Category: Academic

  • Twitter – your first ten follows

    Today is Twitter’s tenth birthday so it feels timely to write a post that’s been brewing for a while. Increasingly people I meet in researcher development workshops have come around to the idea of using twitter to support their activities as a researcher, so the discussions are less “what’s the point?” and more “where do I start?”. This post will suggest ten categories of people and organisations to follow if you are struggling to find your first handholds. Clearly this is the tip of the iceberg and within a few hours of posting this I was back on adding in new names and ideas. Please continue to prompt me to put your favourites in.

    1. funders – pretty much every funder now has a twitter feed. The UK Research Councils, Leverhulme, Wellcome, Royal Society of Edinburgh, European Research Council – they are all there filling their streams with news of funding calls, opportunties to engage with them through committees and events, sharing success stories. Start with… the funder who is already supporting your research and the ones you are most likely to apply to in future.
    2. research support professionals – if you are based in a University in the UK the chances are you have access to a range of professionals to help you. Many of them kindly share their gems of wisdom openly on twitter. So even if your local office is “less than helpful”, you can still benefit from the best of the support that is out there. Start with … Phil Ward, Deputy Director of Research Services at the University of Kent (in the interests of efficiency he can also count towards category 10); Elizabeth Adams, Researcher Development lead at the University of Glasgow; Manchester PG Careers, Pat Thomson (Professor rather than researcher support, but writes often and generously on academic writing), Research Whisperer  and Sarah Blackford (Bioscience research careers specialist)
    3. academic context – as a researcher (especially if you are on a fixed-term contract) you may feel a stronger sense of connection with your research network than the institution that employs you. However, if you’re going to manage a career in academia in the longer-term it’s important to build a broader view of the academic system (if for no other reason than to be reassured that it ISN’T just you and it DOESN’T make sense). Start with… your institution (which is likely to have a number of twitter feeds – general, faculty level, department and support services), Times Higher Education, WonkHE,  Jobs.ac.uk and the LSE Impact feed.
    4. decision makers and influencers – it’s useful and interesting (if you are an HE geek) to get an insight in the decisions, experiences and reactions of senior academics and university management to the challenges and opportunities they experience. With time you will find the academics in your field or institution, often when they tweet or are mentioned at conferences. Start with… the experts and leaders in your field. Until you work out who they are try Athene Donald, Cait MacPhee and Dorothy Bishop (I was also going to suggest Philip Moriarty, but he’s decided to quit twitter. A loss.)
    5. communities – although not strictly speaking individuals accounts, there are a number of communities that are easy to find and connect with on twitter. These are associated with “hashtags” which are basically labels that are tied to tweets so that people can find them. Start with… #AcWri (academic writing),  #PhDChat and #ECRChat.
    6. experts and specialists – on a similar theme to the research support professionals, there are also people with expertise in a range of subjects which relate to academia. Some are, like me, consultants who provide services to institutions, others are experts in related fields. Start with…  Fast Track Impact, James Hayton, Daniel Soule, Andrew Scott and Andrew Derrington. (Other researcher developer accounts are available… Ahem.)
    7. the latest thing – in the same way that a topic or event becomes the talk of the department from time to time, you also get academic trends on twitter. As your account becomes active and the twitterbots start to read your mind you’ll see these appear in a bar on the LHS of your feed, but there are also sites and accounts that tend to retweet these. Be aware that during conferences in your field people have a tendency to tweet the highlights. This can be a great way to spot people with similar research interests, but can get annoying – there’s a “mute” feature on twitter which allows you to temporarily silence someone (without them knowing). Might also be useful during other events people like to tweet about. Start with … The Conversation – a blog written largely by academics and researchers which picks up on current events, research breakthroughs and pop culture and presents an academic view of them.
    8. interests and values – if used well, twitter can be a place of great reassurance and a source of “like-mindedness”. Look for people who have interesting things to say about things that are important to you. My feed reflects my professional interests and personal values. Start with… Nadine Muller (surviving as an academic, mental wellbeing), Institute of Health and Wellbeing at the University of Glasgow Athena Swan (equality and wellbeing) and Glasgow University Knitting (you know you want to…).
    9. peers – another key group of people to connect with (and support) on twitter are your peers. They are likely to be interested in what you’re doing and should retweet information about your work if you develop a positive reciprocal relationship with them. My peers are in researcher development, research support and research. Start with… Clare Taylor, Janet Wilkinson, Tracey Stead and Andrew Derrington
    10. … and relax! Shit Academics Say, Very British Problems, Associate Deans and Lego Academics lighten the load of my feed on bad days. And if the Orkney Library feed doesn’t make you want to go to Kirkwall NOW then you’ve died inside.

    As always, interested in any suggestions to add via twitter.

  • First Steps in Collaboration

    This is one of two posts written for early career researchers on the theme of collaboration. The first was based on ten questions I’m commonly asked in workshops. This one is a distillation of the good practice that I’ve gathered by working with collaborative people, developing networks and interviewing researchers over the last ten years. At the end of the post I translate these into ten first steps for ECRs.

    The same health warning applies to this post as to the other – this is my take on collaboration. I believe that these ten steps will help you, but I’d encourage you to do what I’ve done and talk to people to build a more accurate map of your personal research landscape.

    Successful collaborative researchers…

    1. Have a strong profile – both online and in terms of your reputation. Make sure your online profile (on your university page, a personal website and any other platforms) clearly explains what you do (i.e. what you might bring to a potential collaboration) and your research vision (i.e. what you’d like to address, people you’d like to work with and what impact you’d like your work to have). This should help the right people feel confident about approaching you. Be reliable and responsive when dealing with people and make sure they are aware of your interest in collaborating with others. If they know this and think you would be a strong addition to other partnerships they are aware of they may recommend you.

    A couple of resources to help.

