Academic Writing Amplified

Nothing feels worse than having a piece of writing you’ve worked hard on rejected or criticized. But, it’s part of the academic life, so I’m teaching you how to deal with it in a healthy and positive way that will improve your writing and help get your message out there.  On this episode we’re going to talk about 3 different types of feedback you might receive, how to spot the differences between them and how to respond. I’ll also tell you about an excellent resource to help with your mindset, and why you should consider disconnecting from both praise and criticism.    3 Types of Writing Criticism and How to Respond   1. Posturing  It should come as no surprise to anyone that there is a lot (I mean A LOT) of posturing in academia. The pressure is always on to sound smart, to respond to other people’s work in a way that shows what you’ve read and where you situate your work in the world. That’s not necessarily bad and it’s certainly part of the job. But sometimes that pressure to posture seeps into everything, including writing criticism.   Here’s how it might look in a written review: The reviewer’s criticism does not actually engage with what you wrote, but rather shows off how much he/she knows about the topic (this is the defining characteristic of posturing). The reviewer suggests you cite a completely different body of literature than the one your work relies on (likely a body of literature that he knows better than the one you cited). The reviewer calls you out for not citing one very particular article and implies that you can’t possibly write scholarship in this field without citing it. How to Respond: I suggest you make a table with two columns, detailing the specific criticism or recommendation on the left side, and how you addressed it on the right when preparing to respond to any feedback. To deal with posturing, you might note on your chart: “while I appreciate the reviewers suggestion to include ____  in my article, for ____ reasons I decided not to cite that here.” What this does is make the posturing of the reviewers apparent, and shows the editor that you’ll have none of it. “Remember: it’s your work, and you can decide who to cite.” -Cathy Mazak   2. Silencing The end goal of this type of criticism is to block or revoke publication. What silencing might look like:   A reviewer nitpicking small details of your work.  A reviewer grasping at straws for reasons why your work shouldn’t be published at all, or should be retracted.  Little to no evidence against your piece given other than disagreement with the main idea   I experienced this recently (from a colleague at my own university!) in response to this article I wrote for The Chronicle of Higher Education on what the role of university communities should be in the face of devastating circumstances in our communities.    How to Respond: Like posturing, you need to see through this kind of criticism (good editors help). Silencing can put you on the defensive, but once you recognize it, you’ll see that the critiques have no basis or are not related to your main point. If your piece has an editor, be sure to get in contact with him or her and call out the silencing. Don’t get into an internet fight with the person—be above that!—and let your work speak for itself. “If you let yourself become enraged or beaten down, then the silencer will win.” -Cathy Mazak   3. Constructive Criticism This is the kind of feedback we want! Even though it might hurt, most criticism should be heard and addressed. The review process is there for a reason, and it is not to torture you! We are often so close to our own work that we can’t take a step back and see it from another perspective. The job of the reviewer is to show us our blind spots, see connections we missed, to call us out before publication so that we aren’t called out after.   That said, too many academics give up after receiving reviews. They put the reviews away and give up on the paper. Don’t do this! Remember: your unique, once-only-on-earth perspective on your field needs to be out there changing the world. DON’T let criticism relegate your writing to a drawer.    Here is a step-by-step plan for how to deal with the review process: Make sure you are in a good mental state before opening and reading reviews. After reading the reviews, wait 24 hours before you do anything. Re-read the reviews (after waiting 24 hours) and make a list of all the positive feedback. (We often gloss over this part, draw some attention to it!) Read through again and make a chart with one column detailing each criticism and a second column noting how you will address it. Take a first pass at planning how you will address each item on the chart. Note things that will be quick to fix, and things that will take longer to address. Start picking off the easy-to-fix items on the list. Schedule harder or more time consuming tasks onto your calendar, for example: adding additional literature, re-analyzing data, etc. “Breaking down the revisions into smaller steps helps alleviate feelings of overwhelm and makes sure that you get your revisions done.” -Cathy Mazak Disconnecting From Praise and Criticism  While accepting and dealing with writing criticism is all part of the job in academia, it is certainly not always easy. I want to recommend a great resource for helping you disconnect from both praise and criticism. Playing Big by Tara Moore has a wealth of helpful information on how and why you should do this. A few of the things she discusses:   Feedback often tells you more about the person giving the feedback than it does about your work, or certainly about you as a person.  If you are putting yourself and your work out there in the world as a woman, you are going to get criticized. Criticism hurts more when it mirrors beliefs we already hold about ourselves. Why should we disconnect from praise? Ask yourself: what do I want in life more than I want praise?   “Women who play big get criticized. Period.” -Cathy Mazak, referencing Playing Big by Tara Moore Do you want to be part of a community of academic women who support each other, offer helpful advice and know where you’re coming from because they’ve been there too? Consider applying for Amplify: Faculty Writing Accelerator. To apply, click here.   Connect with me: Website Facebook Group Facebook Page Add at the bottom "This episode was first published at cathymazak.com/episode9

