Quantum Technologies Early Career Forum: member vacancies

• Closing date: 27 June 2025, 11:59pm UK time
• Number of positions: 15 to 20
• Length of term: Three years
• Time commitment: Four to five days each year (including the quarterly forum meetings)
• Remuneration: Dinner, travel and subsistence fees will not be paid. This applies to both in-person and virtual meetings
• Panel meeting: August 2025
• Outcomes communicated: August 2025

The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) is recruiting 15 to 20 early career researchers to join its Quantum Technologies Early Career Forum.

The forum will act as an informal advisory stream to EPSRC.

You will be an advocate for EPSRC within the quantum technologies community, providing a broad perspective on the community’s needs and views.

You will provide advice and perspective across the breadth of the quantum technologies theme remit.

You will actively shape the forum’s agenda and activities.

EPSRC will not cover travel and subsistence costs associated with attending the forum.

Who we’re looking for

Role and person specification

We will select members from the breadth of the UK quantum technologies community.

We expect you to bring a broad strategic view and to act as ‘generous generalists’.

We do not expect you to act as a representative of your own organisation, research area or sector.

We expect you to adhere to the Seven Principles of Public Life.

We are looking for early career researchers holding a PhD (or equivalent) based at a UK higher education institution or employed by a relevant business or organisation.

You must have an understanding of the processes required to deliver world-class research activities in quantum technologies or the commercialisation of such research, or both.

We are also looking for industrialists and individuals working in the third sector and government organisations whose work is relevant to quantum technologies.

Early career paths

To recognise the range of career paths in quantum technologies there is no specific definition of ‘early career’.

However, you should demonstrate why you consider yourself to be early career.

This forms part of the assessment criteria outlined in the ‘how we’ll assess your application’ section.

You may be considered as early career if:

• you are in the process of establishing, or have newly established, your research independence and your research team (established leaders of research groups are not suitable for this opportunity)
• you aspire to leadership within your research community or some experience of community leadership, but may not have a significant track record of community leadership at a national level
• you have a good awareness of the international and strategic context of your research and are starting to show evidence of recognition in the community

This list is not exhaustive or definitive, but may help you to:

• decide if this is the right opportunity for you
• explain why you consider yourself to be early career

The internal EPSRC panel will refer to this but will also take a broad view.

Equality, diversity and inclusion

We are keen to see diversity in forum membership, in terms of gender, ethnicity, disability and other protected characteristics.

We welcome applications from a diverse range of backgrounds.

Find out more about our equality, diversity and inclusion policy under the ‘Further information’ section.

If you are interested in applying but are unsure of your eligibility, contact the Quantum Technologies team (see contact details under ‘Further information’).

Applying to this opportunity will not affect your status under the repeatedly unsuccessful applicant’s policy.

What you’ll be doing

The EPSRC quantum technologies theme is looking to appoint between 15 to 20 members to form the first cohort of the Quantum Technologies Early Career Forum.

You will be expected to:

• act as ‘generous generalists’ in an informal advisory structure, providing valuable insights and additional perspectives on key strategic issues
• act as advocates, proactively sharing awareness of EPSRC process and strategy with colleagues and the wider community
• be visible and represent the early career researchers community, disseminating key knowledge of EPSRC strategy and activities to the community and stakeholders where appropriate
• challenge constructively or validate EPSRC’s perspectives, or both, drawing on the available evidence and your own experiences
• work as a team with other forum members and EPSRC to proactively present issues and opportunities to the National Quantum Technologies Programme Strategic Advisory Board and EPSRC’s Heads of Theme
• encourage and enhance two-way dialogue between respective stakeholder communities and, where appropriate, with decision-makers

You will have the opportunity to interact with other early career researchers from across the breadth of the quantum technologies portfolio, forming new professional networks.

