@leeds.ac.uk

Be inspired by our policy leaders

Whether you are struggling to get going or seeking ideas on what might be possible, our policy leader biographies show that engaging with policy is for all career stages and academic disciplines.