Ten years

It was ten years ago this week that I went to my first meeting, which means I've been doing this work for a decade.  Wow. 

I recently went to a new-to-me meeting (where I suspect I missed the chance to meet a bunch of bloggers - boo!) that was pretty interesting. Not my people, exactly, but I learned some science and had good interactions with my boss. It's weird starting over. I know tons of people at my normal meetings, but very few at this one. In a way it felt like the first few meetings I attended, except that I now know how to navigate a meeting and I know a lot more science. I understand how to pick which talks I see, which sessions I skip, how to handle a poster session, how to mingle in the hallways. Fortunately, I was able to go to meals with my boss and various friends of his, so I was never on my own in an awkward way. Yet I didn't feel like a puppy because I went to most sessions on my own.

Now I'm all jazzed up to get some data!

Keeping a foot in both worlds

One of the tricky things about switching fields, yet being interdisciplinary, is figuring out how much involvement you want to keep in your old field.  My research still incorporates a lot from my old field, and I still identify as more of an Old Field-ologist.  Yet, I want to make inroads into New Field since that's the direction I've chosen for my budding research program.

This identity crisis isn't much of an issue except when choosing journals for papers and picking which meetings to attend.  There are two Old Field meetings this year that I really wanted to go to, but I think I'm going to miss them both in favor of New Field travel.  To be clear, it would have been completely relevant to take my current postdoc research to the Old Field meetings.  I say I switched fields, but they are not completely alien to each other.

Ultimately I'd like to work right on the border of the two areas.  My goal for my postdoc was to learn as much as I could about New Field(s), and then be able to assimilate that with my old stuff into something really cool and unique and interdisciplinary and, I think, hot right now.  So while it's disappointing that I'll miss my favorite meetings and the old friends and colleagues I'd see at them, I think it's better for my progress to go to the New Field events.  I'll be on a steeper learning curve, so I'll probably get more out of them, and I'll probably be expanding my network faster.  But it will be a little sad to tell my science friends, "no, I'm not going to Favorite Meeting again this year.  But I swear I'll be back someday soon".

I'm back, and France was great!  Getting to the conference venue was a bitch, but once we were there is was completely awesome.  It was one of those smaller (<200 people), highly focused meetings where they have you at an isolated place so you stay together a lot.  We had all our meals together instead of breaking off into groups going to different restaurants, so there was tons of opportunity to interact with all different people.  The pacing of the program was really good too, with tons of time for poster viewing and discussion.  That worked because the posters were super good.  Surprisingly, I had lots of traffic at my poster which I hadn't expected given its topic.

I made kind of a personal breakthrough at this meeting as well.  I recently read the book Who Moved My Cheese? and the line from it, "what would I do if I weren't afraid?" really stuck with me.  I kept that in mind as I reminded myself not to be Advisor Junior.  In other words, when I go to meetings with Research Advisor, I tend to stay by her side a lot.  She's great and all, but this means that I don't carry on my own conversations with people and they probably remember me as someone from her lab rather than as someone who is interesting in her own right.  So this time, I made a concerted effort to gracefully walk away to start my own conversations or sit with other people during meals.  It worked really well and I felt like my networking was really effective.

After the conference, I made my way to EGM's sister's place and had a fantastic weekend visit with her and her family.  I'm grateful that we get on so well given that I've only met a few times.  And I'm happy that I made the effort to see his family since we have so little opportunity to visit them.

Now, I hope that the meeting we're hosting next week will be anywhere near as successful!

Prepping

This fall has brought me way more travel than I'm used to.  I went to a meeting a several weeks ago, then there was a departmental retreat, and now I'm getting ready to go to France on Friday!  This is my first international travel for work and I'm super nervous about it.  At least Research Advisor is going too.  I'm happy about that because it will make the travel easier and because it will be nice to have some quality time to catch up.  Like about how we're both so sad about Awesome Technician leaving (I cried at her good-bye lunch, which is the first time I've ever cried at work about anything).  After the conference, I'm going to travel to another French city to visit Ecogeoman's sister.  That should be great fun as well.

All this has been happening in the midst of intense planning the conference we're hosting, working out the kinks in a lab experiment, and planning a major field experiment.  That is to say, I'm juggling way more balls than I have before.  That's cool because this kind of multi-tasking is what I'm supposed to be learning as my career progresses.  On the other hand, the stress makes me wonder if I would be happy with a job like PI's with this kind of stress day in and day out except times ten. 

