What Will a PhD Look Like in the Future? Perspectives on Emerging Trends in Sustainability Doctoral Programs in a Time of Disruption

Abstract

In this perspective paper, we aim to provide insights that can help academic institutions and transdisciplinary doctoral programs position themselves within a changing research landscape and prepare for future disruption. We are a group of eight first-year, transdisciplinary doctoral students at the University of Waterloo, representing diverse disciplinary perspectives and gender and cultural experiences. In the process of orienting ourselves as sustainability researchers, we conducted collaborative workshops to critically examine our intellectual and disciplinary positionality by reflecting on the question: What will a PhD look like in the future? Amid this process, the coronavirus pandemic happened, causing a major disruption to our research activity and personal lives. What began as a reflective process on doctoral research shifted toward a more substantive and far reaching discussion about disruption and academia. Through our workshops we identified four emerging trends in the domain of sustainability scholarship that are shaping the future of the academic experience: shifts from disciplinarity to transdisciplinarity; researchers as knowledge holders to knowledge brokers; researcher competencies as bounded to boundary-less; and metrics of success as citation impact to societal impact. We also identified three broad trends in the context of academia that were accelerated by the coronavirus pandemic and may be exacerbated by future disruptions: (1) increasing virtualization of research and teaching; (2) increasing need for flexibility of academic structures and processes; and (3) growing economic and socio-political uncertainty. We offer concrete recommendations that encourage doctoral students and programs to play a more fundamental role in solving complex challenges in a disrupted academic and social landscape. We conclude with our vision of the PhD student of the future as one who thrives in transdisciplinary settings, links society and science through knowledge brokering, spans boundaries between multiple epistemologies to communicate and collaborate through uncertainty, and prioritizes societal impact.

Keywords

transdisciplinarity knowledge mobilization doctoral program sustainability boundary spanner

Introduction

We are a group of eight first-year doctoral students in the School of Environment, Resources and Sustainability (SERS) at the University of Waterloo (Canada). We represent a wide range of disciplinary perspectives, as well as diverse gender and cultural experiences. Our four-year doctoral program in Social and Ecological Sustainability is positioned within a transdisciplinary (TD) research paradigm (i.e., one that engages multiple disciplinary perspectives, as well as decision makers and communities), alongside numerous other institutions globally.

In the process of orienting ourselves as doctoral researchers, and in the context of a required course on preparing for our qualifying exam, we participated in collaborative workshops that required us to examine our intellectual and disciplinary positionality by reflecting on the question: What will a PhD look like in the future? We reflected on the benefits and challenges of engaging in doctoral research, considered the potential contributions to knowledge from our research, and critically explored our own research foundations. This was an engaging and important process — and then the coronavirus pandemic hit in March 2020.

The pandemic introduced a major disruption to our research activities and personal lives, prompting further reflections on the implications of disruption on future doctoral students. What had started as a reflective process about doctoral research transitioned into a conversation that was more substantive, far reaching, and uncertain. We expanded our inquiry to ask what the coronavirus pandemic could tell us about the PhD of the future through our individual and collective experiences navigating the pandemic.

As a group of young scholars, we had already recognized that our research aspirations were at times at odds with the structure and expectations of a conventional PhD program. This realization had prompted us to reflect on the changing role and nature of doctoral work in the domain of sustainability programs. In recent decades, the role of universities has been changing. University researchers are increasingly collaborating with government, industry, and civil society to solve complex sustainability challenges, including those related to the climate crisis and biodiversity loss (Ankrah and Al-Tabbaa 2015; Leydesdorff and Etzkowitz 1996). Within universities, the rigid disciplinary silos that have historically defined traditional campuses are softening, making room for more creative and outward-facing research institutions (Brown 2018).

The relationship between society and academia is increasingly reciprocal as science responds to societal demands and society is shaped by scientific findings, motivating greater attention towards knowledge co-production and the practical application of research (Cash et al. 2006; Lemos and Morehouse 2005; Ostrom 1996; Wyborn 2019). This interdependence is evident in the societal response to a disruption like the coronavirus pandemic, as academic institutions have responded quickly by adapting research agendas and altering means of course delivery. In addition to the systemic shifts in academia already underway, the job market for PhD holders is changing. For instance, the Conference Board of Canada has noted that only one in five PhD students in Canada will find themselves in a tenure-track position (Edge and Munro 2015). Even within our own cohort, only one of us listed academia as their top career choice post-graduation. The pandemic and further disruptions (e.g., climate change, global market trends) are compounding uncertainty regarding the role of the PhD holder in society.

As we discussed the rapidly unfolding events, we identified four emerging trends within the domain of sustainability doctoral programs that we believe hold promise for addressing complex sustainability challenges and are already beginning to shape the future of doctoral education. These trends include shifts from: disciplinarity to transdisciplinarity; researchers as knowledge holders to knowledge brokers; researcher competencies as bounded to boundary-less; and metrics of success defined by citation impact to societal impact. Further, we identified three broad trends in the context of academia (i.e., surrounding the domain of sustainability scholarship) that have been accelerated by the coronavirus pandemic and may be exacerbated by both expected and unexpected future disruptions (e.g., more frequent and significant climatic change events). These trends include: (1) increasing virtualization of research and teaching, (2) increasing requirements for flexibility of academic structures and processes, and (3) growing economic and socio-political uncertainty. We acknowledge that these pandemic-related trends may accelerate or impede the four emerging trends in different ways, and manifestations of these trends may prove to be short-term adaptations with uncertain long-term implications.

