Academic Medicine Is a Deliberate Choice

Second in the "July 2022 vision series," I re-release my interview with Dr. Kemi Doll. Kemi explains that we need to clear our own compasses so that we know how to navigate our academic careers with meaning and purpose. She describes how she keeps her own compass clear with self-care, self-examination, taking time with herself, as well as planning and prioritizing her academic work according to her own true north. Kemi notes that many academics lose themselves to academic culture and institutional expectations, allowing external pressures to cloud their purposeful reasons for wanting to be academics in the first place. In this way, as they settle and allow the things that were once personally meaningful to them to be stripped away, Kemi explains that they experience burnout in slow motion. She also offers rich and focused advice about how academics can find and dust off their internal compasses. In addition to her academic work, Dr. Kemi Doll also coaches women of color faculty in academic medicine and is the creator of the weekly podcast, Your Unapologetic Career. Find her at https://kemidoll.com.