On organizing a meeting

I'm organizing a small conference.  Sweet Jesus is it a lot of work.  And anxiety.

One of my first tasks when I started my postdoc was to organize this thing.  What an intimidating, enticing challenge.

In addition to managing all the logistical decisions (what space will we use? what is the budget? how much will the registration fee be? will we have a poster session? how will we solicit and review abstracts? how will we determine the invited:contributed speaker ratio? how long will the talks be? and on and on), I had to develop the themes for each session and the meeting overall, invite the invited speakers, solicit industry sponsors, and write proposals for funding.  It's weird and hard to assemble the right mix of speakers in a field that you have only just entered.  Oh, and trying to stick to my principles and make sure there is good representation by women when I don't know enough players in the field to suggest any.  Boo!

Of course I'm not doing this totally on my own. I've had lots of input from my colleagues, and critically, other people have laid the groundwork for invited speakers, or funding, or lent clout to my emails with their names in the cc line.  Still, on the whole, I've been the lead on this thing.  My influence has probably shifted the focus toward my old field a little bit, so I'm curious to see how that will play out in the quality and cohesion of the program.

In sum, I wish I hadn't had to spend so much of my precious postdoc time on a service task, but I'm glad to have tried something new and to gain so much visibility in this new field.

The meeting

Thanks for all of your concern about my travel drama. I made it to the meeting the next day with a couple of hours to spare. My luggage didn't make it on my flight, but they delivered it to my hotel before I wanted to go to bed, so no harm done. That day was about as stressful as I imagined, but I got through it with no major bumps.

Our special session went much better than my travel. The speakers all basically talked about what we wanted them to cover, and we mostly stayed on time. I had the unenviable job of moderating, including cutting off famous scientists when they went on too long. I hated doing this, and won't volunteer to do it again if I can avoid it. On the other hand, we got some good feedback about the session. We have even been invited to write a couple of summary/commentary type reports for publication, which is very exciting. The due dates are really soon, and neither of us really have time for another writing project, but I think it will be quite worth it.

My poster didn't get too much traffic, but I felt fine about that. It was directly after the session and I was too worn out from the travel anxiety and stress of running the session to be interested in answering questions. What's more, it was based on the least interesting chapter of my diss. So whatev.

The social aspects of the meeting weren't as good as they have been in past years, partly due to the geography of the location, I think. Still, I got to see some old science friends, meet a few new ones, witness an ass-shaking contest (abhorrent), and I got a couple of post doc leads. We'll see what comes of those.

In all, it was a successful meeting for me. I'm glad it's over, as I always feel when I return from travel. The weeks leading up to a trip are filled with conversations ending with, "after I get back from the meeting, I'll do x". It's nice that things should settle down now so we can all get some meaty work done.

Overbooked

I should be on an airplane right now. Unfortunately, my flight got canceled due to mechanical problems or something. There were absolutely no seats available on flights to my destination, or to the next nearest city. There were no seats on my airline, nor any other airline. There were no seats from the airport I from which I was meant to depart, nor from the next closest airport, nor from any airport within a 4-hour drive. Only the leg of my journey from here to layover city was affected, but there were no seats to layover city in time for the final leg of the flight. There was just no way to get me to Conference City today. At all. Could I BE any more pissed?!

So, my first airline refunded half my fare and I booked a new flight myself on Southwest, which apparently does not have ticket agreements with the other airline. Thus, I had to pay for the ticket, which was $185 more than my original fare. I will get to Conference City around 9 am. Our special session, which I am moderating, starts after lunch. I should make it with enough time, but I will feel rushed and tense instead of (sort of) relaxed and in control. The original plan was to arrive around 3 pm today, go to the hotel, and finalize details for tomorrow with my friend/session co-organizer. We were going to decide exactly what I'd say at the start and end of the session, what she would say after the break, what we hoped to achieve if we got time to meet with the speakers later in the day. She was going to practice her talk for me, since I am more expert in parts of her project than she is (it's new to her, but is my bread and butter). I was also going to have time to iron my clothes for the week, suss out what talks to see, and have dinner with other scientist-friends. Instead, I'll arrive in the morning, rush to the hotel to drop off my bag if I have time, or else go right to the conference center. I have to register, hang my poster (which is also scheduled for tomorrow), attend moderator training, finalize the deets with my friend, eat lunch, and get to the session. It will all be fine, I'm sure, but not how I wanted it to go. Stupid airplane.