As early-career doctoral students, our aim in this perspective paper is to provide cross-scale insights that can help academic institutions offering TD doctoral programs to better prepare PhD students to thrive in a changing research landscape. To do so, we do not use emerging trends in the domain of sustainability scholarship to project multiple, plausible future scenarios for the future of doctoral research. Rather, we address the evidence of—and the normative reasons to encourage—emerging trends toward one plausible future scenario that we believe may hold greater prominence in the future. This emerging scenario aligns with the type of doctoral education and future career we envision for ourselves: a PhD defined by transdisciplinarity, knowledge brokering, boundary spanning, and societal impact. We also aim to help future sustainability doctoral programs and students position themselves to be more resilient to future disruptions as they navigate uncertainty over the coming decades, including sustainability programs that do not identify as TD. To do so, we reflect on the impact of pandemic-related trends in the context of academia on this emerging scenario. We do not imply that our perspective is based on a detailed survey of graduate experience; our perspectives here are more personal. Further, we do not claim to render a detailed picture of the “PhD of the future” (e.g., to the year 2050), but rather use this concept as a flexible notion to guide discussions. In section 2 we introduce the themes that structured our reflections. In section 3 we present our insights, and in the conclusion, we present our vision of the PhD of the future.

Emerging Trends and Currents in the PhD of the Future

The insights and perspectives offered here were generated in workshops that took place from January to May of 2020 during a core doctoral course on advanced TD research methods. We discussed topics including the nature of transdisciplinarity, transdisciplinarity in our own research, research impact, and knowledge mobilization. As noted above, four emerging trends in the domain of sustainability scholarship came from these structured conversations.

The first emerging trend is the move from disciplinarity to transdisciplinarity, which is a research paradigm that involves multi-stakeholder participation to answer socially relevant questions (Brandt et al. 2013; Lang et al. 2012; Pohl 2010). The second trend is the move from academics as experts or knowledge holders to academics as knowledge brokers. Knowledge brokers are individuals who translate and tailor knowledge to specific contexts and actors within an iterative and bi-directional process (Hering 2015). Under this emerging trend we explored the rise in importance of knowledge mobilization, or the dissemination, transfer, and translation of knowledge with an emphasis on influencing decision-making practices (Levin 2008). The third trend is a shift in the competencies required of doctoral researchers. We define this trend as a shift from competencies that were bounded by the limited scope of expertise and impact expected of doctoral students, to competencies that are boundary-less as students learn to span disciplines and organizations. For example, we discussed that rather than simply adopting a single epistemology, future PhDs may need to respectfully navigate between multiple ways of knowing. The fourth trend that emerged is the shift from metrics of success for doctoral researchers defined by academic publications and citations, to metrics of success focused on societal impact and exposure.

During a virtual workshop we discussed the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on our own experiences as doctoral students and the changes we were observing in the broader academic landscape. We summarize the impacts in three trends (see Table 1) as follows: increasing virtualization of research and education, a requirement for growing flexibility in academic processes and structures, and an increasingly uncertain economic and socio-political context for academia. These trends are occurring broadly and affect many academic programs, shifting the context of the domain of sustainability doctoral programs as well.

Table 1.

Broad Trends in the Context of Academia Resulting From Disruption.

Trend in the context	Description
Virtualization	Moving previously in person activities into an online environment, including thesis defenses, comprehensive examinations, committee meetings, and classes.
Flexibility	Changing previously rigid rules, such as moving thesis defenses from in-person to online and extending timelines for research.
Uncertainty	Managing increasing ambiguity of the future economic and social structures that interact with knowledge production, including research agendas, institutional collaborations, and funding arrangements.

The first trend is the move towards virtualization, which we define as shifting previously in-person activities into an online or remote environment. In practice this means that important doctoral milestones, such as comprehensive examinations and thesis defenses, have been quickly moved online, in many cases for the first time. The University of Waterloo and many universities around the world moved all classes online including field courses, which has accelerated investment in virtual learning and remote research collaboration. The capacity for professors and students to use remote communication software has increased dramatically, proving that virtualization is not only possible but, in our experience, sometimes preferred over in-person spaces. However, the broader long-term impacts of this shift are undetermined (e.g., cognitive and relational dimensions of the educational experience). For example, doctoral training for TD researchers relies on engaging with groups outside of academia, from policymakers and the private sector to community members, which may be negatively impacted by virtualization. Further, while online access has increased for some, virtualization may present additional barriers for others, such as students who have challenges using technology or live in areas with limited internet access.