    As you might expect, the staff profiles at Edinburgh College of Art are beautifully designed. Take a look at some of the staff there and the way the information is presented. Look at other institutions and make a list of what information you find and how useful it is. Use this to improve your profile. If you want to develop a stronger online presence, you should also read Professor Alex Marsh’s musings on his motivations for using social media and the benefits he’s seen. One Academic Online is a few years old but is still a great introduction.

    2. Identify the career boosting opportunities of collaboration and make sure they happen

    This isn’t about publications which I cover later (point 7) but the other benefits. Access to mentors, chances to visit other researchers, opportunities to show leadership, connections with researchers in other sectors. Try to imagine what your profile and network will look like at the end of the project and make sure that you connect with people and talk about you as well as the current project. If people know enough about your career, ambitions and interests they are in a position to help you.

    3. Have fun

    Otherwise, what’s the point? Work with people who fire your creativity, make you see the world in a new way and add real value to your work (and in a few rare instances, your life). Collaboration is harder and often more frustrating than working alone, but if you are working with the right people, it’s worth it.

    4. Match ideas and plans to funding

    Look into funding opportunities EARLY. New ideas are often malleable and information from a likely funder (even one you aren’t ready to approach for a few years) might highlight things you aren’t yet thinking about (such as the need to connect with a non-academic partner or consider how you will develop the researchers involved in the project). This avoids late “forced marriages” once a deadline looms when academics suddenly need to bring in a partner to meet eligibility criteria. Health warning: precise demands from funders do change from year to year so check with research office experts for any insider knowledge they have to help you make the right decisions.

    5. Work with people they trust

    In workshops I talk about “test-driving” research partners by working on something with them which is low risk and self contained. If they turn out to be unreliable, over-committed or just not someone you enjoy working with, it’s easy to walk away. Some examples of these test-drives include – organising a workshop, arranging a student visit, writing a paper (depending on your research model – more common in arts, humanities and social sciences, but very difficult in experimental sciences). Think about activities which will highlight their reliability, integrity and attitudes. But remember, they will be judging you as well!

    6. Know the track record of their collaborators

    If you are planning to work with someone for the first time and there isn’t time to develop trust, ask around your network for advice and feedback. Would they work with this person again? Are there any (acceptable) challenges which are important to manage? One example for me is a long-term collaboration with someone who knows my tendency to do things at the last minute (and not at all if there isn’t a meaningful deadline) and therefore schedules my contributions to come ahead of regular meetings. This creates the “real” deadline that I need and keeps our work together on track.

    7. Ensure projects lead to publications or other valued outputs

    As an early career researcher you are likely to be working at the “coal-face” of the research which may include preparing data which is then used by other members of the team. In some disciplines this puts you at risk of not being recognised as an author of any resulting publications, but rather someone mentioned in the acknowledgements. Most projects include a balance of activities – some will benefit you directly, others are your contribution to the wider project and can’t always be credited. Ensure there is a balance and that your role is recognisable and rewarded. The template from the NIH (look at questions 9-13) can help you to have these conversations when the project is being mapped out. Again, more senior researchers can advise you and support you.

    8. Develop transparency in projects and have systems/approaches for communication

    There’s always a risk that distant teams made up of really busy people don’t communicate as regularly as they should. Data generated through research is a valuable resource which needs to be securely managed and it may be difficult for some researchers to share this even around the consortium. The NIH template touches on this but increasingly institutions will have their own systems and guidelines. Here are two examples (look for your own data experts in your institution).

    University of Glasgow 

    University of Strathclyde

    A related issue is open-access data. Funders increasingly want data produced by researchers they have funded to be openly available. The UK Data Archive produced a Best Practice for Researchers guide in 2011 which is full of advice and resources.

    9. Have a Plan B

    With any research project there is always the real possibility of the hypothesis, methodology or generated data not producing the intended result. Although this is understood by funders, make sure that your project has a detailed project plan which can be used to map progress against. If there are signs that a line of enquiry is unlikely to bear fruit, meet early to consider alternative approaches. Competition for funding is so intense now that you are likely to have worked a lot of this out during the planning stage. It may be useful to have a standing item on any group meetings to consider Plan B.

    10. Are clear about own role and the expectations ON others and OF others

    One of my favourite bits of advice about collaboration (from Professor Tom McLeish, a career collaborator) is “Trespassers are Welcome”, which succinctly conveys how important it is for everyone in a project to feel comfortable talking about the whole project, contributing ideas and highlighting any concerns. This means that you need to have a good understanding of what everyone in the consortium does, how they do it and what this contributes to the whole. You need to understand how your work relies on what they do and how others will rely on you. Take time to talk to everyone, perhaps using some of the questions to reduce confusion in collaboration on this site, so that you feel comfortable and confident about the whole project. This means that you will benefit from better advice, supportive scrutiny and ensures that the data that flows around the network is useable and fit for purpose.

    So how do these ten key behaviours relate to ECRS? Here are my suggestions for ten first steps towards becoming a collaborative researcher:

