Wonder if academia is the right for you? Want to set yourself free from academia and unhealthy practices? Learn from our guest, Dr Ires Ghielen!

Do you ever wonder if academia is the right place for you? Or whether you can ‘hack it’ in your research field? I think every researcher ask themselves such a question at some point…

This is a question that often pops up whenever you feel overwhelmed or stuck in some way. Maybe even trapped into the academic system. You feel like it is never good enough and there is an infinite amount of things to do.

I also experienced this, and it got me into a burn-out. After some rest and a lot of time to reflect, I started to practice science in a completely different way. I could handle negative feedback and took criticism NOT personally anymore, I communicated effectively with my supervisors, I was way more relaxed, and eventually I finished my PhD in 50% of the time by working SMARTER, not harder.

And here, I will share with you the 6 steps as to how I did that.

Step 1: Get insight into the patterns and interactions

As we all know, the academic environment is extremely challenging. There is a lot of pressure (to publish), a lot of interest in play, and a crazy amount of competition. You only hear all the amazing achievements of everybody, not the struggles. And trust me, those struggles were definitely there, but researchers simply don’t want to ‘lose face’.

Supervisors and professors had to work insanely hard to achieve what they achieved, they encountered a whole lot of bumps along their way. So you can imagine, they want to defend what they’ve got. They have become an expert in their field; they DOMINATE their field. That is also probably what attracted you to him or her in the first place, right?

There are two ways for them to defend their position: strengthen it by achieving more (get more money, be a keynote speaker at conferences, publish high impact papers) and weaken others. The second one is of course the easiest way. Because when the other person is inferior to you, you are automatically in the dominant position. So for example, when you receive negative feedback, they put you in an inferior position because ‘they know better’. Also, micro-managing you and micro-aggressions towards you, are examples of this dynamic. And there are many more examples, it happens very subtle and basically every day.

Step 2: Communicate effectively with your supervisors

Once you have this insight, you can also see that it is almost never personal. They put you down (in more or less subtle ways) to maintain their dominant position, not to attack you as a person per se. And this helps you to see it from their point of view, but also to not take criticism personally.

And if you see this, you can use the dynamics to your advantage. If you have conflicts (big or small) with your supervisor(s), you are probably stuck in the same dynamics. And this is constantly the path of the most resistance. How can you choose a path with less resistance? I would say, there are two ways: pick your battles, and communicate in a different way. The first is pretty straight forward, however, the second is a bit more difficult. That requires you to talk in their language, to act more submissive (while actually being in control), make them feel like they have the final say. This way, you get what you want and need, without upsetting your supervisor(s).  

Step 3: Improve your stress management

So there is a lot going on in the communication; the interactions and dynamics. Now, apart from that, it is good to invest in your own stress management. How to effectively cope with stress, feelings of anxiety and depression. And these skills come in handy for the rest of your life!

I found a good therapist, and after that several coaches, that helped me improve my stress management in a sustainable way. There are tons of short term ‘tricks’ to deal with stress, but investing for the long run is way more effective. So it will not really matter what comes your way, you feel confident about handling it.

This starts with putting up a mirror. It is quite confronting and challenging, but you really have to reflect upon yourself. Upon your thoughts, your actions, your words, your feelings. The most important question here is; Why do YOU feel stressed about this? So why does this explicitly trigger YOU?

Step 4: Be sensible about your energy levels

After you feel confident, are in control, and feel strong, it is time to really get those results within your research. You want to finish your research in the most efficient way. And you need ENERGY for that, which is very much underestimated.

Become aware of your energy GIVERS and energy TAKERS. What makes you enthusiastic and what makes you feel drained? For example, having meetings was a huge energy taker for me. I was in a rush all day and felt like I had to make smart comments all the time. A definite energy giver for me is dancing. So I actually dance multiple times a day, in between work, I have done it already 3 times while writing this blog 😉. Once you know this, you can eliminate takers, and incorporate more givers. So you stay energetic, stay motivated, and have more fun!

Step 5: Become world champion in focusing

There are so many tasks, obligations, and distractions, that it’s really hard to stay FOCUSED. But you need focus in order to perform. And there are a lot of different things you can do to upgrade your focus, which altogether makes you a world champion.

The most important one in this is to eliminate distractions. Because you first lose time to get distracted, and secondly, you lose time to go back to your task. So you miss out TWICE! Our biggest distractor is our phone. Every vibration, every light-up, every sound is distracting us from what we were doing. So the best advice I can give you: put your phone away. For me, even having my phone in sight is already distracting, so I put it in another room whenever I need to focus.

Step 6: Develop your own gameplan that works over and over again

Gather all previous things and combine them in order to make a WINNING game plan for yourself. Usually, your supervisor(s) don’t really care HOW you get it done, they mostly worry about that it gets done, and that something is finished in time. So you can take some freedom in HOW you work. If you work best in the morning, start early. If you work best with hardcore music, listen to that. If you work best while taking short frequent breaks, take them. And so on…

We are often limited by ourselves, and a lot of unwritten rules within academia. You have to always be present at the office, you have to work overtime, you have to do all kinds of shitty tasks. But how many of those rules are actually necessary? If you make your own rules, the results will be much better as well, so that benefits everyone!

Closing statement

So set yourself free from all these struggles within academia. It is a harsh environment, so it is so important to take good care of yourself. You cannot change the system, but you can change the way you deal with it all. Take that control, work on your mindset and personal gameplan, to practice science in a healthy and happy way 😊.