Along with virtualization has come an increase in flexibility of the academic processes and structures that define a PhD program. The oral thesis defense and comprehensive examination are long-standing academic requirements and often ceremonial rites of passage for PhD students. The coronavirus pandemic has demonstrated that these do not necessarily need to be in-person, and that universities may consider keeping new, more flexible policies in place in once in-person engagements resume. We recognize that some of the changes from the coronavirus pandemic may be temporary, but some may last into the future. Furthermore, the response to the pandemic provides an indication of how academic institutions may respond to future disruptions like catastrophic climate change. In our personal experience, instructors have also been more flexible with course deadlines and requirements to accommodate practical and health-related concerns. While many of the specific policy changes driven by the pandemic may be temporary, we believe that the notion of flexibility in previously rigid institutional requirements and structures may remain in some form as academia re-organizes post-pandemic. Further, this greater flexibility is not only required to accommodate disruptions like the coronavirus pandemic but may also be demanded by the greater uncertainty in future economic and governance systems that support academia.

The third trend is continued (and exacerbated) economic, social, political, and environmental uncertainty as the effects of climate change and the pandemic reverberate and future disruptions further shift the status quo. Knowledge production in an increasingly uncertain world could face dual forces: shifting contexts and risk (Beck et al. 1992) may limit long-term research, but the desire to understand complexity may require longer-term investment in collaborative TD research. More dramatically, a highly uncertain future may begin to overturn long-standing assumptions regarding doctoral education, such as that PhD programs nominally last four years, focus on one thesis, have a funding component, involve original field or lab research, and confer a degree of esteem. How might these standard features of doctoral research be re-imagined in the face of continuing or yet unexpected disruptions?

A Synthesis of Trends

From Disciplinarity to Transdisciplinarity

During our workshops, we discussed that with limited time and resources to address a host of complex global issues, there is a need to find creative ways of doing purpose-driven research that moves beyond conventional approaches. A growing number of doctoral programs with an applied focus, including sustainability, are adopting the language and practices of TD research, which aims to address complex challenges like climate change, inequality, and environmental degradation. This emerging trend is evident in the growing number of TD programs like our own PhD in Social and Ecological Sustainability at the University of Waterloo. In addition, a Scopus search of “transdisciplinary” and “transdisciplinarity” reveals a steady increase in publications from 2010 (350 publications) to 2019 (1008 publications).

We believe that the emerging trend toward TD research offers opportunities to address urgent sustainability problems. TD research moves beyond simple disciplinary collaboration to address socially relevant problems by uniting diverse knowledge systems, such as scientific and Indigenous knowledge, integrating different methodologies, and by adopting participatory processes that involve local actors (Brandt et al. 2013; Lang et al. 2012; Pohl 2010). TD research evolved alongside other paradigms like mode 2 research and post-normal science that offer different perspectives on how research can become socially distributed and appropriate for uncertain, high stakes decisions (Funtowicz and Ravetz 1993; Nowotny et al. 2003). Trends toward TD research may eventually merge with parallel trends toward the professionalization and globalization of doctorate degrees that are being discussed in circles adjacent to the sustainability field (Nerad and Heggelund 2011).

The trend toward more widespread use and legitimization of TD research faces challenges, but the pandemic has highlighted the value of its flexibility and problem-orientation. TD research can be tenuous due to challenges integrating knowledge, methods, and scopes that fall beyond traditional disciplinary boundaries (Hadorn et al. 2006). Further, the concept has been criticized for conceptual challenges and definitional issues (Hessels and Lente 2008). However, we discussed that overcoming these challenges may be necessary for academic institutions to maintain relevance in an uncertain academic future. Presently, the coronavirus pandemic has demonstrated the value of flexible academic institutions that can accommodate uncertainty, enable collaboration across disciplines, and communicate directly with diverse audiences. Future TD doctoral programs can play a role in nurturing this emerging trend by providing collaborative environments that are free of the disciplinary rigidity typical of traditional programs, providing greater flexibility for doctoral students to adapt to multiple disciplinary perspectives.

In order for TD research to emerge as more prominent in the future, there is a need to embrace diverse knowledge forms, such as Indigenous and local knowledge. However, this requires shifts within academic institutions, dominated by Western science. While challenging, we can look to history for evidence that these shifts may be possible: for centuries, our societies have established institutions to represent the needs of the people: governments, NGOs, corporations, and interest groups, among others. Not only do these institutions represent a diversity of views, but they also embody diverse sources of knowledge such as Indigenous knowledge (Sillitoe and Marzano 2009). In our deliberations, we discussed that future doctoral research will increasingly be expected to engage with these knowledge sources, meaning that future doctoral students will need to actively reflect upon their own positionality, academic freedom, intellectual property, and other normative dimensions of research (Ankrah and Al-Tabbaa 2015). The role of this diversity of “knowledges” is discussed in sections 3.2 and 3.3.

