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This article documents the experiences of three early career academics trying to establish a network of early career academics (ECAs) in a middle-ranked university in Australia. The changing context of academia means that ECAs face considerable challenges in understanding and negotiating effective career paths. Some of the issues encountered include: insecure employment arrangements; unclear and shifting expectations; heavy workloads and competing demands; and conflicting experiences around the collegiate culture of academia. As research and teaching institutions, universities must ensure the ongoing development of new academics. While there is a growing interest in exploring the issues confronted by new academics, much remains to be done to better understand, and improve, the pathways of academic development.

To this end [the authors reflect on their] efforts to establish an ECA network that aimed to enhance professional development, facilitate an improved research culture and establish an informal peer support network. [This was done] through establishing an online presence for sharing information, hosting a series of professional development seminars and hosting a two and a half day writing retreat. [The authors'] experiences suggest that, while efforts to enhance the capacity of ECAs are worthwhile, the very same pressures that [their] network was attempting to address were simultaneously creating barriers to ECA involvement in the network and its activities.

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