    1. sort out your profile and tell researchers in your network what you do (clearly) and what you want to do
    2. look at the profiles of successful researchers – the things they’ve done and the reputations they hold – and identify what you need to do in a collaboration to boost your CV and profile
    3. maintain connections with people whose company you enjoy. Over time you will probably identify ways to work together (and if not, they are worth staying connected with anyway)
    4. look at the kinds of grants you’ll be applying for in 3-7 years time and be honest about where the weaknesses are in your profile and network. Then start building these.
    5. try to get involved in a few activities with people you see as potential collaborators and see if they are good at replying to emails, send information when requested, give you fair credit and treat you with respect. If not, feel happy walking away (or for people you HAVE to work with, make sure you have advice on how to handle them)
    6. talk to people about how they knew their good collaborators were going to be good and what they wished they’d known about collaborators who turned out to be bad. Don’t expect people to “name names” and if they do, be careful not to repeat any negative reports. People will need to trust you to share this and it’s likely to come through face to face conversations rather than in emails.
    7. have the difficult conversation about publications early rather than at the point when the writing starts (or worse, is done). Advice on having difficult conversations here.
    8. understand your institutions data management plan and meet people who manage this to discuss your data so they can help you develop a tailored plan. Be aware that if you are collaborating with other institutions who have their own plans, that any difficulties are often worked out at institution level – another reason for ensuring that the person who may conduct these negotiations really understands your research.
    9. get into the habit of thinking “what will I do if this doesn’t work?” as you plan your own work and also tracking how you adapt to problems or emerging information. If you can do this for your own work and reflect on the process, you’re more likely to be able to do this in a collaboration.
    10. be interested in the work and approach of the people you collaborate with. At this stage, if you aren’t collaborating outside your group or field, talk to other researchers when you meet them and have a stock of good questions to explore their work. (The Confusion in Collaboration questions might be useful)

    As always, discuss these with your own mentors and advisers. Collaboration is likely to be a feature of your career and you can’t start building your network and “trespassing skills” too soon.

  • Ten questions about collaboration

    Collaboration is one of my favourite topics in academia and I particularly enjoy helping people identify ways to start or develop the collaborative strands of their research. This post is the first of two – this one provides a set of answers to questions that I’m commonly asked in workshops and the second covers my own top ten ideas, all with a focus on getting started.

    I’ve been involved in events that try to build and improve collaborations for about ten years. I recently wrote a guide to good practice in collaboration for the Institute of Physics which involved interviewing a range of successful researchers about their approaches and advice. On top of this I also work collaboratively in researcher and organisational development whenever I can.  I’m therefore drawing on the collective expertise of a wide range of academics and organisations and will link to these where I can.

    How do I…

    1. Build internal networks?

    Most universities are large complex organisations with real communication challenges. There are almost certainly a range of events and networks in place which you could join and benefit from but the challenge is finding them. A way forwards is to identify the people and departments who want to foster collaboration (at Glasgow this drive comes from the Research Strategy and Innovation Office which organises a range of networks and events including the Interdisciplinary Researchers Network )

    2. Take the first steps?

    Read my other blog on this!

    3. Find partners in new networks?

    Once in a new network, potential partners need to know what you can do (skills and expertise) and what you want to do (research vision and collaborative plans) so make sure that you clearly introduce yourself with this key information. Look for opportunities to raise your profile in networks by speaking at meetings, offering to organize events and being active. If you will find it difficult to attend all the events, try to encourage people to use social networking tools to broaden the reach of the community – taking the lead on this if no-one else will.

    4. Ensure the outputs and outcomes from collaborations benefit me?

    As an early career researcher this can be challenging but is critical. As soon as research plans begin to take share, make sure that the issues or credit and reward are discussed. An effective leader will do this, but you also need to be clear about what you need from the project in terms of publications, responsibilities and credit. If you are a junior member of the network, ask a more senior researcher for advice and whether they can help you address this. Don’t feel that you are alone in being concerned about this – it is one of the most common reasons for discord in collaborations. There are a number of tools to help – I refer to these as “objective standards” in workshops – meaning that they are external frameworks which don’t favour any individual. Look at the sample partnering agreement produced by the NIH as an example. At the start of planning the research you may not be able to write a comprehensive dissemination plan (although some funders will demand on), but you should be able to agree a set of principles that will help recognition and reward be given fairly.

    5. Drive ideas forwards (and build momentum)?

    If you are working on an idea which doesn’t seem to go anywhere, look for some “hooks” which will create firm deadlines. These might be funding opportunities, conferences where you can present ideas, workshops, student projects – get ideas by talking to people who’ve turned conversations into funded projects about how they pushed things forward.

    6. Plan a collaboration?

    Many planning tools are available – some are listed on the GW4 collaboration guide. However, often the best framework comes from proposal documentation. Collaborative grants are at risk of poor communication, duplicated effort, loss of momentum and scope creep, so funders usually demand robust management structures and plans before they will commit. Think about the longer term direction that you want your project to take and even in the early stages, the proposals for large complex grants (from the MSCA ITNs  or Research Council CDTs ) indicate the planning and management issues of running collaborative projects.

    7. Find funding (especially to build ideas and teams)?

    Use the internal experts to help identify the key funding opportunities (research support offices or local research officers) – some of the funders are listed on the collaboration page of this site.

    8. Manage distant teams?

    Many of the systems and processes demanded by funders are there to ensure that the distance between researchers doesn’t endanger the research progress. In the early stages make sure that people spent as much time as is feasible face-to-face getting to know each other. If they feel comfortbale in each other’s company and have spent time exploring the ideas and “trespassing” on each others’ areas of expertise they are more likely to interact from a distance. Cost into any proposal enough travel funding to ensure that people can get together regularly. Don’t restrict this to the PI and Co-I level – the students and researchers working on the project must also interact as they will be doing most of the work and coming across most of the problems. Make sure that they use technology effectively to keep in touch. This can include shared repositories for data, video conferencing, online forums and social media. There are also some suggestions in this guide from Cardiff University which is aimed at managers of home-based and distant workers, but includes a lot of relevant suggestions.

    9. Pursue elusive collaborators?

    If you have contacted a potential collaborator and heard nothing, don’t despair – they are probably very busy and may be intending to reply to your message but never quite finding the space to do so. Follow up again, making sure that you are VERY clear about what you are proposing, why you want them involved and what you think might be the benefit for them. Say that you appreciate they are busy but that you would like to talk to them and will call in the next few days to see if there is any mutual interest in taking things further. You could also ask if they are likely to be attending a meeting or conference where you might coincide. Another strategy is to either bring them to your department (have them invited to give a seminar) or to travel to them (again, possibly giving a seminar in their department after making contact with the person who arranges their programme) for these initial conversations. This demonstrates your commitment and willingness to make real efforts to engage them which are good things to see in potential collaborators.