Burnout is a real thing for academics. I know you know this, but you might not know exactly what “pre-burnout” looks like, and what to do if you feel like you might be on the edge of a burnout. On this podcast episode, I’m sharing the stories of two times that I got very close to burning out, how I dealt with it, and what I’m doing to keep a comfortable pace right now. I’m sharing some red flags to help you recognize the signs of pre-burnout in yourself, as well as an exercise to help you control the pace of your academic life so academia feels good to you.  My stories My first burnout situation came when my infant son became extremely sick. About two weeks into the semester, after I went back to work from maternity leave, my 10-month-old son stopped breathing while I was nursing him to sleep one night.  This was the beginning of the 10 most horrible days of my life.  By late October I was so exhausted and strained that I could not continue. If I didn’t take action I would end up in the hospital myself. So I took sick leave. Right at the worst time of the semester. I remember sitting in the office of my young, single department head and feeling like he would never understand, or would push back. But he didn’t. I took the leave I needed to recover.  “I thought the world was going to collapse, but it absolutely did not.” -Cathy Mazak My second experience with pre-burnout came the traumatic academic year of Hurricane María. We were a country exhausted from hurricane recovery and a university trying to find our footing after blow after blow by the Financial Oversight and Management Board for Puerto Rico. We were collectively breaking down. But this time I recognized the signals and took action sooner. I heard the desperate voice in my head that said, “I just need to breathe. I can’t keep this up. If I could only rest …” This time, I intentionally listened to that voice and rested. On the weekends, I made myself lie down, I cleared our schedule, we ate more takeout, and the kids watched more Netflix. I whittled down my to-do list until it only contained the absolutely necessary items to finish the semester: grade the papers. Give the classes. That’s it. The difference between this almost-breakdown and the first one was that I knew that if I cut way back, everything would still be fine. The world would not end. And, I deeply understood that if I didn’t deliberately rest, I would collapse, and that wouldn’t serve anyone. Read about my son’s illness, the year after Hurricane Maria, and all the details in this article I wrote for Inside Higher Ed.  Recognizing Pre-Burnout Recognizing you are about to burnout means tuning in to what your body and mind are trying to tell you. Here are some red flags for me:   I was exhausted from the moment I woke up to the moment I went to bed. I had no energy. I was mentally foggy. I couldn’t bring up the words I wanted to use, and my memory was shaky. I was on the verge of tears constantly.   Recovering from Burnout (and Avoiding it in the Future) Recovering from burnout is not easy. It takes intentional effort to make the right choices for your health. Here are some ideas for recovering and avoiding the issue in the future.   Create room for deliberate rest. Nap when you can, go to bed early, do whatever you can to get more sleep.  Pare down your schedule to include only the absolute necessities.  Move your body. Find a way to incorporate gentle exercise. I joined a gym that provided childcare. Call in reinforcements. Ask for help! Draw on whatever resources you can. I called my mom to come help with the kids for a while. When summer rolls around, don’t try to “get ahead”. Plan it out to include rest and activities that rejuvenate you.  Do whatever is necessary to recover, including taking time off. Controlling the Pace-How do You Want Academia to Feel? If you’ve had an experience that stopped you in your tracks like a death in the family, illness, or other serious issue, you may have been forced to change the pace of your academic life. But you don’t need to wait for something to blow up to decide you need a change.    How do you want to feel in your academic life? Remember that the feeling comes first, not after something you’ve set up as an arbitrary sign post. Here is an exercise you can do to prioritize your own goals for how you want academia to feel for you.   Choose one word for the way you want to feel in your academic life and write it down.. (For example: Calm)   Now list 10 things that a person who that adjective describes might do.  