I am currently writing the final chapters of my thesis in the UK. I am from India and there is a offer of joining a private university with the vision to expand its engineering teaching quality and research infrastructure. However, since it is the early days, there is not much in terms of infrastructure. I believe that teaching and research feed each other if they are done in balance. I have done a lot of TA ship over my time as a PhD student and this has made me interested in doing more teaching.However, I also understand that being away from research may be jeopardising. On one hand I am thinking doing a full time assistant lectureship will give me first hand experience in doing independent teaching, course development, administration, writing grant proposal and perhaps some research, I fear that it may impair my chances of pursuing research heavy roles in future if I change my mind.Do you think I may be accepted in research heavy jobs if I spent a year or two in a teaching heavy job?

Any comment will be gratefully appreciated! Shrijit

Research heavy jobs often include some element of teaching, even small, so I think teaching experience would be beneficial for getting such a job rather than detrimental.

My husband is a research fellow. He does a tiny amount of teaching. But his lack of teaching experience is a block to him moving onto a lectureship. But he's happy with his research.

I think the way things are going (i.e. student satisfaction surveys) I think teaching skills are going to be more and more valued so I don't think doing a year or two teaching is a bad thing. I do think though, that you should make sure, during that time that you push out at least 1-2 papers to demonstrate that you're still research active.