Early Career Researchers Workshop

Read the workshop highlights here.

11:00 - 11:05 Welcome and Introduction

11:05 - 12:30 Session 1: Navigating a Research Career in Academia

Presentations dedicated to insights that would support PhD Students and Postdocs in identifying the best practices in obtaining the skills, networks and tools to navigate the different stages of their career development – from a PhD position, through post-doctoral research to an assistant professor position.

Featured talks:

• "A PhD is not Enough: How to Prepare for a Career in Academia" by Dimka Karastoyanova, University of Groningen (the Netherlands) [Slides]
• "Eight Reading Suggestions for Young Scientists: A Personal Recommendation" by Marco Aiello, University of Stuttgart (Germany) [Slides] 
• "On the Importance of Interdisciplinary Research for Informatics Careers" by Gregor Engels, Paderborn University (Germany) [Slides]

12:30 - 14:00 Lunch

14:00 - 16:00 Session 2: What makes a PhD Project a Success?

Several presentations were given by recent PhD graduates, who shared their insights and experience about their PhD projects, what kind of support they had received from their supervisors, organization, support activities, and peer network, and what had helped them navigate through the ups and downs of a PhD trajectory. At the end of the session, a plenary discussion with the presenters took place.

Featured Talks by 2024 Best Dissertation Award Finalists:

• Tim Quatmann, PhD graduate from RWTH Aachen University (Germany) [Slides]
  Currently: Tenured Lecturer, RWTH Aachen University (Germany)
• Tobias Röddiger, PhD graduate from Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (Germany)
  Currently: Research Group Leader, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (Germany)
• Michael Sammler, PhD graduate from Saarland University and Max Planck Institute for Software Systems (Germany) [Slides]
  Currently: Post-Doc, ETH Zurich (Switzerland)

16:00 - 16:30 Coffee break

16:30 -18:00 Session 3: ECSS Doctoral Symposium

The Doctoral Symposium (DS) was a forum of exchange organized to encourage Informatics PhD students to present their early work and exchange ideas with other researchers in an interdisciplinary discussion. Senior researchers provided feedback on the work and advice on organizing and managing research projects. The DS was also a place to establish a social network with the peers from different fields of Informatics research. In addition, there was an opportunity to engage with industry participants interested in this domain.

We encouraged submissions from PhD students at an early stage of their research project, i.e., typically in their first or second year. The choice of research methodology depends on the Informatics field that is at the focus of the PhD project and using a variety of research methodologies from other fields, including design and behavioural science methodologies, was encouraged.

A submission to the DS should clearly describe the motivation, goals, expected results and the research approach taken. Participants were expected to actively discuss their work by reading each other's work prior to the Symposium, giving a presentation at the Symposium, debating together, and listening to senior researchers' feedback.

19:00 - 22:00 Welcome Cocktail including the Poster Session

To participate at the DS, students should submit a paper of 6 pages (including references) that should cover the following aspects:

• The context and goal of the research;
• The scientific problem addressed in the research project. This problem must be justified or substantiated by means of observations from practice, case studies, observations from the business practice, and can be further refined in terms of research questions and hypotheses;
• Earlier works that have addressed the same or similar problems. In particular, explanations why the problem is not yet solved (i.e. limitations, open issues and controversies) should be underlined;
• The proposed approach and the research methodology followed to address the problem at hand;
• The expected results, and any result that has already been obtained so far;
• A plan for the evaluation/validation of results;
• Scientific and/or Societal impact expected.

• Papers should be written in English, following Springer LNBIP style - including all text, references, appendices, and figures.
• For formatting instructions and templates, see the Springer webpage. All submissions must be made in PDF format.

Only submissions from PhD students will be considered for the DS. All submissions made for the DS will be automatically considered for an in-person presentation in the poster session.

Submit via "PDWECR2024" EasyChair: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=pdwecr2024

Submissions not conforming to our guidelines will be rejected without consideration.

All submissions made for the DS will be automatically considered for an in-person presentation in the poster session. If you wish to be considered for the poster session only:

• submit via "PDWECR2024" EasyChair: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=pdwecr2024
• choose the option "Poster Session" in the part "Other Information and Files" at the bottom of the EasyChair form,
• provide the title and abstract,
• and if already available, upload the poster in PDF format.

Those with accepted ECRWS poster submissions are required to participate in the ECRWS, and may be requested to submit additional information to be considered for the publication of post-proceedings. 

Submissions not conforming to our guidelines will be rejected without consideration.

*A limited number of slots are reserved for the Poster Session's Research Showcase, which is open to non-PhD students. Check here for separate submission guidelines.

Papers will be evaluated by at least three members of the DS Committee using the following criteria:

• technical quality, clarity, soundness, precision, novelty and adequacy of the problem statement, related work, self-contained and feasible method description, realistic expected results and sensible evaluation plan.
• overall quality.

Please note that all accepted DS papers will be invited to publish their work in post-proceedings (more details to be announced soon) and will be accepted for in-person presentation in the ECSS 2024 poster session. The best papers will be invited for in-person presentation during the DS session of the ECR Workshop at ECSS 2024.

All DS and poster session applicants will be notified of their submission results individually.