For our example of “calm”, you might write:   Eats breakfast sitting at the table Takes a walk every day  Is content with accomplishing three things Makes a plan and sticks to it Starts work at 9:00 and stops work at 5:00 Gets 7-8 hours of sleep Asks for help before a situation gets out of control Shakes off guilt about undone projects Concentrates on restorative activities on the weekends  Meditates using the Calm app in the middle of the work day   The problem is that you are saying when X happens, THEN I’ll feel Y. But you need to start feeling Y right now. Nothing needs to happen first. “You need to draw a line in the sand and say, ‘from now on, I am a calm person’”. -Cathy Mazak   If you want to join a small cohort of academic women who are learning ways to amplify their impact in academia without the break-neck pace, apply for my Amplify: Writing Accelerator program. In this program, you’ll get permission to do things the way that feels right for you, and learn how to write and publish more while still controlling the pace. Say goodbye to guilt and overwhelm, and hello to a new movement for women in the campus culture. Click here to apply. Connect with me: Website Facebook Group Facebook Page This episode was first published at cathymazak.com/episode8.

Continuous learning through professional development is a key way to accomplish the goals that you and your university share. On this podcast episode, I’m sharing tips and ideas for how to get funding for professional development from your institution.  Although it sometimes might not seem like it, your administration really wants you to succeed--to get tenure, to get promoted, and to stay at your institution. They spent a lot of money finding you. They definitely want to keep you. So guess what? They should be paying for your professional development! But they never will unless you ask. Not sure where to start? Let’s jump in. Here are three steps you can take to successfully request professional development funding from your university.   Step 1: Identify all the Possible Sources I have been offering professional development to women professors for a long time and I have seen everyone from students to full professors get funding, even when they thought they couldn’t use start-up or grant money, or their universities initially told them there was no money available. What I’ve learned is that there is always money somewhere; you just have to know where to look and who to ask. Here are possible sources of professional development funding to explore, and I suggest you tap all of them: Your own start-up or professional development funds. If you have such funds, you can absolutely use them to fund all or part of a professional development program like Amplify: The Faculty Writing Accelerator. Even if you already allotted them somewhere else, it may be as easy as talking to your budget office. Department chair and dean. They might not be advertising that they have professional development money, but many do. You will need to ask and make a good case for why they should use it on you.  Professional development office or faculty support office on your campus. If your campus has this office, ask them to fund your participation in a professional development program like Amplify: The Faculty Writing Accelerator. You could offer to hold an on-campus writing workshop based on what you learned or form a faculty writing group (but you don’t have to, and don’t go overboard on promises you make!). Faculty or equity diversity office. You can ask this department to fund your professional development as an academic woman. There are plenty of stats you can point them to that reveal that women, especially women of color, are less likely to get promoted in higher ed. And what is THE key to getting a promotion and tenure? Yep, it’s writing. For that reason, your equity/diversity office should be paying to support your writing development.    Step 2: Connect to the Strategic Plan This is grant-writing 101: align what you are asking for to the institution's goals. Your university says that it wants to retain women faculty? Quote that in your funding request letter (see this letter template).  Your university’s strategic plan is supposed to be what guides the administration’s decisions. They are committed to that plan because that is how they justify themselves to accreditation bodies. If you want support, you need to intimately know that strategic plan and quote it directly when asking for funding. The more clearly you can connect the outcomes of the professional development program to your strategic plan, the more likely your administration will say “yes.”   Step 3: Ask (and Keep Asking!) Start asking TODAY. And ask at all levels. Start with your department chair, and keep going up the ranks. Ask all the offices mentioned in step 1. If someone says a flat “no, I don’t have the money,” then ask them for a letter of support that you can take with you to the next ask.  Be sure to continue to follow up with the decision-makers that you ask until you get a solid “yes” or “no.” Don’t let your request sit on someone’s desk until the registration period of your target program closes! If you’ve made it to the position you’re in today, you know how to be persistent, so put that persistence to work. “It is in your university’s best interest to keep you, to keep you from burning out, and to not have to recruit another person to replace you… so sit with that confidence that says ‘they chose me’.”   So, what professional development program will you choose?    I’d love for you to check out Amplify: The Faculty Writing Accelerator.  Amplify is a year-long support program for pre-tenure academic women who want their tenure prep to feel less like hazing and more like inspiration. This group is limited to small cohorts of six to ten women who are ready to learn how to do academia differently, with writing solidly at the center. The result is that you will go up for tenure with the confidence of having both the number and quality of publications you need.    This program is available by application only! Go to: http://bit.ly/pretenure to apply, learn all about the program details and find out if it is a good fit for you. Our writing coaches are ready to help you tailor a professional development request to your specific university. Don’t wait, as I’m sure you know, the wheels of academia turn slowly! Connect with me: Website Facebook Group Facebook Page This episode was first published at cathymazak.com/episode7

