PI Forum: Mentoring

Mentoring is something all PIs do although defining it can prove tricky. Sometimes we end up teaching our junior colleagues completely unintended things or hand down experience we did not even know we possessed. But what makes a good mentor and where does the line go between mentoring and other forms of interaction with team members? We’ll discuss all things mentoring to mark the successful completion of the first year of the Charles University Mentoring Programme, while combining the perspectives of both informal and formal mentors as well as that of a mentoring coordinator.

10. 2. 2026 od 18.30 | Skautský institut, Staroměstské náměstí

Registration

WHAT?

An informal space for meeting, networking, and sharing of experience among Principal Investigators working in Czechia, open to all those who hold an independent research group leader position in any scientific field, regardless of age, experience, institution, or nationality.

WHEN AND WHERE?

10 February 2026 from 18:30, Skautský institut na Staromáku, room Minuta (Staroměstské nám. 4/1, Praha 1 – Staré Město)

OUR GUESTS

Eva Janů

Eva works at the Rector’s Office of Charles University as a Postdoc Support Officer. She ensures that postdocs at CU have the best possible conditions for their career development. She coordinates the university’s Mentoring Programme for postdocs and prepares a range of training workshops for them.

She authored and coordinates the Charleston project, a grant scheme for newly arriving postdocs co-funded through the MSCA Cofund programme.

Jaroslav Švelch

Jaroslav is a lecturer and researcher at the Department of Media Studies at FSV UK and at the Department of Game Design at FAMU. His work focuses on the history and theory of computer games and on transformations within the gaming industry.

In 2018, he published Gaming the Iron Curtain (MIT Press), a book on the history of computer games in Czechoslovakia. His second monograph, Player vs. Monster (2023, MIT Press), explores the representation of monsters and “creatures” in computer games.

Since October 2025, he has been leading the research project GAMEINDEX, funded by an ERC Consolidator Grant. The project examines the relationship between real and virtual locations, characters, and objects in computer games and VR.

Jana Voříšková

Jana is a biologist at the Institute of Microbiology of the Czech Academy of Sciences. She leads a research team funded by a Junior STAR grant, focusing on soil microorganisms in the Arctic tundra and their role in the context of climate change.

She has also developed her scientific career abroad, completing postdoctoral stays at the University of Copenhagen, the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland (GEUS), and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California (USA).

Her long-term goal is to understand how microbial processes in soils influence the global climate and how these processes are changing as the Arctic continues to warm.

PROGRAMME

6:30–6:40 p.m.	Opening words
6:40–7:30 p.m.	Discussion Eva Janů (postdoc community officer, Charles University) Jaroslav Švelch (group leader, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University) Jana Voříšková (group leader, Institute of Microbiology, CAS) chaired by Anežka Kuzmičová (group leader, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University)
From 7:30 p.m.	Open discussion, networking, drinks and refreshments