    10. Work out who to collaborate with and who to “compete” with?

    This is a very personal decision and really has to be worked out by you and the other researcher. Sometimes bringing together two people in the same field with similar interests creates a critical mass which allows for the work to progress more quickly. Other times it just feels like a duplication of effort. Trust your judgement if you are in this situation. If the ideas aren’t flowing and it doesn’t feel right, agree to continue to work in the same space, but independently.

    Finally, there’s an overarching piece of advice – I’m presenting my take on all these questions (based on talking to experts, but nonetheless, my take). You should seek advice from more experienced researchers in your field and develop as many “mentoring” relationships as you can with people. Collaboration usually involves working with people with differences in their skills, interests, motivations, backgrounds – getting a bit of insider advice from a mentor will help you approach potential partners with more confidence and awareness.

  • Wish I’d said that

    You know that moment when you walk away from someone at a conference feeling that you’ve made a bit of an arse of yourself and then realise with dazzling clarity what you SHOULD have said? This post is about that.

    At a workshop today at Glasgow University, we were discussing reputation, profile and generally having greater personal impact. I asked everyone in the group to introduce themselves to their neighbour as if they were meeting at a conference. I didn’t give them time to prepare (although they had constructed a mind map of their profile/career/research vision earlier) but instead asked them to say the first things that came to them. After a few minutes we stopped and then reflected on what they said, what they should have said, what they definitely should NOT have said and generally what would be different if they could press rewind.

    Here is the summary of the discussions. I’m posting these because they make up a useful checklist that might help you to prepare for a future introductory conversation. As you read each item on the list, think “How will I do that next time I introduce myself to someone new?”

    – I should have brought the conversation around to wanting to keep in touch and asking for their contact details

    – I should have talked a bit less about myself and instead asked questions which would have helped us find the common ground between us

    – I should have talked more about the impact my work has on the public

    – I should have worked out what to say in two minutes so I didn’t miss anything key

    – I shouldn’t have asked for a job (it was clumsy and felt awkward)

    – I should have been more explicitly about what I wanted and why I was talking to them (I.e. I SHOULD have asked for a job)

    – I should accept that sometimes “big names” just aren’t interested in early career researchers (I’d argue that they probably would be if they could see why you were interesting…)

    – I should have created an opportunity for a conversation to start instead of giving a “mini-talk” that left the listener stunned into silence

    – I should have found a way to be more interesting to the other person (by understanding what they were doing)

    – I should have emphasised the novelty of what I do

    – I should have had this conversation with a chaperone who would have helped me to talk about my highlights, novelty and made it clear to the other person why I was worth talking to 

    Much of his speaks for itself but a few final comments. The apparent discrepancy between “I shouldn’t have asked for a job” and “I should have been clear about what I wanted” isn’t as contradictory as it appears. It’s fine to approach someone and say that you are going to be available for opportunities soon and to ask their advice or whether there are likely to be any openings in their group/institution in the near future. It isn’t fine to have a conversation which appears to be about something else and then bluntly switches into “Gis a Job“. Think about the flow and how to set up the conversation so you feel comfortable asking about opportunities.

    I also loved the final point about the chaperone. Sometimes it’s much easier to have someone there who will celebrate your successes. Who can do this for you in your network? Next time you are at a conference and someone suggests that you talk to a senior academic, ask them if they would mind making the introduction. These introductions can be virtual as well as “in the room” so don’t be afraid to ask people in your network to build your connections (they may be grateful to have an excuse to make the contact and to do both you and the other person a favour!).

    Happy networking!

  • Enterprising Women

    This page supports the Enterprising Women programme which I run at the University of Edinburgh and which was developed by myself and Janet Wilkinson.

    Here’s where I’ll post useful links and any ideas which connect to the themes that we looked at on the three days. For those of you who haven’t attended the course, the themes are:

    • creativity
    • comfort with cash
    • control

    Creativity

    For creativity, I’m going to be lazy and link you to the existing pages on this site which cover this topic as well as the site I developed from the original Girls Geeks workshop which was the “grandmother” of Enterprising Women.

    Creativity – different for me, different for you a fairly old blog post but covers my creativity philosophy

    Deadly 50 – the introducing yourself activity which we do

    The Entrepreneurial Knickers post  and the website that grew out of them…

    http://www.entrepreneurialknickers.com/ (yes, really)

    Comfort with Cash

    The two books I recommended were

    Nice Girls Don’t Get the Corner Office

    Nice Girls Don’t Get Rich

    (both pretty cheap on Kindle and highly recommended although best not to read in public as there are lots of “D’Oh – I do that!” moments in them both)

    We looked briefly at the Research Professional site which you can use to search for funding opportunities. If you access the site from within the University you should be able to search without a login.

    If the University mystifies you as much as it did me when I worked there and you’re a postdoc, why not go to the next Get Connected event in January and find out exactly who does what.

    We talked about Athena Swan as a facilitator for improving equality but also as a potential opportunity to demonstrate leadership if you get involved in this in your school or institute. Contact your local champion once you’ve got to grips with the ethos of the award.

    Many of you were keen to make more of social media, LinkedIn in particular, but not sure where to start. There are lots of guides including the excellent ones on LinkedIn itself. Here are a few:

    https://university.linkedin.com/linkedin-for-students

    https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/10-tips-students-new-grads-linkedin-omar-garriott

    https://targetjobs.co.uk/careers-advice/networking/273059-social-networking-and-graduate-recruitment-manage-your-online-reputation

    https://targetjobs.co.uk/careers-advice/networking/328863-a-graduate-job-hunters-guide-to-using-linkedin

    Finally, many careers services will have their own guides, but I have a particular regard for the Careers Service at Manchester, particularly their support for researchers:

    http://www.careers.manchester.ac.uk/findjobs/graduatejobs/networking/linkedin/

    I mentioned a guide I’d seen which helped people make the transition from Facebook to LinkedIN – I haven’t been able to find this on the web so it may be very out of date, but here is a copy of it from my archive.

