That's good advice from Wowzers. Also consider contacting local departments to see what seminar series they have which are open to external people, and start going along to get to meet people. Twitter is a good place to develop an academic network, and sometimes jobs and funding opportunities are circulated there. Look out for prizes (e.g. essay competitions) and one day courses/seminars that you could possibly attend to keep your hand in and build up your CV.

Any decent supervisor will realise you have to make ends meet while waiting for a PhD to come up.

The important thing, I'd say, is that even if working in a completely different area, try to maintain as much contact as you can with academia, whether face to face or online. It might help you network and find out about opportunities that you might not hear about otherwise.

Not as yet, I still have a few months to go. Reading stuff here and elsewhere has made me aware in advance of the challenging nature of the job hunt so I am bracing myself for that.

Even if you don't have access to a careers service, friends and colleagues can still be useful for casting an eye over your CV, especially if they're in the roles you're working towards. It doesn't mean your CV is bad, it could just be that you're not emphasising the right things, or highlighting certain things well enough. No harm in asking them!

Basically, make as much use as you can of anyone who can give pointers or advice. They may also know of some opportunities to point you towards. Most people are usually happy to help.

I agree with bewildered. But if you're still considering it, also factor into the financial calculations the 'opportunity cost' i.e. not only is there the financial cost from the tuition and your living expenses, you are also losing out on whatever salary you would be getting by doing something else instead.

Edited to add... you don't mention what your long term career plans are. If you want to be an academic engineer, then a PhD may be useful. If, however, you want to work in industry, check that a PhD would really enhance your career prospects - you may be better off without one.

Yes. Sometimes also called 'Research Fellow'.

That said, "museum jobs" are oft touted as options for art/humanities PhD grads, with (a) not many opportunities out there and (b) competition with adequately qualified people with BAs + Masters in museum studies.

I think it's right to be realistic about the job prospects post PhD, though it is worth thoroughly researching viable alternative careers.

When did you send the emails? July-Sept tends to be a difficult time to get hold of academics - as well as holidays it's conference season, supervision time for MSc students and preparation time for the start of the new academic year. So people might not be on top of their emails.

I'd caution against sending unsolicited research proposals. At best they may be ignored by busy professors; at worst your might find your ideas being pilfered.

I'm a little unsure from your post whether you have actually applied for a formal MRes programme. Usually there would be no need to approach supervisors directly in advance.

It sounds like you have a very realistic view of the job prospects from starting a PhD which is good. A lot of people embark on the path with no idea of the challenges, and are left tremendously disappointed at the other end.

Two questions -
1. Do you have a plan B? An alternative career to pursue now or later that could give you some degree of satisfaction.
2. If your desire to do a PhD in palaeontology is primarily for interest's sake (having acknowledged the limited potential for it to translate into an actual job), do you think this is something you could do part time further down the line? Plenty of people do PhD's later in life purely for their personal satisfaction, rather than as a career goal. Perhaps this might be a way to scratch that itch?

If you want to pursue a research role, then (a) is by far the most important, and this should be an urgent priority. (b) is a good addition to your CV. (c) probably won't help you if you wanted a pure research job as it might not add anything - how common are those dual roles? They might be something you have to seek out a bit later when you've established yourself a bit more. (d) Great if you want to be a lecturer, not so important for a researcher.(e) Not sure this would help you as a post doc, apart from with regard to the professional practice of a dual role if you can find one.

If research is your interest, prioritise (a). If you're happy to move away from that and more into the lecturer side of things, (d) would come into play.

I don't see why not, as long as it didn't cause you a conflict of interest, though it might be sensible to check the policies of the journals in question to be sure.