Kristiania University College is offering up to five fully funded PhD fellowships in Communication and Leadership for a fixed-term period of three (3) years beginning in August 2025. During this time, the successful applicant will be employed at Kristiania University College and included in a team of researchers with ambitious plans to further develop research and pedagogical activities at the university college. We invite applicants to apply with research proposals in a broad range of research areas and encourage everyone to examine the different areas here.
About Kristiania University College
Kristiania University College is Norway’s largest independent comprehensive university college with 18,000 students. Our mission is to strongly contribute to Norway’s social and economic development through problem-driven and applied knowledge development and dissemination, in close cooperation with the public and private sectors. Students can choose from a large portfolio of study programmes at the bachelor’s and master’s levels that are offered in Oslo, Bergen and online. Among these are study programmes in management, organization, marketing, communication, computer science, information technology, health sciences, innovation, and creative arts. The two PhD programmes at Kristiania University College offer advanced graduate work in most of these fields. For more information about the PhD programmes, see here.
About the positions
The PhD position is a three-year fulltime position that involves 30 ECTS credits of required course work. This is equivalent to one semester of study. The remaining time is allocated to the development and completion of an independent research project, which takes the form of a written dissertation. The three-year employment period granted to the successful candidate may be reduced if the candidate has previously been employed in a PhD position.
The successful candidate is expected to live and work in the Oslo region during the employment period and to take an active part in scholarly and social activities at Kristiania.
Description of the subject areas
The PhD program in Communication and Leadership is interdisciplinary, which means integrating Communication and Leadership to give more comprehensive perspectives. The degree of interdisciplinarity will, however, vary from PhD project to PhD project. This implies that all PhD projects will have aspects of both Communication and Leadership but may address mainly the discipline of Communication, mainly the discipline of Leadership or more fully integrating the two disciplines with a higher degree of interdisciplinary approach. Communication and Leadership can also be combined with other fields such as Health leadership and communication, leadership and communication with the arts etc.
The successful candidate will take part in research groups within relevant areas at Kristiania, and applicants must enclose a project description with topics or research questions within one or more of the research areas outlined here.
For more information about Kristiania’s research groups see here.
Applicants are encouraged to contact relevant research groups at Kristiania for more information.
Qualifications and personal qualities
Required qualifications:
- Master’s degree (120 ECTS or equivalent) in a relevant subject area with a grade B or better on the master’s thesis and for the master’s degree in total. The master’s thesis must be a minimum of 30 ECTS or equivalent. The relevance of the subject areas is dependent on the type of project candidates propose.
- Relevant 180 ECTS bachelor’s degree
- Proficiency in both written and spoken English (interviews, and all communication will be in English)
- Strong methodological skills
Personal qualities:
- Curiosity and a strong motivation to carry out independent research
- Good communication and cooperation skills
- Excellent analytical skills
- The ability, desire and capacity to work independently, systematically, and purposefully
- Orientation toward the completion of projects and the attainment of goals
Emphasis will be placed on personal suitability for the position.
Your application must include:
- A research proposal of maximum 10 pages. All applicants are required to follow Kristiania’s template for PhD research proposals
- A short cover letter (maximum 2 pages), describing the applicant’s qualifications, motivation, and research interests.
- Official Transcripts and Diplomas in a Scandinavian or English language. If the original is in another language than these, then both the original and an English translation should be submitted.
- Curriculum Vitae
- Master’s thesis
- Any relevant publications
- The names and contact information of two reference persons. (One should preferably be the main supervisor/advisor of your master’s thesis.)