Translational research (TR) is the movement of fundamental scientific discoveries into healthcare settings and population health policy, and parallels the goals of DOHaD research. Unfortunately, there is little guidance on how to become a translational researcher. To understand the opinions of DOHaD trainees towards TR, we conducted a workshop at the DOHaD World Congress 2022. We found that trainees were enthusiastic for their work to have translational impact, and that they feel that holistic, multidisciplinary solutions may lead to more generalisable research. However, there lacks support for TR career pathways, which may stall the execution of the long-term vision of the DOHaD agenda. We put forward recommendations for trainees to clarify their purpose in pursuing TR and for seeking relevant people and patronages to support their training paths. For mentors, training institutions, and scientific societies, we recommend developing TR-specific programmes, and implementing training opportunities, networking events, and funding to support these endeavours.

Public agency executive jobs are temporary matches of individual bureaucrats with government employers. Together, the buyers and sellers of executive labour form jobs in ways that define critical links in the policy process: the relationships between agency administrators and their elected officials. This article argues that when the executive is hired from outside, the job typically carries a mandate for significantly greater engagement with elected officials than when the executive is promoted from within an agency. Analysis of three very different types of agencies demonstrates that individuals who were hired from outside interact with their elected officials more frequently than do those who were promoted from within. These results shed new light on bureaucratic executives’ roles in the policy process, their relationships with the governments that they serve, and the theoretical significance of bureaucratic jobs as units of analysis in public policy studies.