I wonder if at some point we'll look back on this time as the good old days. It doesn't feel like it but perhaps, with time, it will be possible to laugh that this semester started in chaos and overwhelm. Difficult to imagine at the moment. Mostly I'm avoiding people as much as possible, trying to keep my head down, work on projects, manage the to-do list. I suspect to many I've become a disembodied email person. It's easier than dealing with the stress of other people's stress.
But I'm still around.
Thursday, October 15, 2015
Thursday, September 24, 2015
Today was strange.
Today has upset the apple cart a bit. But not in a bad way. I was doing a course a few years ago and was asked to resubmit the final assignment - it wasn't quite right. Then the admin role struck and a few other things went really wrong and my time (and energy) evaporated and I gave up. I understood that I'd had my chance and hadn't passed the module in question. I thought the changes required for resubmission were substantial and quite fundamental - that I'd be trying to sell apples as oranges. Apparently all I need to do is demonstrate understanding of what oranges are then talk about apples.
It sounds doable.
But doable is a relative thing there's a lot of other things that need to be doable as well this semester.
I would very much like to get this thing done but I had given up. It became a 'thing' and cracking open the files again is likely to dredge up a whole heap of stuff. I don't particularly want to go back in time and revisit why I gave up, or dwell on the things that weren't/aren't that great at work in general. Has sufficient time passed to just get on with it? Will good enough be good enough? I don't know. But I have agreed to meet with the course leader to go through and see what changes needed to be made. I'll hold off worrying until I know exactly what I have to do.
In other news, there are some folks out there who are completely awesome.
It sounds doable.
But doable is a relative thing there's a lot of other things that need to be doable as well this semester.
I would very much like to get this thing done but I had given up. It became a 'thing' and cracking open the files again is likely to dredge up a whole heap of stuff. I don't particularly want to go back in time and revisit why I gave up, or dwell on the things that weren't/aren't that great at work in general. Has sufficient time passed to just get on with it? Will good enough be good enough? I don't know. But I have agreed to meet with the course leader to go through and see what changes needed to be made. I'll hold off worrying until I know exactly what I have to do.
In other news, there are some folks out there who are completely awesome.
Tuesday, September 22, 2015
When did things start to change?
I have a theory that when you go to a new place or start a new job, what you do for the first 3 days is different to what you do for the first 3 weeks. That differs from what you do for the first 3 months and as I have recently discovered, what you do for the first 3 years differs as well. What do I mean by differ? I mean the routine, the places you go, the people you speak to, the things you do. The first 3 days in a new place are 'settling in' to the really unfamiliar newness. The first 3 weeks are settling down. But it turns out the first 3 years (e.g. in a new job) are as well. If I think back over the years in my current job, there was a change about 3 years in. Consider that I'd never been in one place for 3 years before now - that's just the way of an academic pathway.
So what happened at the 3 year mark?
Firstly, I shook of the shroud of probation that adorns most new lecturers in the UK. For a brand new lecturer, it is 3 years long. It isn't comparable to tenure although some institutions place specific requirements on passing probation and these may include funding effort. In my case it was comparable to tenure for a variety of reasons. So perhaps I started my job still thinking in 3 year terms, a bit like a post-doc does. Then I had to face the notion that it was going to be a much longer commitment.
Secondly, I suddenly became the (proud) owner of a full teaching and admin load, and some research support and knew enough about the place to take on bits and pieces here and there. Working with different colleagues on various projects was still an interesting part of the settling in process. Yes, settling in still 3 years in. If for no other reason, this was valuable for learning more about how I needed to work with collaborators. I found out what ways of working suited my style and which of my colleagues were most suited that style. The flip side of this particular lesson is that I didn't know enough going into some projects and as a result got totally screwed.
Thirdly, I started to see what the 'next big thing' in my career progression was. The looming admin role. The declining funding rates and changes to funding schemes. The academic weather systems that would shape the following years started to reveal themselves and it wasn't all sunshine and picnic weather.
