A scientist can be called upon to play many roles. One minute you are designing an experiment for an hypothesis you’re testing, the next you are booking hotels for a conference you’re organizing. For many of these roles you may receive no formal instruction while a student. However, you can learn by experience.

Your professors will be playing these roles, and you can volunteer to help. If one of them is organizing a workshop, perhaps you can help set up the workshop website. If they are preparing a grant proposal, even serving as a proofreader can give you some experience. Be proactive about getting involved. Your involvement may expand, and you may have an opportunity to observe other parts of the process. If your professors are good at playing these roles, you can learn from their successes. If they are bad at it, you can learn from their mistakes. 🙂

You can even initiate opportunities by co-opting your professors as partners. For example, you can ask a professor to lend their name and experience to a proposal for a conference workshop in the area you’re specializing in, where you agree ahead of time to take on the logistical burden.

This kind of experience will help you hit the ground running when take your first independent academic post, and may even help you to obtain it.