As an academic woman, your writing needs to be at the center of everything. On this episode of the podcast, I’m making the case for why it’s so important to prioritize your writing, and giving you the steps to take to make it happen. You know your writing and publishing is important but it doesn’t feel urgent; writing always falls to the bottom of your list; you put writing off until you have “enough” time, and end up doing frantic writing binges instead of making steady progress; thinking about your writing gives you a pit in your stomach; you have a pipeline full of unfinished projects.  Sound familiar? Maybe you haven’t put writing at the center of your career.  In this episode, I’m showing you what having your writing at the center can be like: you always know when your next writing session is and what project you’re working on; you feel happy and invigorated when you think about writing; projects flow smoothly through your pipeline (and out of it); you feel empowered and in control.  That sounds better, right? So let’s jump in as I show you why you should prioritize your writing above everything else (yes, I have hard facts for you), and how to go about it.    Why Should You Put Your Writing at the Center of Everything? 1. Writing mindset matters: urgent vs. important. When you prioritize writing, you start to see through the urgency of everyday tasks that try to steal your attention. Your department head may have a fire that needs putting out; that’s urgent. But your writing is important; when you focus on it, you are developing yourself as a scholar, connecting to your bigger purpose in the world, and taking care of your career and yourself.  “Taking care of your writing is taking care of yourself.” -Cathy Mazak 2. Writing has real payoff. You are allowed to dedicate time to something that equates to a payoff, and writing and publishing more is how you get jobs, keep jobs, get promoted, become a full tenured professor.  There is a persistent disparity between overall pay averages between men and women in academia. Why? Some of the reasons given in this article breaking down the annual faculty compensation survey done by the American Association of University Professors are: fewer women are fully tenured and more are contingent, more women are in lower paying fields of study, and fewer women teach at higher ranking PhD granting institutions. Much of the disparity comes down to the numbers of women who are fully tenured professors.  There is a real link between writing and higher pay. The more you write and publish, the higher up the chain of professorship you can move. Writing pays off.  3. Writing drives alignment. If you work to have everything else in your career support your writing, you feel more focused, pulled in fewer directions, less frazzled. Project and services decisions become easier as they are informed by whether they support prioritization of your writing goals.  4. Writing creates a brand. When your writing is at the center of your career, you are able to drill down more clearly to the message you are putting out into the world. Your publication list builds on itself, developing your “academic brand”.  “If you’re writing more, you’re getting more publications out, and your publications are really how the world sees you.” -Cathy Mazak 5. Writing gives you mobility. The more you write and publish, the greater your ability to move between institutions. You may be at a more teaching-centered institution now, but you never know what may come up there, or in your life or career. Putting your writing at the center gives you options.    How Do You Put Your Writing at the Center? 1. Put writing first- literally. Schedule an hour first thing on Monday morning for writing. Get this in before you teach, before you open email, before you start anything else. Start your week off in the writing mindset.  2. Use your mission statement. Create a mission statement for your career, and verbalize how writing is a priority. Treat your academic mission statement like a thesis for your career. Write it down and refer to it when you need a reminder, or to help with decision making. 3. Find support. Don’t go it alone. Join my I Should Be Writing facebook group, sign up for a program, or find other like-minded academic women to support you in putting your writing first.  4. Invest time and energy. Putting your writing at the center of your career and keeping it there will not happen by accident. It will require intentional time, focused energy, and continued development. Choosing to make investments in your writing pays off, but only if you follow through.  “It takes time, energy, and sometimes a little money to make real change in your life. And you have permission from me to invest that time and energy!” -Cathy Mazak If something clicked or shifted for you about prioritizing your writing, come on over to my Facebook group and share it with us.  Connect with me: Website Facebook Group Facebook Page This episode was first published at cathymazak.com/episode6