Conferencing alone

Do you think it's better to attend a meeting on your own or with people from your lab? I see pros and cons to both situations.

Going with labmates can be great, particularly if they are good about introducing you to people they know. It's nice to have a guaranteed meal companion, someone to chat with during breaks, or to talk to when you get saturated and can't pretend to look at posters anymore. Beyond making a meeting experience less awkward, being with someone who knows people can certainly help you break into the conference cliques or get you introduced to potential collaborators. Tagging along with the Right Person can turn a so-so meeting into a career path-altering experience.

On the other hand, sometimes it's good to be on your own. Going with a colleague who does a poor job of introducing you to the people they know is infinitely frustrating and makes you think you'd be better off on your own. Moreover, when you're alone at a meeting you meet people because you have to. Because it's easier to stay in your comfort zone with labmates than it is to meet new people, labmates can inhibit networking. Being with friends can not only keep you from branching out, it can keep other people from approaching you if your group seems tight and intimidating.

The best case is when promoting your colleagues blends seamlessly with your own networking. It's poor form to ditch your labmates, but the point of conferences is to network and discuss science with the wider community. The balance depends on the personalities and experience of the players, of course, and I'm starting to think it takes some finesse to achieve.

December slump

My whiny post yesterday was a little bit of foreshadowing. Today I will discuss how I always feel crappy in December.

I have gone to a meeting in each of the past 3 or 4 Decembers. It sucks. There is always so much else going on with the holidays and scrambling to meet year-end goals. And I am never motivated in December. I'm either feeling lousy because it's dark and dreary or distracted because I'm excited about the approaching break/holiday. Every year I vow I won't do it again and then the next year I see myself hitting submit on an abstract for a December meeting. But I didn't this year! I'm blissfully deadline free until February. In any case, since it's so hard for me to set and stay focused on reasonable writing goals even when I'm feeling good, I think it's prudent for me to spend some time in the lab during a time when I know I'm easily distracted.

On top of my normal December yuck, EGM is away for 6 weeks (have I mentioned this yet? I'm one of those people who tells the same stories over and over and sometimes I worry I do it on the blog, too). I dropped him at the airport last weekend and now he's gone and I'm sad. I've never liked living alone. It's hard for me to resist turning into a giant stain when I'm home alone.

I mentioned the other day that I since I want to continue making progress on my new paper, I intend to write for the few first hours of each day and then move on to lab work. I think this is a great plan for my December because it should keep me moving. I think I'd spend a lot of time spacing out in front of my computer if I planned to just write this month. My idea is that if I plan to be at the bench, I'll at least be doing something. Seeing some measurable results will make me feel good about myself and perhaps keep me from slumping more. And it will be great to have something to show for myself when EGM returns.

Submitted!

I submitted the symposium proposal today. I feel like we did our honest best, so I'm happy with the product. It was a little nerve wracking to press send, especially after a gaff wherein I emailed the section chair a word document with the track changes still on (they hadn't been showing on my screen). A breathed a sigh of relief later in the day, though, when Cauliflower sent me a very nice and reassuring email saying everything looked great.

We still have two outstanding speaker invitations but if they both say yes, the final gender tally will be 7 women and 2 men. For the most part, we simply looked for the best person to represent certain topics and it just happened to be mostly women. Towards the end, I started to feel a little bad that we had so many women and tried to think of more men, but 7 to 2 is how it worked out. That might change if we get refusals, of course. A common complaint for women in science is that they don't get invited to give high profile talks because they just don't occur to the old boys. I didn't want to be a hypocrite. Given that it even crossed my mind, I think we were as fair as possible.

If the proposal is accepted, it will be awesome to know our work was fruitful and to have the exposure of producing the session. Fortunately, the negative consequences of a proposal like this are pretty limited -- it's not like our salaries are riding on it or anything. Even if it's not accepted, this has been a great learning experience. I have been amazed at how positive and supportive everyone has been and it was cool to interact with a few new people.

