BACKGROUND: Employee training needs assessment (TNA) is a critical human resource management function for academicians in both public and private organizations. It also often considered the most important step among the stages of training. OBJECTIVE: This paper attempts to highlight an employee training needs assessment for PhD candidates among academicians in Malaysian public universities. METHODS: Qualitative face to face in-depth interviews were conducted with twenty one lecturers from seven public universities in Malaysia. All of them were furthering their PhD studies in the field of Social Science. A framework analysis was conducted by using the ATLAS.ti software version 7. RESULTS: The researchers identified eleven major themes related to an employee training needs assessment for a PhD candidate; the training of (1) research methodology, (2) supervision, (3) writing and publishing journals, (4) procedural management, (5) sharing experience, (6) financial, (7) motivation, (8) religious knowledge, (9) spouse training, (10) health, and (11) language courses.The implication of this study showed that few of the training aspects above were needed and suggested by them, especially before they pursued their doctorate studies. CONCLUSION: An employee training needs assessment for PhD candidates is an important strategy to support them becoming more confident and highly committed to succeed. This will boost their concern to adopt appropriate PhD training needed in order to minimize the duration of study delay. Several recommendation have also been discussed in this research.