Ralf Künster works as a data-manager at the Social Science Research Center Berlin (WZB), partly in the department “Skill Formation and Labor Market”. In part, he also works for the NEPS unit, stage 6, “Vocational Training and Transition into the Labor Market” since 2007. He received his training in sociology at the Free University Berlin (1994) and made an additional training as an application developer at the Siemens-Nixdorf Training Center (1996-1997). For more than 10 years (1994-1995, 1998-2007), Ralf Künster worked as a data-manager for the “German Life History Study” at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development Berlin (MPIB). He developed innovative computer assisted tools for collecting, editing and exploring life course- and panel-data. These tools were used in different longitudinal surveys like the “German Life History Study” (MPIB), the Swiss panel-survey “Cocon, Competence and Context“ (Jacobs Center Zurich), the survey “ALWA, Arbeiten und Lernen im Wandel” (Institute for Employment Research, Nuremberg) and the project “Dual careers: The entwined life courses of academic couples” (WZB).