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I'm applying for a job at the LMB in Cambridge, UK. I am aware that the LMB offers two paths for a postdoc: an MRC Postdoctoral Training Scheme and a Career Development Fellowship. I am unclear of the implications that each one entails.

For the postdoctoral training scheme, I will receive a settlement allowance of £1,000 that is taxable but not pensionable. I will have to find a mentor in the institute and will receive an allowance of £850 per annum in year 1, increasing to £1,300 per annum in year 2 and £1,800 per annum in year 3 and beyond. This allowance will be taxable but not consolidated for pension purposes and paid on a monthly basis as a normal salary throughout the year. No redundancy payment is made at the end of this fixed-term contract.

While with the career development fellowship, I will have no formal mentoring and will not receive the allowances but will be eligible for a redundancy payment at the end of your fixed-term contract.

What are the pros/cons of either?

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  • "£850 per annum" or "£850 per month"? Anyway, it seems the heart of your question is financial, not so much academic.
    – Jon Custer
    Commented Jan 3 at 14:13
  • Do you have links to the details on these schemes, since otherwise it's a bit hard to answer by anyone not based there? In particular, an MRC 'Career Development Fellowship' usually refers to the MRC's independent group leader career establishment fellowship. This would not be an either-or comparison with a postdoc training award, as they're for quite different career stages. But perhaps LMB have some alternative local usage?
    – Stephen McMahon
    Commented Jan 3 at 14:20

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Last time I checked Career Development Award fellows are seen as junior PIs, and a CDA is the first step towards having your own lab. As such you will likely employee your own postdocs and technicians, and follow your own science, and be awarded substantial research costs to fund the research of you and your team. You will be paid on a salary scale similar to that of a tenure track professor likely somewhere in the £40k-£50k ballpark). The scheme is administered at the national level. This would count as a "first major funding" and you would not then be eligible for further funding schemes targeted as "my first grant" style awards (such as the MRCs NIRG, the BBSRCs New Investigator Award, or the Wellcome Trust's Career Development Fellowship).

I've not come across the MRC Postdoctoral Training Scheme and google doesn't turn anything up, but my guess is that it is an internal LMB scheme. You would be "someone's" postdoc, working with them on topics that are related to the areas their lab researches. You would not have your own team (although you may be given technicians or grad students to supervise on a day-to-day basis). You would be paid as a postdoc (probably somewhere in the £30-£40k ballpark).

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