The Programme Shaping the Future (PSF) runs throughout the five-year probationary period of new Assistant Professors and Researchers at Técnico, with the aim of ensuring and conveying:

• full integration into the academic life of the Department and Técnico
• a set of ethical values and good institutional practices
• a strategic perspective on career development that allows them to
  * maximize their potential as members of a higher education institution
  * align their career development plan with Técnico’s strategic objectives and mission
  * guarantee all the conditions for the success of their probationary period.

The PSF monitors and develops the careers of the Assistant Professors and Researchers of Técnico in order to:

• promote their academic and scientific independence
• value original and relevant contributions from a scientific, pedagogical, and societal perspective
• stimulate a commitment to excellence in teaching
• promote national and international recognition of the activities carried out
• create conditions for success in attracting competitive funding
• promote the leadership of scientific teams
• identify potential for future management/coordination roles

The PSF is organized around four main pillars

• Mentoring and monitoring
• Startup funds
• Training
• Communication

Throughout the probationary period, a set of policies are designed for reviewing the activities carried out, as well as other activities that, in a phased manner and over time, aim to support the career development of new teachers and researchers.

These activities include core training, with compulsory participation in the first year of the contract, mentoring, with the assignment of a mentor chosen from among teachers and researchers who are good role-models for the mentees, and classroom support and monitoring (including lectures observation and follow-up meetings), which may give rise to complementary training activities suggested by the Academic Development Unit team. Shaping the Future also provides financial support from startup funds to ensure minimum installation conditions, a partial sabbatical abroad, and the implementation of specific scientific-pedagogical projects.

The PSF assumes and defends several guiding principles, which must be followed by the management bodies of Técnico and its organizational units, with regard to the service of Assistant Professors and Researchers in their probationary period

• assignment of teaching duties that minimizes the dispersion of taught courses, with a significant component in more advanced courses that are closer to their scientific experience, and that facilitates interaction with potential second and third cycle students;
• for the purposes of distributing teaching duties, and until the first evaluation of performance, assignment of an “Excellent” rating with a corresponding reduction in the annual teaching load;
• no assignment of management or coordination positions;
• authorization of a partial sabbatical (up to six months) abroad, ideally to be taken by the seventh semester after hiring.