Leibniz Association: Leibniz Mentoring

Attracting and retaining outstanding female researchers is an important part of the Leibniz Association’s strategy for safeguarding academic excellence over the long term. The Leibniz Mentoring is a crucial strategic component when it comes to fostering academic talent and to accompany young scholars as their careers progress.

The comprehensive and varied Leibniz Mentoring Programme supports highly qualified female post-doctorate researchers on their path to obtaining a professorship or some other leading position. It supports the participants in managing their careers in a goal-driven way, in expanding their subject-specific networks and in taking on managerial tasks with confidence.

In addition to the structured and supervised mentoring partnership, Leibniz Mentoring offers a series of competence seminars as well as professional assistance during the process which guarantees the transfer of acquired knowledge and skills into the daily routine. The Leibniz Association also organises seminars that are targeted at the mentors exclusively and offer them the opportunity to expand their own leadership qualifications.

The call for applications for the 2025/2026 round is scheduled to be published at the end of November 2024.

Programme details, downloads and contact

Leibniz Mentoring rests on the three pillars of further training, networking and process assistance. The core component of Leibniz Mentoring is the cooperative relationship between mentor – leading in her or his field of expertise – and a mentee, an up-and-coming female scholar with a doctoral degree. This so-called tandem meets at regular intervals, the goal being to foster the mentee’s professional progress.
The acquisition of key qualifications for future leaders, in particular in academia, is promoted in an accompanying programme which comprises skills seminars for the mentees. Three essential fields of training are of particular concern here, meaning career strategies, managerial skills and research financing. The seminars, each of them one or two days long, usually take place every other month at the headquarters of the Leibniz Association in Berlin. In order to cater for the heterogeneous nature of the group in terms of prior knowledge and career strategy, the programme has a mix of mandatory and optional modules. In addition to the three mandatory modules – career planning, negotiation and EU research funding (this seminar is run in collaboration with the Europe Office of the Leibniz Association and takes place in Brussels) – participants must choose two modules from: visibility and networking, successfully attracting research funding, appointment processes, and voice and body coaching. Childcare is offered during the seminars (except in Brussels).
During the duration of the programme, both mentees and mentors receive support in the form of process assistance. This assistance constitutes a framework that combines all elements of the mentoring programme, conduces a continuing reflection on the progress achieved and thereby guarantees that acquired knowledge and skills are being transferred into the daily routine. Process assistance is split into a preparatory workshop on choosing a mentor and three seminars – at the beginning, middle and end of the mentoring year. It also includes accompanying training units for the mentors.
The Leibniz Mentoring programme is aimed at female scholars in the post-doctoral orientation and consolidation phase who have set their sights on a leadership position in academia or in occupational fields that require a scientific qualification. They must work for a Leibniz Institute. Eligibility criteria are excellent achievements in research and the manifest goal of acquiring a leadership position.
The core of the mentoring partnership consists of personal exchanges between mentee and mentor which ideally should take place three or four times over the course of the mentoring year. A continuation of the tandem relationship after the end of the programme’s run is the desired result. Both mentees and mentors receive written guidelines on mentoring by the project coordinator. A mentee and her mentor must be members of different institutes (cross-mentoring). All conversations taking place in the context of the mentoring partnership are confidential.