Now, a good few years on from the 3 year mark, and importantly 3 years into that looming admin role, things are changing again. So what is it about the 3 year mark? Is it some sort of academic 3 year itch? Is it just that once you've done things for 3 years you change things to avoid annoying stuff? Or is it just that I'm looking around for the next big thing?
So what happened at the 3 year mark?
Firstly, I shook of the shroud of probation that adorns most new lecturers in the UK. For a brand new lecturer, it is 3 years long. It isn't comparable to tenure although some institutions place specific requirements on passing probation and these may include funding effort. In my case it was comparable to tenure for a variety of reasons. So perhaps I started my job still thinking in 3 year terms, a bit like a post-doc does. Then I had to face the notion that it was going to be a much longer commitment.
Secondly, I suddenly became the (proud) owner of a full teaching and admin load, and some research support and knew enough about the place to take on bits and pieces here and there. Working with different colleagues on various projects was still an interesting part of the settling in process. Yes, settling in still 3 years in. If for no other reason, this was valuable for learning more about how I needed to work with collaborators. I found out what ways of working suited my style and which of my colleagues were most suited that style. The flip side of this particular lesson is that I didn't know enough going into some projects and as a result got totally screwed.
Thirdly, I started to see what the 'next big thing' in my career progression was. The looming admin role. The declining funding rates and changes to funding schemes. The academic weather systems that would shape the following years started to reveal themselves and it wasn't all sunshine and picnic weather.
Now, a good few years on from the 3 year mark, and importantly 3 years into that looming admin role, things are changing again. So what is it about the 3 year mark? Is it some sort of academic 3 year itch? Is it just that once you've done things for 3 years you change things to avoid annoying stuff? Or is it just that I'm looking around for the next big thing?
Monday, September 21, 2015
In the beginning
I am an academic who no longer qualifies as early career but isn't yet willing to embrace the mantle of middle career (or anything else with the word middle in it for that matter). The funding programmes and initiatives for early career have either passed me by or I was part of the last cohorts that didn't get. Perhaps that additional postdoc would have been a better idea than what I did pick. The postdoc probably distinguishes my field somewhat so let's just assume I'm a non-traditional scientist. At times I feel weighted down with 'what-ifs' and other abject acts of career orientated self-pity. At other times I think my job is the best thing and I love it. Well, 80% of it anyway.
At the moment, standing at base camp of another academic year, I'm simultaneously looking forward to the return of the restriction of timetables and the semester, and dreading it. I feel I put too many things on hold for semester time, too many important things. But then I proved this summer that I don't do a lot of them even when I have the time.
So why blogging?
Well, my best thing job is quite isolated. I mentioned 'non-traditional' scientist didn't I? I have a general sense of never having fitted in properly anywhere and while I can accept that I generally occupy different space to colleagues, I've never quite come to terms with the feeling of exclusion that comes from that. I also need to get back into the habit of writing more regularly about anything. I follow and read a number of academic blogs and identify with many of the situations outlined in many. I'm less good at commenting because other than saying 'me too', it's not clear what to add.
Why a public blog and why not a private journal? Because reading other blogs show me that it might not just be me and so I share in the hope that someone else might see something and think it isn't just them.
At the moment, standing at base camp of another academic year, I'm simultaneously looking forward to the return of the restriction of timetables and the semester, and dreading it. I feel I put too many things on hold for semester time, too many important things. But then I proved this summer that I don't do a lot of them even when I have the time.
So why blogging?
Well, my best thing job is quite isolated. I mentioned 'non-traditional' scientist didn't I? I have a general sense of never having fitted in properly anywhere and while I can accept that I generally occupy different space to colleagues, I've never quite come to terms with the feeling of exclusion that comes from that. I also need to get back into the habit of writing more regularly about anything. I follow and read a number of academic blogs and identify with many of the situations outlined in many. I'm less good at commenting because other than saying 'me too', it's not clear what to add.
Why a public blog and why not a private journal? Because reading other blogs show me that it might not just be me and so I share in the hope that someone else might see something and think it isn't just them.
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