How do you feel when you think about writing? You are never going to write and publish as much as you want if you feel yucky about your writing. But feeling good about your writing doesn’t just happen randomly or by accident. You have to create that positive relationship with your writing.   In this episode I’m talking all about creating a positive relationship with your writing in order to get more writing done and feel better doing it. I call this creating “positive feedback loops.” It means that when you write, you feel positive feelings, which make you want to write again, in a super-happy loop of unicorns and rainbows.I exaggerate, but you get what I mean. These positive feelings are created by you by implementing certain writing behaviors.  Actions to Take to Cultivate a Positive Relationship with Writing It doesn’t happen on it’s own, and it doesn’t happen by wishing for it, but you can take actionable steps to make yourself feel better about writing, with reinforces your desire to do it.      Start with small wins. Getting in one hour of focused writing per week consistently is the first small step.Then you can expand to two or three hours. Do this during your “tiger time” (not sure what that is? Take a listen to episode 2!) The idea is to set yourself up to win at writing. Small goals, consistency, writing with focus so that the writing feels good. Be purposeful and gentle on yourself.       Reward yourself. Set up an easy-to-maintain reward system so that you are giving yourself positive feedback for small and large writing successes. For small successes (completing your one hour sessions to start with) try something like a gold star on the calendar, or what a member of the I Should be Writing Facebook group does: putting a pebble in a glass vase for each day that you meet a small writing goal.   When you meet a large goal (submitting for publication or some other large project) be sure to give yourself a bigger reward: go out to dinner, open a nice bottle of wine, or maybe just an at-home dance party in your living room. Get into the habit of acknowledging your work by creating a positive experience for yourself.     Adjust your mindset. So much of writing is about mindset. We all struggle with impostor syndrome, guilt, and overwhelm at one time or another. There is so much pressure around writing and publishing in academia because the stakes are very high: getting the job, keeping the job, getting the promotion, getting the grant. Much of it is dependent on your publication record. Sometimes all the pressure can lead us to believe things about our writing that aren’t true, and certainly aren’t helpful. Adjusting our mindsets may need to include reprogramming how we think.   “We have to actively learn to reprogram our negative writing stories so that we can get our big message out into the world.” How to Unlearn and Relearn Writing in Academia Most of us aren’t trained in writing as a practice, so we are making up systems and behaviors as we go along. When these systems and behaviors come from a place of pressure and fear, they can end up creating negative cycles of feedback between us and our writing. Instead, you must realize that writing is about caring for yourself and your career. It is about getting your message out into the world, where it can change your field and help people. Your teaching and research are better when you feel good about your writing, and you are happier. Here’s how to accomplish this mindset switch.     Identify the stories you have been telling yourself about your writing. These are all the messages that come up when you sit down to think about your writing. For example:   “I’m a bad writer.” “I have nothing new to say.” “This is going to get a desk reject.” “I don’t have time to write.”   Flip the script. Now take each story and literally flip it on its head. Write exactly the opposite.   I don’t know how to write→ I know how to write. I have nothing new to say→ I have new and important things to say.   Reprogram. Changing our default thoughts takes diligence. Try writing your new writing stories on a paper and hanging it up on the wall, or set an alarm on your phone and read your new stories aloud to yourself several times per day.   When your old stories come back, shoo them away with a phrase like “not helpful.” If you have to say it out loud, do it! Do whatever it takes to relearn that relationship to writing. If you were a writer as a kid, remember the reasons you wrote then: you had a story to tell, a message to communicate, something to say! You can connect with that kiddo again–and believe her that you have something important to say. “Writing is worth your time, reflection, and energy, perhaps more than any other academic undertaking.”  Conclusion We all know writing is vital to our academic careers. In order to maintain our productivity and our sanity, we need to intentionally cultivate a positive relationship with that part of our academic lives. No amount of pushing ourselves to write will be as effective if we don’t get this right first.    If you need more ideas on how to find time to write, head here to grab my FREE PDF download: 10 ways to make time to write.  Start taking action today to write and publish more and FEEL BETTER about it! Connect with me: Website Facebook Group Facebook Page Originally published at https://www.cathymazak.com/episode5

Discover strategies for managing overwork in academia and creating an ideal week with a visualized calendar. Learn how to prioritize deep work over shallow tasks, understand the impact of fast capitalism, and make time for writing and research in a competitive market.