Symposium proposium

Since a few of you seemed interested in the process of proposing a symposium, I thought I’d write a post about it. I spent a lot of time struggling with it this week, so I’d like to talk about it here anyway. I am working on this proposal with a collaborator, Cauliflower, who works in another state and just recently finished her Ph.D.

I’m sure the way that symposia make it into meetings varies dramatically among societies. For this particular society, anyone can propose a symposium topic. Proposals are comprised of a 400 word description, a 250 word justification, and a list of speakers. They are due 11 months before the meeting. They are competitive; however I do not know the success rate. I do know that some symposium ideas are rejects and some end up as the less prestigious but similarly formatted Organized Oral Session.

This society is divided into subject sections that can endorse one symposium proposal and provide secondary endorsements for two more. This doesn’t ensure success, but it helps. There are two relevant sections for us, one of which had already committed to another proposal but agreed to give a secondary endorsement, and another that wants to evaluate all ideas it gets before it decides on one. If that section decides not to endorse our idea, I think we will try for an OOS. This is fine, but it appears to be a little less credit for about the same amount of work.

So, what’s the work we have to do? Well, first we pitched the idea around to our colleagues to see if it was something they thought would generate interest, be appropriate for this particular society’s meeting, etc. They liked it, so we crafted an email with a brief description to send to the section chairs. They liked it, so we began working on the proposal itself. We wrote a draft that we sent to Academic Advisor (who is very good at this sort of thing and did one himself a few years ago). He suggested some retooling.

It’s rather difficult to write about a big (sort of technical) knowledge gap in less than 400 words that will appeal to a broad swath of a large society. We had identified a good problem, but needed to state it more broadly. And we hadn’t really said what we hoped to achieve with the symposium -- how we would address/solve the problem. On top of that, Cauliflower is currently overseas working with collaborators, so there is a big time change that is inhibiting our communication. Both of us really struggled with the ideas this week, but after much back and forth I finally emailed what I think is a much better draft to Cauliflower last night. If she likes it, I’ll send it to our advisors for comments. We need to have a pretty final version finished early next week to submit to the subject section chair.

Okay, what else? We have to work with the section chair who happens to be a big famous scientist who I have never met (Cauliflower has) and intimidates me somewhat. Then we have to invite all the speakers, some of whom we know and some we don’t. The more speakers we have committed, the better. Some are famous big-wigs and some are quite early career. This is scary. However, it is exciting to have a reason to contact people I’d like to know. I think this is a major benefit of trying for a symposium, even if it is unsuccessful. I also think this is the part that will foster the most growth for me. If our symposium is selected, we have to write a short blurb for the program, work with the speakers to make sure they know what we want from their talks, make sure they get their abstracts in, and run the show the day of the session.

There were some comments alluding to the fact that it is surprising for students to be taking on a symposium proposal. That’s true – I fear I’m just at the brink of having bitten off more than I can chew – this is very challenging for a grad student and early post doc. However, the society always wants to encourage participation from new scientists so our proposal will actually be favored to some extent because we are so early in our careers. I think we have good people around us who think our idea is good and will help us along or at least keep us from falling on our faces. Let's hope, anyway.

Meeting notes

Oh my, have I been dragging my heels about posting my experience at the Big Meeting last week. I have been thinking about all the things I want to share, so this post is a little rambly and I might write more later. Plus I'm so excited about some of it that I've wanted to work rather than blog. So out of character!

First of all, thank you for all the well-wishes before I left. My talk went reasonably well, I think. Not outstanding, but not a flop. I felt very lucky because I was in one of the few rooms that was an appropriate size for the attendance at my session (most sessions were in rooms that were pratically empty or had people sitting on the floor in the aisles). While I was speaking, I noticed that the audience was very still and quiet. I took this as a good sign, since people tend to get fidgety if they are bored during a 20 min presentation (rather than falling asleep in that short time).

As for the science, I saw some good talks and posters, but no standouts that really blew me away. There a few clunkers, but mostly what I saw was solid but not ground breaking. Where I really benefitted was the networking.