    From Facebook to LinkedIn

    The first “call out” to something generated by one of our enterprising women is the MODON research site established by Nathalie.

    http://modonresearch.com/

    Keen to feature more here so please send me any links!

    Control

    The final day is in December – stay posted!

    (We’ll almost certainly refer to this at some point…)

  • A badge of honour?

    Yesterday I spoke at the “Taking Control of your Career” event for the Institute of Physics (there’s another blog based on the day here). The event was aimed at young female physicists and it’s perhaps inevitable that the topic of imposter syndrome came up. As I listened to the first speaker, Dame Professor Athene Donald talk about her career and acknowledge that she had made mistakes and that she felt imposter syndrome I could feel the relief from the audience as they realised “It isn’t just me”. Athene’s talk is available on her blog and many of the ten messages she shares can be related to imposter syndrome. As a regular reader of her warm and wise blog I found her earlier post “Getting Away with It” struck a similar chord last year.

    My day job of running researcher and academic development workshops means that the topic of imposter syndrome comes up regularly. Most people feel at some point or another that they are “getting away with it” and although I feel this most of the time, the more I hear talented and successful people talk about it, the more I see it for what it is.

    I feel imposter syndrome when I stretch myself. Even though I intensely dislike the feeling that I’m about to be caught out and humiliated (and it has happened on a few occasions) it is far, far preferable to the mind-numbing alternative of living my life safely cocooned in my comfort zone.

    As I wrote my slides for the Taking Control event I added a line to my final messages which conveyed this:

     Imposter syndrome is a sign that you are stretching and learning.

    When it actually came to say it, I went even further.

     Imposter syndrome is a badge of honour.

    Which makes a great tweetable soundbite, but I think warrants a bit of explanation for those who weren’t in the room. On my (long, long) journey home I started to worry that this might be interpreted as trivializing the impact imposter syndrome can have on people. Earlier in the week I had read a beautifully written guest blog post on Professor Pat Thomson’s site by an anonymous PhD student on her fears and how they are affecting her confidence in her academic abilities.

    I’d encourage anyone reading this to look at the post, but perhaps more importantly the comments at the bottom which are filled with empathy, advice and a constant stream of “me too”. Although it definitely helps to know that you aren’t alone in feeling this and to recognise that imposter syndrome comes as part of learning and stretching, it is critical to have a strategy for coping with those feelings and managing the impact they have on us.

    When I talk about this in workshops I use the word resilience and point people to some of the resources that helped me to ensure my coping strategies were all they could me. I also wrote a blog post containing these links and my own resilience strategy.

    If you feel the grip of imposter syndrome, recognise it as a sign that you are working towards your ambitions and congratulate yourself on having the courage to stretch yourself. But don’t do this in isolation – talk to people about the triggers (in the case of the student on Pat Thomson’s blog this seems to be partly down to the imbalance between critical and positive feedback from supervisors) and see if you can make changes. A resource I seem to point people towards pretty much every time I leave the house is the excellent “We Have To Talk” – a guide to difficult conversations.

    When I summed up the day in my closing comments I made a few other points:

    • Capture your successes and get credit for your effort. Most of the CVs I looked at during 1:1 appointments barely scratched the surface of what was on offer. Take some time to stop and think about what you’ve achieved and keep your CV up to date (this is also a great reminder of what you have acheieved which is another resilience strategy)
    • Don’t be the person who say no to you – there are plenty of other people who can do that. This advice came from Professor Eugene Kennedy who spoke at the Dublin launch of the funding guide I wrote for the IOP. (You can find his slides on the Dublin launch page – full of advice.) He was making the point that we often don’t put ourselves forwards for opportunities because we assume we aren’t good enough – let someone else make that decision as they may be less harsh than you are on yourself.
    • As an early career researcher you have LOTS of time but you need to use your time wisely. The point I was making is that you have time to make mistakes and to have false starts but don’t just drift and wait for things to happen or for career inspiration to strike. Be proactive and show initiative but don’t worry about deciding on your whole life when it’s barely begun.
    • Be comfortable marketing yourself. I think this is more than a gender issue, but I see many incredibly talented women who are uncomfortable celebrating their successes. Even Professor Dame Athene Donald shied away from describing herself as successful at this event. We all need to be more comfortable accepting praise and describing our worth.
    • Finally, I emphasised the value of networking – being part of a supported community has given me the confidence to pursue opportunities and I get nearly all of my consultancy work because other people celebrate my successes. Build a network, be active in it, be generous with your praise and support of others and the karma fairy will ensure someone does the same for you.

    In summary I still see imposter syndrome as a badge of honour, but I take resilience seriously. I hope that the fantastic women I met yesterday felt as inspired as I did by the end of the day to continue to push themselves into the “stretch” zone but also to look after themselves and each other along the way.

  • Impact, Initiative and Ideas

    I gave a talk yesterday at a great event run by the Institute of Physics with the aim of helping women physicists, particularly PhD students, take control of their careers. A variety of speakers spoke about their careers, the opportunities in their sectors and giving advice (and smashing myths) about doctoral employability. A highlight for me was hearing Professor Dame Athene Donald give her perspectives on the theme of taking control (in typically proficient style this was published on her blog within a few hours).

