From professional experience to academic research: Executive PhD intake 3 candidates begin their second year

The May 2025 intake of the Executive PhD in Private Sector Development has begun its second year. To mark the occasion, candidates returned to Maastricht for two days of on-campus workshops on writing a conference paper, research ethics, AI in research and advanced statistics.

For Pavitra Raja, who lives in Switzerland, the first year has been both challenging and intellectually stimulating. She entered the programme with questions shaped by her professional experience. Since then, she has been learning how to turn those questions into academic research.

“As an Executive PhD candidate, I think you are effectively learning to become bilingual. You understand the language of practice, and you then have to become fluent in the language of academia. Positioning an idea within existing research, developing an argument, working with theory and demonstrating a contribution. You quickly realise that professional experience gives you a valuable perspective, but you still have a lot to learn about how to turn that experience into research.”

Finding a focus
Pavitra’s research explores how organisations can develop initiatives that create positive social impact, and whether those initiatives can also generate economic or commercial value. Her interest comes from seeing both the ambition to create change and the practical challenges of securing support and sustaining an initiative.

Over the past year, her initial area of interest has developed into a more focused research programme. She is working towards a three-paper format and has a clearer sense of the question at its centre: how organisations can pursue social impact while operating within commercial realities.

Space to think and exchange ideas
The workshops offered Pavitra a chance to step back from individual papers and deadlines and consider the PhD as a whole. Conversations with fellow candidates and faculty members were equally valuable.

“Research can become quite solitary, so having people around you who can challenge an assumption, ask a different question or offer another perspective makes a real difference. There is something very productive about having someone ask, “But why?” when you have become convinced that something is obvious. It forces you to unpack your assumptions and examine your argument. For me, that is one of the real benefits of being part of an academic community. The workshops gave me both the space to think and the opportunity to test that thinking with others.”

The advanced statistics session was particularly relevant to her work. Revisiting regression analysis prompted her to reconsider the methodology for her second paper and explore a different way to address its research question.

Looking ahead to year two
For Pavitra, the second year is about moving from developing the research towards carrying it out. She plans to complete and present her first conference paper, work towards publication and progress the empirical work for her other papers.

Her advice to professionals considering an Executive PhD is to start with a question they are genuinely curious about and a clear reason for pursuing it. The journey takes time and patience, she says, especially when learning to examine familiar problems in a new way.

That exchange between professional practice and academic research is also what she has valued most so far. “A question from practice can lead to a research question, while something I learn through the research can give me a different way of looking at a practical problem. I am still learning how to build that bridge, but that dialogue between the two worlds is probably what I have valued most about the Executive PhD so far.”

Would you like to join the Executive PhD in Private Sector Development as well?
The next intake will start in September 2027 and the application window is now open. Click here for more information about the programme, the research clusters, the admission requirements and how to apply.

You can also join our Executive PhD webinar on Thursday, 26 November 2026 to learn all the details of the programme and ask us any of your questions. Click here for more information and to register.

In case of any further questions in the meantime, please don’t hesitate to contact us via msm-phdadmissions@maastrichtuniversity.nl.

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