When people asked about my timeline, I was able to say I'd be graduating soonish and I am starting to think abut post doc opportunities, so hopefully I'm on the radar for some labs. I think a few people might be interested, but it's still a little far off. I also tried to talk up a new experiment that my research group has recently established, the kind where we do the most central aspects of the research and others come from elsewhere to use the study site to perform related work in a somewhat synergistic way. I think at least one person will be contacting Research Advisor about a possible collaboration. I also had an idea for a symposium that I think I'm going to propose with a grad-student friend. Everyone I have suggested it to has encouraged us to pursue it, so I feel really excited. It will be a lot of work and it will probably get rejected, but it makes me feel really good to have come up with something that people think is a good idea.

This meeting is by far the most fun of all the big meetings I typically attend (it's rivaled by a small, biannual meeting that's my favorite). I always come away feeling super exhausted, yet energized by the connections I make both to new people and to new ideas. I ended up staying out till between 12 and 3 am every night, then getting up between 7 and 8 am each day. I have made some good friends with people I see at meetings year after year and then we introduce each other to new people each time. It has become easier for me since it doesn't take as much effort to meet everyone new for the first time, but it remains fresh. Still, I was postively wiped out by the end and pretty much slept and slothed all weekend.

One thing I have learned about myself is that although I'm pretty outgoing, I'm not really an extrovert. It takes a lot of energy for me to interact with so many people so intensely. I really enjoy it and the experience invigorates my work, but I don't feel like I obtain energy from the people time. I often think how difficult meetings must be for really shy people. It would really be a challenge to get the most out of a meeting if it was hard to talk to new people.

Oh, and I got to briefly meet Addy N. We didn't make a plan for meeting up, but she had told me her name when we emailed about the possibility of meeting, so I checked out her website for a photo. I was just standing talking to a friend when I looked up and recognized her. It was very cool to meet her and D., but too bad we didn't get to hang out more.

In other news, I had a great meeting with Academic Advisor about that paper I blogged about months ago. He suggested some relatively straightfoward changes, some of which I did right away and get this: he commented on my changes right away too! He says he thinks it's nearly ready, so cross your fingers that Research Advisor will agree when she reads it.

List

First of all, the new Scientiae is up at Faraday's Cage is Where You Put Schroedinger's Cat. Cherish did an excellent job putting it together in a most creative way, so go see it. Second, Silver Fox has an explanation for why many blogs aren't loading right today (if you're lame like us and use Internet Explorer).

Anyway, I'm wound up tighter than a tick (as my dad would say) preparing for Big Meeting, mostly because I'm not settled with my talk yet. So, a list.

• Finish talk (nearly there).
• Email talk to Academic Advisor. We had a great meeting on Thursday; he made many helpful suggestions to improve the structure and flow. I want to send him the completed presentation so he can make any last comments if he wants. Research Advisor, who knows the work I'm presently much more intimately, has been away on vacation without her computer for the last week and a half (good for her!) so I haven't been able to benefit from her guidance.
• Practice, practice, practice. It's the only way to reduce nerves.
• Obtain quarters for laundry, do laundry, iron.
• Review the meeting program so I can figure out what I want to see and when I'll have free time.
• Visit Walgreens. Need toilet paper (the cats have shredded some of my stock); clear-ish nail polish (to try to prevent biting. It's unbecoming in so many ways, not the least of which are annoying the person seated next to you by making disgusting chewing sounds and offering to shake someone's hand with a hand that's just been in your mouth.); travel size hairspray and toothpaste; gel inserts for the cute shoes I really want to wear but are just slightly too big and rub blisters.
• Pack suitcase with clothes and backpack with proof of registration, bus ticket, supporting info for my talk in case people want to discuss it later, etc.
• Cat stuff. EGM won't be back from Canada until Wednesday, so I need to leave them with enough supplies for a few days alone.
• Tidy up. But not very well.

Can I just prepare an awesome talk?

If things go to plan, tomorrow I will have the last of the data I need for my talk at Big Meeting in two weeks. Having two weeks to work with the data is actually pretty good for me. As much as I swear I won't do it again, for whatever reason I always end up scrambling to get the last results with just a few days to spare. This time, I have worked with the preliminary data pretty extensively (I gave a poster on it last year) so I at least have some idea what to expect.