You will also have opportunities to:

• participate in EPSRC strategic advisory activities
• interact with senior EPSRC staff
• receive insight into UK funding body policy and practice

Scope

The forum aims to engage with EPSRC, to support and enable EPSRC to sustain core research capability, across the breadth of quantum technologies, which has the potential for significant impact.

The forum will act as an informal advisory body. It will help support EPSRC in its vision to secure and sustain the future of the UK’s growing capability in quantum technologies by focusing on needs and outcomes for early career researchers.

This will:

• ensure that EPSRC’s strategy yields maximum benefits for early career researchers
• identify skills and training needs within the UK and enable talent retention
• raise awareness of opportunities within the UK, inclusive of career development and leadership opportunities
• develop strategic knowledge within the early career researchers community

The forum will be organised and aligned to cover the breadth of EPSRC’s quantum technologies remit, including the wider UK National Quantum Technologies Programme.

You are eligible to apply from academia and industry.

Find out more about the quantum technologies theme and research areas.

Forum meetings will be organised collaboratively between EPSRC and forum members, with the meetings being hosted at members’ organisations.

EPSRC expects you to be willing to actively participate and contribute to the forum’s planning and activities on a regular basis.

The forum will meet on a quarterly basis, with each meeting running over one day.

We expect you to attend the majority of meetings.

Operation

Appointments will be for three years (with effect from September 2025 to September 2028).

You should be willing to actively participate and contribute to the forum’s activities on a regular basis, including attending and hosting meetings where required, and consultation via email.

We expect forum members to commit between four to five days to the role each year (including quarterly forum meetings).

Support for costs

This is not a direct funding opportunity. It is an expression of interest to become a member of the Quantum Technologies Early Career Forum.

EPSRC will not cover travel and subsistence costs associated with attending forum meetings.

We expect these to be covered by your host institution (employer), as agreed in your letter of support.

If this is not possible, EPSRC can consider providing support to ensure you do not incur personal expenses.

How to apply

Submitting an application

This is a single-stage process, based on an expression of interest.

You should apply through the Quantum Technologies Early Career Forum expression of interest 2025 form.

Your application will be final upon seeing the end screen ‘You have completed this survey’.

Deadline

You should apply by 27 June 2025, 11:59pm UK time.

We will not accept applications after this time.

Applications to this opportunity will not count towards the repeatedly unsuccessful applicants policy.

Guidance on writing an application

Preparing an expression of interest

You should complete all sections of the expression of interest form on the UK Research and Innovation Engagement Hub.

You must address the criteria outlined in the ‘assessment criteria’ section.

Preparing a statement of support

Applications must be accompanied by a statement of support on headed paper, written, signed, and dated by your host organisation head of department (or equivalent).

The statement of support must explain clearly how the department will support your membership of the forum.

It should:

• confirm that the host institution (employer) is supportive of your time commitment to the forum
• confirm that the host institution (employer) is prepared to support you to host a forum meeting during your term of membership
• not include your name within the statement, as the application will be assessed anonymously

We will reject applications without a statement of support, or where the statement of support does not meet these criteria.

How we’ll assess your application

Assessment process

Expressions of interest will be assessed against the specification criteria by an internal EPSRC panel.

There will be no postal peer review of applications for this forum.

When making appointments, the internal EPSRC panel will consider the following:

• how well you have articulated your fit to the assessment criteria outlined in the ‘assessment criteria’ section with the evidence provided in your expression of interest
• ensuring diversity of membership with a balance of subject expertise, geographical representation, and gender balance

Vacancies will be filled from the shortlists with consideration to the following:

• provision of an appropriate balance of expertise across the quantum technologies remit
• ensuring a gender balance in line with our ambition of achieving at least 30% participation of the underrepresented gender
• ensuring an ethnicity balance in line with our ambition of achieving at least 20% ethnic minority representation across all advisory bodies
• diversity of organisational affiliation and across the UK’s regions and nations

This step of the recruitment process will consider the balance across the forum membership.