    A few themes emerged in conversations I had during the day:

    • Most PhD physicists leave academia, yet many current PhDs still feel guilty about considering other options and find it difficult to discuss with supervisors
    • The pressures of academic life are being felt by early career researchers and putting many of them off despite their love of science and research
    • Being able to talk about careers, imposter syndrome, funding and general frustrations in a supportive and like-minded community is energizing and reassuring
    • Social media is seen as something that is valuable for career development, but many present were sure what they should engage with and where to start.

    I suspect that the best outcome from the day for many who attended will be the sense of community and I hope that they keep in touch with each other and with the speakers.

    My talk was on the topic of using funding as a career booster. The IOP have recently published a guide to funding aimed at ECRS which I wrote and which was written with female researchers in mind. I’ll set out the key points from my talk here but also weave in a few other messages which came up in the during some individual careers appointments I ran.

    What do employers want?

    I started with a quote from Carl Gilleard, who was Chief Executive of the Association of Graduate Recruiters for 15 years. I met him just after he was appointed in 1998 when I was still relatively fresh into my job as a careers adviser and asked him if he could sum up what recruiters were looking for. Expecting the usual slightly tired lists of skills, instead I got a fantastic answer which has stayed with me and informed a lot of my career choices.

    Employers want to see a bit of oomph.

    I’ve spent the intervening years thinking about this and what it looks like when I see it. I put forward my deconstruction of oomph but encouraged the audience to start looking around them for the characteristics of people who were successful.

    Initiative

    This is top of my list. I want to work with people who see that something needs doing and do it. In order to show initiative you need to be aware of your surroundings and the opportunities that are open to you. This means being ready to take opportunities or persuade people to give you chances. It’s about showing independence (this was almost on the list in it’s own right but I think the overlap with initiative rules this out) which convinces me that you can work without close supervision and get on with things, sometimes with minimal direction and instruction.

    In funding terms this is about deciding to pursue funding to do more than your PhD or project requires; it’s about seeking out funding which isn’t immediately obvious and making the connection with your ideas.

    Ideas

    A room full of researchers is a room full of ideas, but I want to see that you can turn these ideas into something tangible. To do this you need to involve other people and to convince them that your idea (and you) are credible, exciting and worth an investment. The process of articulating an idea into a funding proposal and the achievement of securing funding suggests that you are going to be able to push forward your agenda in future. It’s a great answer to the dreaded application form question “Tell us about a time where you convinced people to do something” which always flummoxed me. The review process associated with funding also gives you a track record of managing criticism, equipping you to deal with this in different situations.

    Impact

    The final “I” is about delivering results. If I’m going to take a chance on you by giving you a job I am taking a huge risk. If you can show me that you’ve taken opportunities and turned them into new knowledge, which has had an impact in your community, I feel reassured. I can see that you are the sort of person who makes a difference – although it’s an appalling phrase to use about people, I feel more confident that I’ll see a “return on investment”.

    Underlying all of this is the fact that securing funding demonstrates ambition – what I have been given isn’t enough and I need more to achieve my vision. I like that sentiment and would want to draw it into my organization.

    But what if….?

    I know enough about funding to know that the current success rates make depressing reading, so the final part of my talk looked at the value you get from engaging in funding even if you don’t get the money.

    Focus

    Applying for money forces you to turn an intention to do something into a set of actions. This focus on the criteria and expectations for a grant may well be the impetus you need to get things done and to stop making excuses to yourself. Get that paper written because you need a minimum number of papers for a fellowship application. Talk to that potential collaborator and start developing ideas because you need them to write a letter of support. Ask to co-supervise an undergraduate or master project because you need to present proof of concept data. Deadlines create a sense of purpose.

    Develop your thinking

    As soon as you start to write down an idea you will see the gaps and the flaws in it. I can still remember with horrible clarity a moment when I was writing my thesis when I realize I couldn’t finish a sentence because I hadn’t done the right kind of experiment. If we are forced to construct a written argument and plans for our ideas we see the weaknesses and we can work on them,

    Confidence

    It may seem disingenuous to suggest that putting your precious flower of an idea under the dirty boot of a reviewer is going to build your confidence in the short term (it probably won’t, so see the sister post to this one…) but in the long term, the more we put our ideas “out there” and find ways to cope with the criticism they receive, the more confident we can be next time of making a stronger case. You will also become more articulate and be able to present your ideas more elegantly and engagingly (especially if you find opportunities to review the work of others).

    Benchmarking

    Funding processes are all about comparisons with others. Job searching is all about comparisons with others. Promotion is about comparison with a set of criteria. This will be done to you repeatedly in your career, so start doing it to yourself as early as you can. Do I stand out from my peers? Am I taking all the opportunities that are offered to me? Am I finding additional opportunities that aren’t obvious? If you aren’t regularly benchmarking yourself, there may be a blind spot in your development.

    Mentors

    No day aimed at early career women can pass without a reference to the value of mentors. A major theme of Navigating the Funding Landscape was the role they must play in your funding strategy and the same message applies to your career. Find one – use the IOP or the networks and societies you have access to. Talk to people around you and get advice. Don’t work in isolation.

    I finished my talk with a few key messages, but frankly this post is already too long, so they are in a separate post.

  • Time Management – by academics

    I’ve run a small flurry of time management courses in the last week and used them to gather the collective wisdom of busy academics.

     

    Here are my top ten tips for time management, illsutrated with their specific advice and reflections.