Despite that, my anxiety about preparing for conference presentations seems to increase as I gain experience. I have been to pretty many conferences (1 to 3 each year since 2001) and I have grown less anxious about the meeting itself since I am familiar with the routine and I now know enough people that I can usually find someone to have lunch with even when none of my labmates are there. But the stakes feel higher for my presentations. I used to feel like I was just a young student, so people would know not to expect too much from me. On top of that, I could relax with the idea that they wouldn't remember me anyway, so if I said something stupid, it would vanish into the black hole of the unremembered and I would start with a clean slate next year. But now people do remember me (for which I am grateful, of course!). And I want to impress them. I want them to have in mind that I gave a nice talk when I let them know I'll be graduating and looking for post docs soon.

While diligently working in the lab to get the last of my data, I've been carrying around 8-10 papers that are highly relevant to the talk I plan to give. Yet I haven't read them. Since I only have two weeks to do all the data analysis, interpret the results, make pretty graphs, and write the talk, you'd think I would try to be efficient by doing any necessary literature review before I get the data. But no. Instead I'm all paralyzed by worry about the scientific quality of my presentation. Can I just get over it?

I like to think of myself as a junior colleague. The scientists at these meetings are not the "grown-ups", they are my more senior colleagues (by now, some of them are even junior colleagues to me!). I want them to respect me and my work as I come up the ranks. So can I please not make a boring talk during which I say something ridiculous?

Back

I'm back! Actually, I've been back for a few days but I haven't gotten around to posting because I had so many posts to read. You people are just far too interesting.

So, the meeting was fine. It was an annual workshop that I've attended before, so I didn't get as much out of it this time. The participants were all students, at all levels, in a range of disciplines. Personally, I think the workshop program needs major overhauling in order to meet the very difficult task of providing something valuable to all members of such a wide audience. They ask us to come for an entire week in June, the time when people are finally freed from the classroom to focus on research or need to be working outdoors in the field, so I think we should be able expect to really benefit from the program that takes us away at such a crucial time. The worst part for me was listening to several of the same talks, positively steeped in opinion, that I heard last year. The best part was interacting with the many undergrads who were eager to learn all about grad school, what it's like to do research, and the science everyone is doing. The even better part was that more than 50% of the people there were women, some from very male-dominated fields.

My talk was okay, but not as seamless and interesting as I would have liked. As I was working on it, I realized that I don't have a super good grasp of how the work fits with some of the recent literature. One lab group has published several very nice papers in the last 6 months or so that put forth a new concept substantiated with several lines of observational evidence. I need to study those papers to figure out how my research adds to that body of work rather than simply confirming it. So, that's why my talk last week was so unsatisfying. However, I think I know what I need to do next (before my presentation at the big August meeting).

Since I've been back, I learned that Research Advisor finally started to do a Lab Thing that has been holding me up. She didn't finish it, but we decided I could move on with part of it in the meantime. I'm glad because waiting for her had me suck on two different projects and I was starting to resent it. But before I do any work in that lab space, I have to clean it because someone did Something Bad in it and now I don't trust the integrity of samples processed in it. Poo. On the personal side, yesterday we met a bunch of friends at a festival where I saw 1. a man wearing a black cowboy hat, cowboy boots, and tiny briefs that had "evil" written in glitter across the ass, and nothing else. and 2. a man wearing tiny denim briefs and nothing else. There was also a marching band band that was awesome and seriously, the most openly-affectionate same-sex couples I've ever seen. That was really cool. Today I had grand plans for doing all sorts of housework, work reading, etc., but ALL I've done is read blog posts. Maybe I'll get my ass into gear and at least go to the grocery store.

Travel anxiety and procrastination

I'm going on a trip tomorrow. I have to attend a workshop for my fellowship program during which I will give a 30-45 min talk (nice that they were so clear with the time expectations, eh?). The talk isn't finished yet, but it shouldn't take me too long to polish it off. Too bad I'm blogging instead.

I always get a lot of anxiety before I travel, especially when it's for work. I get nervous about making my flight, how I'm going to get to the airport, how I'm going to find the hotel, etc. I mentally list what I'm going to wear so I don't end up short a shirt or something. I also worry about my talk/poster. I'll have visions of forgetting the poster tube or bringing the wrong memory stick. I'm usually fine with actually giving the presentation, but I get anxious about everything up until the session starts.

I best get back to work on the talk so I can go to bed early tonight and enjoy the afternoon in conference city tomorrow with some of the fellows with whom I have become friends at past workshops. Also, I'm not sure if I'll be blogging while I'm away, but with the infrequency of my posts lately, that should be nothing new.