In our discussions, we agreed that TD doctoral programs of the future may address the currently high degree of mistrust directed towards archetypal academics and science, particularly among more politically conservative groups (Funk 2017; Gauchat 2012; Leiserowitz et al. 2012). In response to concerns over mistrust and to facilitate greater uptake of academic knowledge, bridges need to be built to encourage the movement of ideas, information, and results (Brandt et al. 2013; Hadorn et al. 2006). For example, researchers in our own doctoral program are increasingly adopting TD approaches to enhance communication and collaboration with communities outside academia. In our discussions we emphasized the importance of structuring future doctoral research environments with this bridge-building in mind—a factor that is especially important considering how the coronavirus pandemic has exposed the iterative, uncertain nature of the scientific process to the public domain.

Such collaboration and partnerships with external organizations and groups may also become more important as doctoral graduates increasingly stray away from traditional academic career pathways (McAlpine 2016). Acknowledging this trend, we discussed how non-academic organizations can invest in TD doctoral students following the lead of many doctoral programs in sciences and engineering, which use the university as a Petri dish to develop well-connected experts. We believe this kind of collaboration can help universities more effectively train professional researchers for a changing and uncertain future.

While we acknowledge that structure remains important for maintaining quality doctoral research, we also lamented how the rigid structures of the doctoral degree can inhibit TD research and imagined more flexible, adaptive, virtual spaces that could meet our needs. This rigidity can be particularly disadvantageous when it stifles the researcher’s ability to adapt and remain fluid across disciplines, which are competencies that may be required for future TD doctoral programs (see section 3.3). We believe that doctoral programs of the future can offer thoughtfully curated venues for creativity and collaboration. Universities have the potential to meet this growing need by developing and offering physical and virtual support systems (Acs et al. 2009). Our experience navigating the coronavirus pandemic has demonstrated opportunities for virtual collaboration and new forms of academic support that allow for greater flexibility.

In sum, the emerging trend toward transdisciplinarity showed us that universities may shift their perceived role away from institutions of disconnected knowledge production to facilitate greater trust in academic knowledge, improve collaboration, and integrate knowledge forms. We believe that a university of the future could become a more transparent scaffold of academic networks and institutional frameworks, both physical and virtual, that incubates future generations of TD researchers. Such a structure may enforce and monitor ethical research practices and create a global network by which TD research can be shared and communicated between institutions (Brandt et al. 2013; Carew and Wickson 2010). Whatever form this kind of future collaborative space for research may take, we discussed that it must be able to support several necessities of TD work: the application of methods from various disciplines, communication between stakeholders across complex networks, and a secure flow of information and ideas for knowledge exchange. Accelerated virtualization of university spaces may address many of these needs and may be required in response to the sudden shift to remote research and education during disruptions like the coronavirus pandemic. Limitations to international travel may introduce constraints for TD research specifically, due to its focus on participation and collaboration (discussed further in sections 3.2 and 3.3). However, as researchers adapt to an increasingly online environment, we expect that there may be more opportunities for virtual TD research. Future doctoral programs and the institutions that host them may embrace emerging trends in TD research, flexibility, and virtualization to solve urgent global challenges.

From Knowledge Holders to Knowledge Brokers

The link between science and policy has historically been framed as a linear process (McFadden et al. 2009). Western forms of knowledge, quantitative models and top-down governance processes have typically driven management and governance decision-making processes both in Canada and globally (Mach et al. 2020). As discussed in section 3.1, PhD programs that address societal and sustainability challenges have been transitioning toward transdisciplinarity, which aims to involve diverse epistemologies and knowledge holders to address complex problems (Tengö et al. 2014). In our reflections on the future of the PhD, we identified an emerging trend toward incorporating different types of knowledge—a trend that aligns with the emerging trend toward transdisciplinarity. We believe that nurturing this trend requires future doctoral students and doctoral programs to learn to mobilize knowledge and engage with diverse forms of knowledge (e.g., Indigenous knowledge) in ways that foster action and change.

We define knowledge mobilization as the dissemination, transfer, and translation of knowledge, with an emphasis on influencing decision-making practices (Levin 2008). Knowledge mobilization requires engagement with multiple actors—researchers, policy makers, the private sector (small and medium businesses) and civil society—in ways that contribute varied perspectives to help address problems on the ground (Bennet and Bennet 2007; Norström et al. 2020). New forms and examples of knowledge mobilization have emerged in response to changing contexts and disruptions (Fenwick and Farrell 2012; Reason and Bradbury 2006), such as the coronavirus pandemic and climate change. Therefore, we discussed the emerging trend of PhD students transitioning from the more traditional role of knowledge holder to that of knowledge broker (Bilecen and Faist 2014; Phipps and Morton 2013).

Knowledge brokers are individuals with the unique capacity to translate and tailor knowledge to specific contexts and actors, within an iterative and bidirectional research process (Hering 2015). The process of knowledge brokering is particularly relevant to TD doctoral students at present, which aims to involve stakeholders who hold different forms of knowledge in the collaborative identification of barriers, gaps, and solutions to complex problems (Armitage et al. 2011; Clark et al. 2016). However, we discussed that doctoral programs that seek to develop future knowledge brokers are also likely to be impacted in diverse ways by trends in the broader context that have been accelerated by recent disruptions like the coronavirus pandemic.

