Former Secretary of State Colin Powell offers leadership advice through storytelling in this collection of anecdotes and true tales. Each short chapter derives a lesson from an incident encountered in his military and political service, and occasionally from private life. Often chatty and rarely preachy, the text is as enjoyable as it is informative. An […]
Not long ago, the Fighty Squirrel noticed that as her days wound down, she was struggling to read. Over the course of thirty minutes at the very end of the day, I’d go from not being able to read a computer screen, to not being able to read a book to having a massive headache. […]
A few weeks back, my mentor had us watch Amy Schumer’s parody video about women at the top of their respective fields continuously saying, “I’m sorry,” and then we talked about why it’s just not what you want or need to say. Well, yesterday morning I had my chances to prove that I took that […]
Have you ever had a panicked colleague breathlessly share how hard they are working on grants, papers and mentoring only to find that you feel completely stressed out just having talked to them? It turns out there’s a biological basis for it. A subset of your brains neurons are activated not only when you feel bad or are […]
Frances Oldham Kelsey. This name may not ring a bell, but it should. She died on August 7 at the age of 101. But how does Dr. Kelsey affect you? Dr. Kelsey began working at the FDA in August, 1960, one of 7 full time medical officers hired to review human drug applications. Early in […]
Step 1 of the 1 Step Sure Fire Way to Know What Your Boss Thinks About You is….. ASK! Sounds ridiculous, right? But there are countless people who spending sleepless nights worrying they aren’t doing enough, they are doing the wrong things, the wrong way while sporting bad hair. Stop freaking out. Open your computer, send a […]
Your colleagues, current and potential trainees, collaborators and yes, study sections are doing internet searches on you with greater frequency. Knowing that people are looking, why not show them what you want them to see? Here’s a list, in no particular order, of things these folks want to see on your first lab website. A picture […]
I’d like to make a modest proposal. We should stop scheduling meetings with zero time to go from one meeting to the next. Does this describe your life? You have a meeting scheduled from 9:00am to 10:00am. And then another meeting from 10:00am to 10:30am. You have left yourself exactly zero minutes to get from […]
Although passion is often thought to be a necessary ingredient for success, we all know it’s not the only one. If you’re passionate about handwritten letters, but everyone you know uses email, you may need to adapt to communicate. Likewise, if your passion is autism, but another developmental disorder is what’s getting funded, you’re faced […]
One of the most widespread myths in academic writing is that you can, and should, try to “clear the decks”—that is, finish all of your other obligations before you can focus on your scholarship. The reality is: Things never clear up. They don’t even reliably settle down. Your in box is always full. The decks […]