    1.Do the most important stuff first

    1. Schedule it in and stick to the schedule
    2. Be clear about expectations in your role
    3. Identify things that will help you to achieve your long term vision as well as urgent tasks
    4. Ask yourself “Is this task contributing to something that takes me to where I want to be?”
    5. Work on email in the evenings (if you are happy to) to create clear space first thing

    2.Turn off email

    1. .…and the internet and any other distractions
    2. Use technology to help you (this plug in blocks specific or all websites for set periods) https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/stayfocusd/laankejkbhbdhmipfmgcngdelahlfoji?hl=en
    3. Use an old phone to reduce connectivity
    4. Don’t open or answer emails first thing in the morning

    3.Work to meaningful deadlines

    1. Create real deadlines by including other people – have someone ready to review a draft or proposal
    2. Relate activities to meetings to make deadlines immovable

    4.Work in the right environment or change that environment

    1. Shut your door
    2. Schedule student meetings rather than “open door”.
    3. Learn to push people out of the door (politely)
    4. Work from home occasionally (if you don’t get distracted there)
    5. Work in the library or other places if you are disturbed in your office

    5.Get to know the energy rhythm of your day

    1. Schedule unimportant things in for low energy points
    2. Go to bed earlier
    3. Exercise more to clear your head, focus your mind
    4. Secure the best times in your diary for important (to you) things
    5. Answer emails in the low energy times

    6.Stop solving other peoples’ problems

    1. Do an audit of your time and identify your priorities
    2. Manage meetings effectively, Close and finish them earlier
    3. Learn to say no. Advice here and here

    7.Identify things you can do in the margins of each day

    1. Have a list of ten minute/15 minute tasks
    2. Use “train time” effectively
    3. Be realistic about how long things take (chunk them down to smaller tasks)

    8.Notice what breaks your good resolutions

    1. Do an audit of your time and identify the barriers to good habits
    2. Try to keep your focus on important tasks rather than urgent, less important ones

    9.Wean other people off their expectations of instant gratification

    1. Manage demands for administrative information and tell them that they have to wait if you have other priorities (particularly if made at short notice)
    2. Delay replying to email – use Boomerang to schedule when emails are sent http://www.boomeranggmail.com (so even if it suits you to reply immediately, you don’t need to send it!)

    10.Do things well (enough)

    1. Especially teaching (most new lecturers over-prepare)
    2. Be careful not to get too tied up in details

    If you want to work on your own time management, there’s a time management guide in the academic section of the site which I hope will help.

     

    Here’s more advice, this time from academics at Kent University, on “Balancing the Conflicting Demands of Academia” . There’s a lot to admire on the Research Fundermentals website, but if you’re here to improve your own time management, I probably shouldn’t distract you with shiny things. Even worse, would be to point out that the author, Phil Ward, is on Twitter.

  • Resources for new and aspiring principal investigators (PIs)

    This blog post contains the resources and links that I most commonly send on to academics and senior researchers who attend a training day I run on developing successful academic careers. The collection of links might seem a little eclectic as they stem from the discussions we have at these workshops, but I refer people to them so often that I thought a blog post was warranted.

     

    I’ll try to update this page as I find new resources – it also takes a little pressure off the plans to write some more detailed guides to social media and collaboration to add to the existing guides to time management and building a research profile.

     

    Most of my workshops raise awareness about the opportunities you need to create and take advantage of in order to progress your career. I am very conscious that most academics don’t sit around all day wishing they had more to do, so the first step we discuss is to reduce existing commitments.

    These two blog posts explore strategies for saying no:

    http://www.designsponge.com/2012/03/biz-ladies-saying-no.html (thanks to Dr Josie McLellan for this)

    http://zenhabits.net/say-no/

    Not everyone on these workshops has secured a permanent academic position, so this is a good place to give a plug to the GLASGOW Fellowship guide which offers advice on preparing an application and the interview process.

    Delegation is another key skill – workshop participants will get a guide to delegation, but in a rare example of not haemorrhaging intellectual property, I’m not going to post that here. Instead here are a range of links:

    The rather terrifyingly named Asian Efficiency site has a very nice step-by-step guide to delegation for freelancers which translate well for academics

    Libcom ( a site with infinite potential for distraction for any sandal wearing liberals) also has a gentle guide to delegation

    Social media is a really hot topic in workshops now and it’s been interesting to see the gradual shift from dismissing it as the natural home of freaks and time wasters… to being curious and open-minded about the potential… to finding at least 30% of any workshop group actively engaged.

    The following blog posts from academics might give additional insights into the value of social media to academics and researchers:

    http://www.katherinelwheat.com/lifeafterthesis/uses-and-misuses-of-twitter/

    http://deevybee.blogspot.nl/2011/06/gentle-introduction-to-twitter-for.html

    http://thermaltoy.wordpress.com/2012/05/09/what-is-the-point-of-twitter/

    http://occamstypewriter.org/athenedonald/2013/03/23/learning-the-foreign-language-of-twitter/

    http://www.nature.com/spoton/2012/10/spoton-london-2012-tweeting-to-spread-the-word/

    http://computingforpsychologists.wordpress.com/2012/04/23/how-many-social-networks-do-researchers-really-need/

    http://dynamicecology.wordpress.com/2012/09/13/why-i-use-twitter/

    http://dynamicecology.wordpress.com/2013/02/06/why-should-an-academic-read-blogs/

    This isn’t the only list of such articles – here is another list of science/social media related articles and resources,  from the Social Networking for Scientists Wiki (more US based).

     

    If you know of any others PLEASE let me know – I’ll try to keep updating this list.

     

    If these convince you, the introductory guides I tend to suggest are:

    http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2011/09/29/twitter-guide/ (very basic)

    http://www.rin.ac.uk/our-work/communicating-and-disseminating-research/social-media-guide-researchers (still the best I’ve found although any publishes guide to social media will gradually become outdated – I see signs that ResearchGate is proving more popular than Academic.edu at present)

     

    Most of our leadership programmes include MBTI – I know some people dislike this as a tool but I still find it very useful for demonstrating that differences between people are positive if you understand them. As a summary, I like the new MBTI heads which celebrate the 70th anniversary of the tool – rather fetching silhouettes with summaries of key words for each type (I know one academic who has hung his on his door as a warning…)

    http://www.mbtiparty.com/#gift (either click on “don’t leave without your free gift” or scroll way down until you get to the Party Favors (sic) section)  – enter your type and choose PDF or image. If you don’t like MBTI you will hate this page, so probably best not to go there…

     

    Another challenge for new PIs is the process of growing a research group. For this I still recommend the HHMI online guide – Making the Right Moves – it’s aimed at bioscientists, but the advice is largely generic and although there are now some omissions (it’s over ten years old), it still contains great advice.

    http://www.hhmi.org/resources/labmanagement/downloads/moves2.pdf

    Funding

    Although I don’t cover funding on any of my research leadership courses (I’d rather encourage people to make contact with their own research funing support offices as these are full of excellent helpful people), I’ve recently come across a couple of resources that are frankly too good not to include here.