It may, where candidates are of equal merit, take positive action to prioritise candidates based on gender and ethnic minority underrepresentation.

Individual diversity data requested during the application will be used solely in this step.

EPSRC reserves the right to reject applications that it deems to be outside the scope of this opportunity or wholly beyond the remit of EPSRC, as well as those that do not follow the application guidelines.

The outcomes of the selection process will be announced in August 2025.

If you are successful, you will be invited to a meeting on 11 September 2025.

In the event of this opportunity being substantially oversubscribed, EPSRC reserves the right to modify the assessment process.

Assessment criteria

Applications will be assessed on providing demonstrable evidence to address the following selection criteria.

Essential

You should:

• be an early career researcher and hold a PhD (or equivalent) or based at a UK higher education institution, or employed by a relevant business or organisation
• have an understanding of the processes required to deliver world-class research activities in quantum technologies or the commercialisation of such research, or both
• have a track record of outstanding work or research in quantum technologies (within the scope of the EPSRC quantum technologies theme), and of delivering impact
• have evidence of involvement in the academic, industry, or user community, including examples of leadership, exploring research opportunities, or positioning yourself to take up these opportunities
• have excellent communication skills and a willingness to develop these further
• have a willingness to help with two-way communication between EPSRC and stakeholder groups, and to act as an advocate for EPSRC and its activities
• have a willingness to devote sufficient time to the role

Desirable

You should have:

• an appreciation of EPSRC processes and operations and an aspiration to develop this further
• an ability to work flexibly and adapt to different ways of working

Feedback

Due to the high volume of applications expected for this opportunity, we do not expect to provide feedback to applicants.

Further information

Contact details

Quantum technologies theme

Email: quantumtechnologies@epsrc.ukri.org

Useful links

Framework for responsible research and innovation
Research integrity in healthcare technologies: ethics
Equality, diversity and inclusion
Conflicts of interest
Reviewer guidance: standard grants

Supporting documents

Equality impact assessment (PDF, 252KB)

Equality, diversity and inclusion

We are committed to a policy of equal opportunities.

Appointments to the forum are made primarily on merit and we are keen to obtain greater diversity across the forum membership.

We particularly encourage applications from:

• women
• people who identify as an ethnic minority
• people with a disability
• other groups who are currently underrepresented

We welcome applications from people based in all regions and nations of the UK.

We hope to continue improving the gender balance on the forum, in keeping with EPSRC’s overall goal of achieving at least 30% participation of women (as the underrepresented gender).

We are committed to working towards increasing ethnic minority representation, aiming to increase the membership on our advisory bodies to 20%.

This is part of our commitment to race equality and is one of our immediate actions.

The recruitment process will consider the balance across the forum and, where candidates are of equal merit, take positive action to prioritise candidates based on gender and ethnic minority underrepresentation.

The long-term strength of the UK research base depends on harnessing all available talent.

EPSRC expects that equality and diversity is embedded at all levels and in all aspects of research practice and funding policy.

We are committed to supporting the research community, offering a range of flexible options which allow you to design a package that fits your research goals, career and personal circumstances. This includes:

• career breaks
• support for people with caring responsibilities
• flexible working
• alternative working patterns

With this in mind, we welcome applications from academics who job share, have a part-time contract, or need flexible working arrangements.

We are committed to ensuring that fairness is fully reflected in all our processes by advancing policy which supports equality, diversity and inclusion.

Find out about EPSRC’s approach to equality, diversity and inclusion.

As part of the application process, we require you to submit your diversity data to help us assess and subsequently monitor the diversity of membership.

This data will be collected, stored, and used in line with our strict General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) 2016/679 guidelines.

The use of your diversity data in the selection process will be clearly outlined.

All diversity data that is used for monitoring purposes will be appropriately anonymised and aggregated according to Office for National Statistics rounding and suppression methodology.

Last updated: 25 April 2025