Virtualization impacts the information, relation, and dissemination of knowledge as it flows from the producer to the user (Taylor and Dunne 2011). Virtualization can be isolating (as we have experienced), but it can also be used to create a space of co-production, social learning, and innovation with activities that actively engage with members of the society who are usually at the margins of academic networks. Virtualization as a trend in doctoral research and teaching seems unlikely to disappear, providing both opportunities and challenges for TD research. The trend toward virtualization can reduce the financial burden on those who hold relevant knowledge for TD research. For example, stakeholders based in lower income countries may be able to participate in networking and knowledge exchange events, such as conferences. However, widespread virtualization also has the potential to highlight the inequities in access to internet and remote working technologies—a trend that has become increasingly apparent during the coronavirus pandemic (Corlett et al. 2020).

Through our deliberations, we discussed that the increased institutional flexibility we observed through the pandemic reveals opportunities for improved knowledge mobilization in doctoral programs. Flexibility may leave space for more intentional inclusion of different forms of knowledge and allow academic instructors and students plan for and respond to shocks. Further, greater flexibility can create opportunities for PhD students to develop competencies for effective knowledge mobilization and brokering (see section 3.3), including responsiveness to change, situational awareness, and ability to establish linkages between their research topic and context. These abilities are increasingly needed for research that is just, equitable, effective, and appropriate for diverse contexts and perspectives. We also discussed that the creation of spaces for knowledge mobilization within doctoral programs needs to be carefully designed to allow for equitable access and meaningful engagement with diverse views. Consequently, we believe that nurturing the emerging trend toward knowledge brokering within future doctoral programs requires training that goes beyond superficial adjustments toward substantive changes such as decolonizing PhD programs, questioning northern hemisphere-centric processes, and acknowledging power and privilege. To this end, we believe that future knowledge brokers will be able to reflect carefully on their positionality.

Finally, greater future uncertainty may change how a PhD of the future is achieved. Some disruptions are recurrent and can be prepared for in advance, as has been done seasonally in many places around the world (e.g., disaster risk reduction for seasonal hurricanes). The timing and frequency of other future disruptions are unknown, and yet these too are likely to shake the foundations of knowledge practices and openness to alternative types and forms of knowledge in applied doctoral research programs. Further, broader social and geopolitical changes may impact academia and thereby doctoral students—the widespread impact of globalization and the interdependencies it has created may emphasize greater multilingualism in stakeholder collaborations and de-emphasize English as the dominant academic language of the future. In sum, future doctoral programs can help researchers become knowledge brokers who generate more inclusive, collaborative, and impactful research.

From Boundary Creators to Boundary Spanners

Following the trends toward transdisciplinarity and knowledge brokering, we discussed that TD doctoral students of the future may require a more dynamic and expansive range of competencies than students today. Current and future doctoral programs contribute to this trend by nurturing the skills required to conduct meaningful TD research in a changing knowledge production landscape, as introduced in sections 3.1 and 3.2 and discussed at length in literature (e.g., Augsburg, 2014; Klein et al., 2001). We characterize these skills as those of a “boundary spanner.” This skill set includes epistemological flexibility, collaboration and communication through uncertainty, and methodological creativity. The evidence for the trend towards boundary-spanning is tied to the growth in TD research because boundary-spanning encompasses some of the fundamental skills required to conduct research that crosses disciplines and epistemologies. Such competencies require that doctoral programs move beyond the recent reorientation in literature from “PhD as a product” to the “PhD as a process,” where the final dissertation remains important but more emphasis is placed on the skills gained by the researcher through the process of completing the work (Buckley et al. 2009; Durette et al. 2016; Park 2005). Further to gaining research skills, future PhD students may need to develop certain characteristics or personality traits that align with the TD approach, such as humility and open-mindedness (Guimarães et al. 2019, Kelly et al. 2019).

From our deliberations, we concluded that future doctoral researchers aligned with the move toward transdisciplinarity and knowledge brokering may require greater epistemological flexibility, allowing them to shift between positivist and constructivist frames and embrace knowledge diversity (see section 3.2). Literature states that TD researchers require the skills to balance development of their individual expertise with a broader capacity for conducting reflexive research that integrates diverse views (Godemann 2008; Kemp and Nurius 2015). TD research also requires students to be willing to take risks (Augsburg 2014; Gibbons and Nowotny 2001; Guimarães et al. 2019), step out of one’s comfort zone and area of expertise, and acknowledge other perspectives of a problem (Giri 2002). Greater self-awareness and ability to take intellectual risks may also help students communicate to diverse audiences and meaningfully include marginalized perspectives (Wall and Shankar 2008). We discussed that such epistemological flexibility may be cultivated through greater exposure to TD research frameworks (e.g., Claudia et al. 2013) and experiential learning programs that expose students to the value of diverse ways of knowing. In addition to developing an appreciation for multiple epistemologies in a research context, we believe these programs can also help students look inward to develop a greater sense of their own positionality. Over time, this kind of doctoral training could play a role in breaking down the perceived superiority of scientific knowledge over other knowledge forms (Reed and Abernethy 2018). The pandemic has revealed the complexity of our biophysical and socio-economic systems and the gaps in current ways of understanding them. Knowledge systems that view human-nature interactions differently than Western science may provide valuable insight into the dynamics of our interconnected world (Tengö et al. 2014; Turnbull 1997). In grappling with our own doctoral projects, we also believe PhD students need training in systems thinking that allows them to envision solutions for complex problems.

