Shafiq-Ur Rahman

I am a Professor in the Department of Urban & Regional Planning at Jahangirnagar University, Bangladesh and teaching transport planning modules both in undergraduate and postgraduate levels. I am also serving as the Chair of the Department. As a Chair, my responsibility is for overall leadership and management of the department which consists of around 250 students, 20 faculty members, and 8 support staff. 

My experience in ITS helped me a lot in the areas of designing my project/ research, managing multi tasks under pressure, attaining deadlines, working in a team of diverse people, managing my team and budget, delivering conference talks and publishing in journals for my profession. 

I chose my ITS course and the University of Leeds because ITS is the world leading institute for teaching and research in transportation, widely known around the world, and has a good reputation. 

My advice to students interested in this course and a career in transport is to visit the website of ITS to have a preliminary idea about the institute and join ITS for an excellent teaching and learning experience. If you want to develop a career in the transport sector you must take the experience from UK’s best and one of the world leading institutions. 

I did not take part in the ITS Employer Visit because before finishing my PhD I did receive a job offer from UK’s Transport Research Laboratory (TRL) and joined there as a researcher consultant. However, I would recommend you to take part in the ITS Employer Visit to secure your job. It is worth mentioning that my work and experience at ITS was definitely an added advantage for getting a position at TRL. 

The highlight of my career so far is that I became more international, I studied/researched in world-leading institutions or organisations like ITS, TRL – and now often visit in different countries for research (as visiting researcher), teaching (visiting faculty), and as a consultant. 

Certainly, you will get a lot of advice from Leeds University Career Centre. I received advice from the Career Centre before my interview at TRL and they also arranged a MOC interview conducted by an expert for my preparation. In the end, I did get my job out of my first interview, and before finishing my PhD. 

My advice to potential new ITS international students who are seeking work in the transport sector is to get work experience (e.g. internship) during your studies and do as much networking with professionals as you can during your studies. Obviously, you also need to gain quality (unique) skills and knowledge during your studies at ITS.