The institutional narrative is your bridge

I was recently coaching a client – a female early career researcher in the visual arts – who lamented that her circumstances made her track record of outputs and achievements ‘completely uncompetitive and hopeless’. It was a statement full of frustration and anger, but I wanted to share it with you here because it highlights…

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Social is Successful?

I was sitting in on a conversation with a group of ECRs this week, all sharing their anxieties and concerns about their research careers. I could relate to all those worries and what ifs, and it felt like only yesterday I was at the coal face of life as a postdoc.    One question posed…

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The Genre Games

In a recent coaching session, one of my Granted students described her anxiety about having weak grant writing skills. She said she was motivated to improve, but that everyone she’d turned to for help on the subject so far had been unhelpful. I asked her what she meant. Everyone’s response, she explained, had been the…

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To Ask or not to Ask?

In the last few weeks, I’ve been coaching late-stage and newly minted PhDs in my PhD2Postdoc program.  As we prepare a plan for getting them a research/academic position, one of the recurring themes is the fear to reach out and ask established names in their field to talk to them about opportunities to collaborate on…

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Research impact: a security net in disguise

In my last post, I implored you to think about how you could have an impact on the wider non-academic public with your research. At this time of year, this issue has more relevance than you think. Let’s explore why this is, then look at some examples to get your imagination firing with ideas.  …

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Is your knowledge ‘usable’?

The measurement of research impact is a hot topic in Australian academic circles.   But let’s not for a moment think it’s a new concern.   While dipping into Peter Drucker’s The Effective Executive recently (a classic written some 50 years ago), I was interested, but not surprised, to read a similar concern about the…

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Before/After: The role of the grant ‘architect’

I distinctly remember the end of major grant rounds this year. Right on cue, I developed a chest infection, and was up to my eyeballs in application reviews at work. And then suddenly, like a storm, the deadline for the last major scheme came – and went.   That night, thoroughly spent, I fell into…

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Research merits, Research money

In the transition from PhD student to aspiring postdoc, my mentor said something I’ll never forget: ‘your PhD isn’t a job ticket’. What she meant was: an attitude of entitlement to research funding, or an academic job, misses the point.   Over the years I’ve realised it’s one of the major mistakes newly-minted PhDs seeking…

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