Through reflecting on our own experiences, we also recognized the need for future doctoral students to be able to collaborate and communicate through uncertainty. TD research (see section 3.1) is meant to address complex problems, where diverse experts must work together towards shared aspirations and objectives (Bill and Klein 2001; McGregor 2017). Here, the need for researchers to maintain flexibility, adaptability, creativity, and inquisitiveness to collaborate through uncertainty is well recognized (Canadian Health Services Research Foundation [CHSRF] 2003). Further, TD researchers require the capacity to collaborate with and empower local actors (Brandt et al. 2013), which requires commitment, ability to build networks, mutual trust, personal chemistry, and a feeling of safety (Augsburg 2014).

The disruption of the coronavirus pandemic has offered a glimpse of how urgent social issues can emerge unexpectedly and that collaboration is crucial. Doctoral researchers may be learning to adapt their research plans to changing conditions and pursue windows of opportunity to further research agendas during times of crisis. Further, policy responses to the pandemic have exposed the contested, political nature of science through statements like “governments cannot just follow the science” (Stevens 2020), which demand transparency and meaningful collaboration. Based on our own collective experiences before and during the pandemic, we feel a need to be better prepared to respectfully elicit and synthesize diverse problem framings and to use participatory methods to engage in public discourse. These methods, such as scenario planning (Peterson et al. 2003), can help researchers navigate complex situations as different framings, values, and data types are integrated. Future doctoral students can gain exposure to these methods in action by shadowing established researchers and using these methods in their dissertation research.

Finally, our experience shows that TD doctoral students may need to exercise a high degree of methodological creativity. TD researchers are positioned to develop a combination of methodological groundedness (i.e., understanding and skillful handling of one or more methodological approaches) and epistemological agility (i.e., the ability to understand different ontological and epistemological views and perspectives across disciplines) (Haider et al. 2018). However, the concept of methodological creativity has been largely unexplored. The coronavirus pandemic has demonstrated that the emphasis on stakeholder participation in TD research is threatened by the consequences of disruption, such as decreased travel, reduced in-person interactions and limited virtual connectivity in some locations. As such, we discussed that future doctoral programs can train PhDs to design robust research and to adapt research questions and methods to opportunities and challenges associated with the disruption. Our experience shows us that future doctoral students could make contingency plans, choose strategically between in person and virtual interactions, or delegate data collection to a local collaborator in the event of future travel restrictions. In sum, opportunities exist for future doctoral programs to nurture the competencies of a boundary spanner, which we believe will be increasingly valued in a future that values transdisciplinarity, knowledge brokering, and boundary spanning.

From Academic Impact to Societal Impact and Exposure

The final emerging trend we identified is a shift in focus from academic impact to societal impact. The criteria for success for current PhD students can be grouped into two categories: program-specific requirements and general academic success. The major program-specific requirements in our PhD program include a comprehensive examination and a dissertation. The general academic success criteria revolve around publication of peer-reviewed articles, which is important in both academic and private sector careers (McGrail et al. 2006; Nicholas et al. 2017). Publication in peer-reviewed journals with high impact factors is a pertinent goal for many on the doctoral path (Archambault and Lariviere 2009). In our workshops we discussed how we think publication in journals may continue to be important, but the measures of impact may shift as doctoral education prepares students for greater societal impact.

In our workshops, we discussed that journals may maintain their primacy and relevance—at least in the near term—but that the metrics used to determine impact are changing in service of greater social impact. Currently the journal impact factor relies on citations in other peer-reviewed journals (Balandin and Stancliffe 2009) and the measure of impact most traditionally used for individual researchers is the Hirsch core, or h-index, which is calculated based on the number of citations in peer-reviewed journals (Thompson et al. 2008). Major publishers including SAGE have launched their own alternative impact metrics that consider exposure outside of peer-reviewed journals. Altmetric is a modular metric that indexes references to an article on social media platforms and popular websites like Wikipedia. We discussed that the use and validity of these metrics may continue to grow, which aligns with increasing attention to the impact of TD research and virtualization of academia. These trends may affect the priorities and skill sets required of future doctoral researchers, as discussed in section 3.3.

The current focus on impact defined by peer-reviewed paper citations encourages researchers to pursue ideas that are valuable to the field and thus get more citations (Alonso et al. 2009). However, we discussed that what is of value to a discipline of research and what is valuable to broader social issues may be two different things. In one of our workshop sessions, we observed how early career researchers with lower citation counts may have higher public profiles as compared with disciplinary stalwarts. The ascendancy of alternative metrics, like Altmetric, may encourage prioritizing research that connects to problems that also have high profiles outside of the field. The increasing flexibility in academic processes that we have witnessed during the pandemic may allow for consideration of alternative metrics in award and hiring decisions. In our deliberation, we recognized that social media, particularly platforms such as Twitter and LinkedIn, have an increasing importance in building the profiles for early career researchers, beyond journal citations. While Twitter and LinkedIn may be succeeded by other forms of social media in the future, future platforms for increased connectivity within and outside of academia have the potential to elevate the public profiles and societal impact of researchers.

