Industry track: from academia to industry

A network of talents and corporate partners

The Max Planck Society is the international flagship for German science. In its 84 Max Planck Institutes and research facilities, scientists research the foundations of the natural sciences, life sciences and humanities. Their outstanding talents, from doctoral students to institute directors, are recruited from all over the world. Around 12,500 young scientists work in the institutes throughout the year. They are exceptionally qualified, digitally fluent, with strong networks, and they successfully completed a rigorous application process. And many of them are interested in a career outside academia.

The Max Planck Society provides supports for this career ambition with its Industry Track programme. Under the umbrella of the Planck Academy, this programme offers support to doctoral students, postdocs and research group leaders who are planning a transfer from academia to industry or the public sector. To ensure that this training programme takes into account the requirements of industry and organisations, the Max Planck Society networks with partners from industry and the public sector. The programme is supported by the Stifterverband. Together with this network, the Max Planck Society designs concrete offers for personnel development with the aim of ensuring that talented researchers are ready for a transfer to industry. To this end, there are regular workshops, training courses and events both as in-person  and online formats.

Support and offers

Since July 2020, the Industry Track, in cooperation with PhDnet and PostdocNet, has offered the English-language Career Evolution Web Series, a virtual discussion group with alumni, industry partners, and coaches. The focus of the discussions is on personal experiences of career development, understanding different career fields and working in different industries.

Another element of the Industry Track is the Career Evolution Games Week, which took place virtually for the second time. This event offers interested doctoral students, postdocs and research group leaders the chance to playfully try out which skills are important when transferring from academia to business or the public sector. The Games Week also provided participants with insights into the careers and working methods of leaders at companies and their career offers.

Another component of the Industry Track, is individual counselling for people who intend to make a career change from science to business.

Finally, the Career Evolution Hub will be online from September. This virtual meeting place offers direct exchange opportunities between talents and industry partners. With this platform, Max Planck wants to contribute even more intensively to improving the permeability between the worlds of science and business.

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