The awaited ResearchComp Community of Practice (CoP) — a Europe-wide network created under the CROSS project — is now live.
The Community of Practice aims to foster collaboration and strengthen research careers across Europe by bringing together professionals involved in researcher development, training, HR support, and doctoral education. The CROSS project recently hosted its first co-creation event within the emerging ResearchComp Community of Practice. The online focus group, titled How can ResearchComp enhance researcher training in your institution? brought together professionals from research-performing organisations across Europe.
ResearchComp as a Shared Reference Tool
The ResearchComp project is the European competence framework for researchers. It defines key transversal competences that complement disciplinary expertise and support long-term career development — both inside and outside academia. It provides a structured overview of areas such as:
- Research integrity
- Open science
- Communication and engagement
- Leadership and supervision
- Project and data management
- Career management
For example, a postdoctoral researcher is preparing to lead their first project. He/she can use ResearchComp to identify gaps in leadership, budgeting, or team supervision skills and seek targeted training.
During the above mentioned session, participants attended a live demonstration of a prototype ResearchComp-based assessment tool for training programmes developed within the CROSS project. They provided valuable feedback on how such a tool could support institutional strategy and training development. Participants highlighted its usefulness in identifying gaps, clarifying priorities, and aligning course content with broader institutional strategies. Many saw strong potential for supporting long-term planning and portfolio development.
Strong Interest in Continued Exchange
At the same time, participants identified important challenges:
- The need for contextual adaptation across disciplines and career stages
- Securing institutional buy-in
- Avoiding overly prescriptive or checklist-style use
- Recognising that much competence development occurs through research practice and peer exchange rather than formal courses
Flexibility and strategic application were considered essential to ensure meaningful implementation. Additional concerns included:
- The framework currently being available only in English
- Early-career researchers potentially feeling overwhelmed
- The need for simplified, user-friendly tools to support reflection and planning
Mentoring was highlighted as a key mechanism supporting competence development alongside structured training. Participants expressed interest in sharing practical examples and partial implementations, exchanging lessons learned, engaging in peer learning and exploring alignment approaches without promoting rigid standardisation or benchmarking.
Further workshops will build on these discussions, exploring institutional needs in greater depth and supporting peer learning on how ResearchComp can be effectively translated into diverse researcher training contexts.
Join the Community
If you are passionate about developing researchers’ skills and shaping the future of researcher training in Europe, we invite you to join the growing ResearchComp Community of Practice (User Guide: ResearchComp Community of Practice). Become part of a collaborative network dedicated to strengthening research careers — and help shape its next steps.
The ResearchComp Community of Practice is hosted within the EntreComp Community platform. To join and begin exploring:
- Create an account on the EntreComp Community platform.
- Access the ResearchComp Network area within the platform.
- Connect with peers, explore resources, and participate in upcoming activities.