Given our own experiences, there are a number of potential implications of these trends for doctoral students in the future. For example, the future metrics of success for completing a doctoral education may shift towards an increasing focus on professional skills for more collaborative, TD careers within and outside the academy. Thus, the role of a doctoral researcher may shift away from that of knowledge creation towards a role of knowledge brokering (section 3.2). While the future PhD may remain as the pinnacle qualification for researchers, many of us expect to work outside academia (Edge and Munro 2015) or as boundary spanners that unite diverse perspectives and knowledge forms. Several students in our cohort are dedicating their research to uniting diverse knowledge systems like Traditional Ecological Knowledge and scientific knowledge. Accordingly, some universities are beginning to offer professional skills workshops (Gauvreau et al. 2016) and internship options to enhance the skills of PhD graduates in the near term. For example, the University of Waterloo instituted a Professional Skills Foundations workshop series to prepare graduate students for the non-academic workplace. This trend aligns with growing practice-oriented TD research, which requires that professional skills be more tightly integrated in the academic requirements of a PhD.

One of the core academic requirements of a PhD is to make a significant contribution to knowledge. The current forms of knowledge contributions include applying and/or developing theories, models, set of principles, frameworks, as well as new approaches (including combinations of approaches) to reframing existing problems. These contributions may remain essential and continue to be of high priority in PhD programs. However, as we discussed our own experiences and aspirations as doctoral researchers, we realized that the methods in which we go about mobilizing and evaluating conventional contributions in the future may shift alongside the changing competencies expected of researchers, such as communication and collaboration. For example, there may be less emphasis on presenting papers at academic conferences and more emphasis on public presentations or social media. Moreover, in keeping with the increased connection with non-academic bodies like non-governmental organizations and corporations, the contribution to knowledge may be mediated through those bodies. Research dissemination may also be affected by the shift described above towards more high-profile research topics; the coronavirus pandemic has again highlighted the important role of experts in developing and implementing policy. Virtualization may provide more opportunities for knowledge dissemination through events, such as conferences, by becoming increasingly accessible to a wider audience. In this environment, TD research, which emphasizes collaboration and an ability to recognize positionality across multiple epistemologies, is well-suited to thrive.

Conclusion

Our objective was to reflect on accelerating trends in academia and our relationship to them as eight individuals in the initial stages of our doctoral program. We are engaged in applied sustainability research and this brings with it unique expectations and perspectives. Using the concept of the “PhD of the future” we identified four emerging trends that we believe hold promise for addressing urgent sustainability challenges and are relevant to a broad array of future doctoral students and the programs that train them. These trends were further influenced by a series of broad trends in the context of academia that were accelerated by the onset of the coronavirus pandemic.

We do not expect TD research to completely replace disciplinary work in the near future and we recognize the significant history and value of existing scholarly institutions. However, we anticipate that doctoral researchers trained to communicate and collaborate across knowledge cultures and navigate through uncertainty will be increasingly valued. The coming decades are expected to be a time of increasing complexity and rapid non-linear change that may contribute to more frequent disruptions like the coronavirus pandemic (Homer-Dixon 2011; Steffen et al. 2018). Although catastrophic disruptions are not new, the unprecedented global scale of the ongoing pandemic has directly impacted our thinking on the future of PhD programs. We have offered these insights and perspectives to aid academic PhD programs maintain or increase their relevance and resilience in this uncertain future. Following these insights, Table 2 offers our vision of the PhD of the future in which these emerging trends contribute to dramatically reshaping sustainability doctoral education.

Table 2.

Our Vision for the PhD of the Future.