    I was pointed to the first of these during a discussion with the director of a research support office, giving it a real seal of approval.

    The Research Funding Toolkit was developed by research funding experts and academics (arguably these are also research funding experts, but hopefully you’ll understand the distinction) and includes a series of excellent presentations,  checklists and a great blog.

    The next resource came indirectly through twitter. One of the most generous and honest academics that I follow is Dr Nadine Muller of Liverpool John Moores University. She writes regularly about the highs and challenges of academic life and her “The New Academic” blog is packed with advice and insights from Nadine and guest writers.

    The post on writing grant applications gives a fantastic starting point for any first time applicant and in the comments stream is a link from Neon Anonymous to their post entitled “All-the-things-ive-learned-while-i-should-have-been-working-on-my-thesis”

    In this post is a link to  “The Professor Is In” Blog and Dr Karen’s Foolproof Grant Template. Although written by an American academic for her funding opportunities, to me it appears to travel across the Atlantic very well.

    I’ve also recently found rather old but still very effective guide to funding:

    The Art of Grantsmanship

    The final links are to help people reflect their research culture online – the website of Prof Roberto Cipolla at Cambridge is a good example of explaining a model of supervision. As far as I can see he hasn’t updated this page for about 18 years (I’ve been linking to it since 1999)– but there’s no evidence he needs to!

    http://mi.eng.cam.ac.uk/~cipolla/phdguide.htm

    The second has been updated recently – the Barton Group at Dundee University. I think that the embedding of Geoff Barton’s twitter feed is really effective here as it ensures that the site looks current with minimal effort. The feed conveys his enthusiasm and humour. Also worth noting is the excellent guide to the UK academic system which demonstrates his commitment to supporting international students. Photos of the group and their successes complete a picture of a strong group, where successes are celebrated, international researchers are welcomed and where a comprehensive picture of the work in the group can be seen. (Having met Geoff and some of his group recently, I felt the page reflected the positive group culture really well.)

    Here endeth the brain dump, but please let me know which sites and resources I could add.

  • The Power of Positive People

    I’ve spent most of this week where I spend a lot of my time – in UK universities working with research staff and academics. I’ve had lot of conversations about various aspects of academia and careers but two really stand out.

     

    One was with an institute director with whom I was discussing some ideas to support his researchers. We met at the end of a long day for both of us and I must admit I went into the meeting with some weariness. I received a email just before the meeting from someone who has a habit of sending scornful messages and was distracted thinking about how I was going to respond. I was facing a long drive home and an early start the next day.

     

    Two and a half hours later I emerged from a meeting which completely energised me. We had a great plan and determination to turn our ideas into an event or programme. We’d shared book recommendations and people in our networks. My good mood wasn’t due to the prospect of a new piece of work (although that’s great), but because I’d connected with a positive person. For those few hours, anything was possible.

     

    Academic life isn’t easy at the moment. I spent a day with new and emerging research leaders this week and the discussions about REF were demoralising for me (let alone them). It feels like the important things in academia that can’t be measured are being devalued, and that the sector risks favouring 4* papers over “4* people”. The pragmatist in me understands where REF has come from and that scrutiny of academia is part and parcel of public funding, but it worries me that we risk losing a generation of brilliant, committed people who are made to feel that they don’t tick the right boxes. 

     

    The second conversation of the week was with someone like this. They are exactly the kind of person who should succeed in academia. Passionate about their work, delivering important outcomes and yet demoralised by the perception that they are failing. During our conversation I recalled my meeting earlier in the week and we talked about the power of positive people. I suggested they find ways to spend time with people with a positive approach – working with them if possible.

     

    As we spoke about ways to find positive people and connect with them, two areas of opportunity cropped up – the impact agenda and the push towards collaborative research. Both of these are based on developing relationships and both provide the chance to meet people who care about the things you care about. Even if they are only a small part of your workload, these connections might “top up your happy tank” enough to get you through the daily grind. 

     

    Although I now work on the periphery of academic life, I’ve embraced both of these ideas. I’ve found another positive person (a teacher in a local school) and set up and run a very successful little science festival. (If you know me, you’ll know ALL about this, otherwise, check out last year’s event…). I think the success of this is down to the fact that both Andrew and I focus on what is possible, rather than what is difficult. I’m not suggesting it was easy to run the event, but it was fun and energising because we kept meeting people who were positive about what we were doing. Neither of us receive an income from our work on the festival but it pays a rich wage in terms of the people we meet and the satisfaction we get from delivering a great event.

     

    I’m also collaborating much more as part of my professional life. Although this means sharing rewards and remuneration, the benefits are huge. I use collaboration as a mechanism to spend time with other positive people – I perform better with them because they inspire me to push forwards and do bigger things. Not all of our projects come to fruition but we all benefit from the time we spend together.

     

    Some people have the negative default – focusing on what you can’t do and why “that won’t work here”. They often make good points and help us avoid repeating mistakes, so this post isn’t suggesting that you should avoid all negative thought. However, if the negative voices are all you hear, they will stifle you. 

     

    Time with positive people builds your resilience. They remind you of why you’re in your role and why it’s important. They give you permission to be positive yourself and to get excited again about being a researcher.