The Development of the Vitae Researcher Development Framework
Evolving the Vitae Researcher Development Framework – Vitae RDF 2025
In 2009, Vitae developed the Vitae RDF in response to calls to solidify the career of ‘researcher’ into a recognised profession and to ultimately benefit researchers in their professional development.
Over the year 2023 –2024, a new working group has been formed to update and revise the Vitae RDF, to enhance its domain categories and descriptors.
This has been done through a process of consulting researchers, and key figures that work with them, to enable their experiences and perspectives to shape the updated Vitae RDF.
Read more about the progress of the Vitae RDF update: Evolving the Researcher Development Framework: Update from the Vitae Community Working Group.
What are some of the updates made to the refreshed Vitae RDF for 2025?
- Updates to language and content related to such key themes as: wellbeing and mental health; EDI; open research; digital innovation and skills; interdisciplinarity and environmental sustainability
- Focus on the accessibility of the framework and the user experience
- Streamlining of some descriptors for ease of use
- Placing the researcher at the centre of the framework, and thereby making the individual the entry point to the framework
- Emphasising the importance of teams and team working to the research endeavour
Timeline for the Vitae RDF 2025 rollout
We will update this page and the timeline below with further events and resources as they become available.
If you have questions about the transition to the Vitae RDF 2025, please email learning.development@vitae.ac.uk
February 2025
The Vitae RDF 2025 will initially be launched at an online event open to those from Vitae member institutions on 12 Feb 2025.
February 2025 – August 2025
There will then be a transition period where support will be available to institutions in moving across to the Vitae RDF 2025, with resources and peer support also available.
June 2025
We will run an online event, open to all, on transitioning to the Vitae RDF 2025.
September 2025
We will then look to fully launch the Vitae RDF 2025 to researchers and the wider sector in September 2025 in time for the 2025/26 academic year
A brief history of the Vitae RDF
In Europe, Horizon 2020 placed firmer emphasis on strengthening researcher careers and human resources management of researchers across member states. These themes are echoed across the world.
The growing requirement to establish the career of ‘researcher’ as a valued profession, is evidenced, for example by the European Charter for Researchers and Code of Conduct for the Recruitment of Researchers (2005) and the UK Concordat to Support the Career Development of Researchers (2008).
As a result, in 2009, Vitae developed the RDF for researchers, in collaboration with the higher education sector and other stakeholders.
The scope of the RDF development was to:
- present the generic descriptors common to researchers in higher education
- seek to describe characteristics of anyone conducting research in UK higher education
- contain other activities related to research that may or may not be undertaken by individual researchers within higher education
- recognise that increasingly as researchers progress through their careers they will conduct research as part of a portfolio of responsibilities in which research may or may not be the main activity
- be aspirational, yet realistic: identifying the attributes of good researchers at different phases of their development
- make no judgement about the career choices researchers make
- attempt to anticipate how the research environment may change through to 2020
- avoid any link to performance appraisal, national or local role profiles, job evaluation exercises or academic promotion procedures.
The Framework is grounded in research through interviews and focus groups with over 100 researchers and additional expertise from specialists and stakeholders. Within an iterative, interpretive design, the methods used in the project were: semi-structured interviews with researchers, focus groups, literature reviews, sector wide consultations, specialist reviews and advice and expert panel review. The interview data were analysed using a phenomenographic approach and the results were validated by an external independent advisory group of expert, established researchers.
The resulting Framework captures the knowledge, behaviours and attributes that the higher education sector, overall, has identified as significant for researchers. Therefore the core of the Framework has been determined and defined by the research profession and validated by stakeholders, such as employers and funders.
You can read more about the methodology used to develop the Vitae RDF in the RDF Vitae methodology report.