Emerging trends	Vision for the PhD of the future	Near-term enabling actions for doctoral programs	Influence of pandemic-related trends
Disciplinarity to transdisciplinarity	The PhD of the future can integrate methods and knowledge systems across traditional disciplines as necessary for tackling real-world issues.	• Establish flexible institutions that allow doctoral candidates to collaborate across disciplines • Open up institutions to embrace Indigenous and local knowledge and build capacity for researchers to understand their own positionality • Build networks and “bridges” that establish trust between academic and non-academic communities with different perspectives and epistemologies • Take advantage of virtual spaces to create more transparent, networked doctoral student support systems	• Virtualization offers unique opportunities for creative, collaborative, more international TD spaces • Limitations to international travel and in-person contact threatens collaborative nature of TD research • Greater flexibility (i.e., as institutions have been forced to adapt to the ongoing pandemic) offers opportunities to introduce new forms collaboration between disciplines and stakeholders • Greater uncertainty (and the iterative nature of the scientific progress) exposed during the pandemic highlights the need for bridges across disciplines and between academia and the public to build trust
Knowledge holders to knowledge brokers	The PhD of the future moves beyond being a “knowledge holder” to become a “knowledge broker” who facilitates linkages across knowledge systems and disciplines and between science and society to equitably and collaboratively solve problems.	• Train doctoral students to serve as knowledge brokers between actors • Carefully use virtual spaces to enhance TD research and global networking where possible, while acknowledging its limitations • Pursue ambitious changes toward equity, including decolonizing PhD programs, questioning the bias toward global North scholarship, and teaching students about their positionality • Establish institutional flexibility to help doctoral students prepare for and respond to future disruptions to their research	• Virtualization offers opportunities for social learning with marginalized members of the society, but can also exacerbate inequities • Greater institutional flexibility offers opportunities to weave together different forms of knowledge and to pursue more substantive changes for equity (e.g., decolonizing doctoral programs) • Greater uncertainty may demand new, more flexible ways to complete a doctoral degree is achieved (e.g., adapting requirements)
Competencies as bounded to boundary-less	The PhD of the future is a “boundary spanner” who has the capacity to navigate between multiple epistemologies, communicate and collaborate through uncertainty, and use various methodologies creatively and effectively.	• Train doctoral students to have greater epistemological flexibility through exposure to TD frameworks, systems thinking, and their own positionality • Prepare students to communicate and collaborate through uncertainty, focusing on the ability to adapt research plans to changing conditions and pursue emerging research agendas during unexpected windows of opportunity • Develop capacities for methodological creativity that allows students to adapt to changing conditions and cater the methodology to the research problem and context	• Virtualization offers opportunities (e.g., creative methods) and challenges (e.g., lack of in-person engagement) for the collaborative nature of TD research • Greater uncertainty (e.g., disrupted ecosystems) emphasizes the importance of TD research and embracing multiple epistemologies • Greater uncertainty has demanded that institutions already started to increase capacity to adapt research plans, etc.
Metrics of success as academia impact to societal impact	The PhD of the future is motivated by metrics of success defined by societal impact and exposure, beyond traditional academic incentives.	• Prepare students to develop their academic and public profiles beyond traditional journal articles and citations, such as social media and alternative metrics • Develop professional skills for collaborative research and non-academic careers • Expand expectations for doctoral students’ contribution to knowledge to include applications and societal impact	• Virtualization aligns with greater online presence of academics (e.g., on social media) • Virtualization offers opportunities for different avenues of research dissemination that include more diverse audiences • Institutional flexibility offers opportunities to consider wider scope of factors in hiring/incentive structures (e.g., Altmetric)

We acknowledge that our vision faces numerous barriers due to the dominant norms of universities. The resources required to conduct meaningful participatory research that integrates alternative knowledge systems (e.g., Indigenous knowledge) are not always considered in conventional academic systems, which are biased toward Western science. Hiring and career advancement processes reward academic publications and citations, and these metrics do not always correlate with social impact. Existing systems also diminish the importance of knowledge mobilization that uses diverse forms of science communication, such as policy tools, blog posts, podcasts, and social media. Further, the lack of established frameworks to assess the quality of TD research creates challenges for quality control and legitimization of TD research among disciplinary peers.

We have demonstrated that doctoral programs have a role to play in a more disruptive and uncertain future characterized by complex global challenges. Future doctoral programs can help students more intentionally mobilize their knowledge beyond academia, thrive at boundaries of disciplines and knowledge systems, and contribute to collaborative, problem-oriented research.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

Thank you to Dr. Derek Armitage for guiding our initial workshops and providing substantial edits on early drafts of this paper. Thanks also to Patrick Lauriault for participating in the workshops and contributing to our ideas.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iDs

Anita Lazurko

Ella-Kari Muhl

Author Biographies

Anita Lazurko is a PhD student in Social & Ecological Sustainability at the University of Waterloo. Her research focuses on resilience, transformation, and scenarios for decision making in complex, uncertain water resource systems.

Tim Alamenciak is a PhD student in Social & Ecological Sustainability at the University of Waterloo. His research focuses on volunteer participation in ecological restoration.

Lowine Stella Hill is a PhD student in Social & Ecological Sustainability at the University of Waterloo. Her research focuses on disaster risk governance, intersectionality, power and the influence of networks in decision making.

Ella-Kari Muhl is a PhD student in Social & Ecological Sustainability at the University of Waterloo. Her research interests lie in equity, co-production of knowledge and intergrating different management models for improved, sustainable governance of marine resources.

Augustine Kwame Osei is a PhD student in Social & Ecological Sustainability at the University of Waterloo. His research focuses on soil biogeochemical processes as influenced by perennial bio energy crops on marginal lands and its impact on climate change mitigation.

Dorian Pomezanski is a PhD student in Social & Ecological Sustainability at the University of Waterloo. His research focuses on landscape ecology, herpetological conservation, and mitigation.

Kyle Schang is a PhD student in Social & Ecological Sustainability at the University of Waterloo. His research focuses on how climate change and habitat fragmentation influence tree species range expansion and distribution.

Dilruba Fatima Sharmin is a PhD student in Social & Ecological Sustainability at the University of Waterloo. Her research focuses on migration decision and its socioeconomic implications under climate change.

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