Bozena shares her thoughts on the challenges facing
Posted: Thu Feb 06, 2025 4:20 am
Being an early career researcher is a very individual journey and it is hard to think of challenges that are universally applicable. Managing the multiple, proverbial ‘hats’ is certainly in my top three.
The role of PhD student is usually clearly defined, but most PhD students don’t have a permanent job guaranteed upon completion of their thesis and the opportunities that come up are very circumstantial.
This means you have to be flexible and often change mexico rcs data your ‘hat’, so that you can develop a coherent portfolio of work, while making the most of opportunities available, even if they do not neatly align with what you would like to research in the perfect world.
There is also the ‘long-term hat’ and the ‘short term hat’ – there may be funding opportunities that require you to plan for a few years ahead. At the same time, you may not know where your next paycheck is coming from.
There is the ‘leadership hat’ and the ‘supporter hat’ – sometimes you take a lead role on papers or projects, and you make executive decisions that may contradict someone else’s views. Other times, your role is to support someone else, even if their views contradict yours.
You need to find a way to be proud of your successes, while swiftly moving on from rejections; to lecture without preaching; to compete without letting it impede your collaborations.
The good news is that, with practice, one day you find yourself with a wardrobe full of `hats` and whatever comes your way, you will already have a `hat` for that.
The role of PhD student is usually clearly defined, but most PhD students don’t have a permanent job guaranteed upon completion of their thesis and the opportunities that come up are very circumstantial.
This means you have to be flexible and often change mexico rcs data your ‘hat’, so that you can develop a coherent portfolio of work, while making the most of opportunities available, even if they do not neatly align with what you would like to research in the perfect world.
There is also the ‘long-term hat’ and the ‘short term hat’ – there may be funding opportunities that require you to plan for a few years ahead. At the same time, you may not know where your next paycheck is coming from.
There is the ‘leadership hat’ and the ‘supporter hat’ – sometimes you take a lead role on papers or projects, and you make executive decisions that may contradict someone else’s views. Other times, your role is to support someone else, even if their views contradict yours.
You need to find a way to be proud of your successes, while swiftly moving on from rejections; to lecture without preaching; to compete without letting it impede your collaborations.
The good news is that, with practice, one day you find yourself with a wardrobe full of `hats` and whatever comes your way, you will already have a `hat` for that.