International PhDs

Are you an international PhD candidate, here to expand your horizon and crush those experiments? Welcome to the Netherlands (and my site)! I hope you have succesfully acclimated to the Dutch culture, nature and weather. If you are (still) struggling in any way or are interested in personal development, please feel free to contact me.

First of all, my apologies for this site being Dutch-only. Dutch is my native language and I feel more comfortable writing in this language, specifically when expressing my feelings about myself (as this site is a reflection of my personality). Hopefully Google translate functions well enough and you are able to get some intel on me that way. However, my conversational English is pretty good and I am available as a coach for international PhD students.

What can I do for you? Examples of coaching topics are energy management, burnout prevention, discovering your talents and drive or changing persistent patterns of behaviour or unhelpful patterns of communication. My main goal is to help you feel more enthousiastic and more confident during your PhD.

As an international PhD candidate, you might encounter specific issues: not having family and friends nearby, navigating cultural differences in the workplace, difficulties in finding a place to live… In most universities and cities, there are possibilities for international (PhD) students to meet up and for instance get a buddy or join activities aimed specifically at your ‘target group’. Please make use of this wherever you can! It is important to feel part of a community (hopefully, your research group will make you feel at home as well).

If you feel like this is not enough, you need someone to talk to or confide in, or are enthousiastic about discovering yourself: let me know. Coaching in a language that is not your own might have its challenges. Chances are you will recognize this; especially communicating emotions in your non-native language can be tricky (although we are so used to English movies and music that in some cases it might actually be easier 😉). In science we use English as a lingua franca, and we can communicate well – missing some subtleties from our native language, but being able to understand each other nonetheless. This should be the case in coaching as well.

We can always get a virtual coffee to get to know each other, so please contact me via  info@annemarieweerman.nl or the contact form for a free introductory meeting. Talk to you soon!