Building the 'How' of Science: A MonksHillLab Skill Development Session Series for Early-Career Researchers

This living document provides a framework for skill development sessions for early-career researchers (ECR). The sessions focus on competencies in communication, problem-solving, and project ownership within academic research. Each session is based on "Engagement Starter Tasks"—practical scenarios that simulate research challenges. Each starter task is followed by a debrief that introduces a conceptual framework for direct application. This living document contains complete guides for the first following sessions:

1.) "Expectations," which defines collaborative partnerships

2.) "Supervisory Meetings," which outlines a structured approach for research discussions.

3.) "Scientific Writing," which outlines the core need of unambigious, clear scientific communication.

4.) "Scientific Figures," which focuses on creating clear, self-explanatory, and visually coherent figures that effectively communicate scientific results.

The living document will be updated with additional sessions in the future versions. The next version will add sessions on "Scientific presentations", "Work Organization" and "Research Proposal Writing".