For successful execution of the day-to-day tasks of academia, especially writing, we need to be good project managers.      As academic women, we are required to balance multiple projects at the same time, from writing and publishing to course prep to service work. The day-to-day project management tasks of the academic life are not part of our training. In some cases, these tasks are modeled by excellent mentors,but most of the time we’re making it up as we go along.   If you’ve been following along, you know that I’m on a one-woman mission to reveal all the “secrets” of how to do academia successfully so that we can all be happier, healthier, and more fulfilled in our careers. In this episode, we’re looking at how project management can help accomplish these goals.   “Without a system for project management, you’re going to feel overwhelmed and exhausted all the time, no matter how much progress you’re actually making.” -Cathy Mazak   Understanding the Basics of Academic Project Management Before we jump in to how to build and execute our project management systems, it’s important to understand a few basic skills.    Not all writing tasks involve actual writing. When I say “writing,” I don’t mean only putting words on a page. I mean all the things you must do to complete a writing project. These could include: reading, collecting data, analyzing, creating charts and graphs, proofreading, etc. By thinking about all of these things as writing, you will see progress towards your publication goals, even when you are not physically writing.     A project is not the same thing as a task. The first step to managing your academic writing projects is to know the difference between a project and a task. Projects are big: writing an article, a book proposal, a grant. Tasks are small: Write the introduction, investigate competing titles, create the grant budget. Tasks are what we put on our calendars. Projects are what we put on our publication pipelines. If you’ve been writing “finish article” on your to-do list, it’s time to break it into manageable tasks.     Estimating time for completing each task is critical.  Most people underestimate how long it will take to do something. The danger of this is that you start to feel bad about your writing, which leads to guilt and overwhelm, writing’s two biggest enemies.  Instead I want you to overestimate the time it will take you to do tasks. To maintain and perpetuate positive feelings about your writing tasks, you need to feel like you are “winning”,  checking things off the list, moving projects forward. If you overestimate the time it takes to do a writing task, and then you get finished earlier: that’s what you want!   Many of the academic women I coach having been writing for years but still can’t put accurate time estimates on how long it takes for them to complete writing tasks. In this episode I talk about an exercise you can do to dial in your ability to estimate the size of your tasks. It’s important that each task is able to be completed in one hour or less.     Scheduling tasks in your calendar. I recommend one of two methods: (1) actually give each task a due date or (2) have a prioritized bank of tasks and scheduled writing time; during the writing time you pull from the bank of tasks. Whichever method you choose, be sure your individual tasks have a place on your calendar.     Systems are the Foundation of Writing Project Management   It is best to work on one project at a time, but this is nearly impossible in academia. So strive to work on one writing project at a time and move it all the way to completion. Moving a project through your pipeline and to completion is dependent on implementing workable systems. Here’s how:     Use templates to make common project tasks repeatable. So much of our writing energy goes to figuring out what to do next. A writing project management system eliminates this time spent thinking and planning at the beginning of every writing session. A “template” for academic writing projects is a generic task list and outline for that type of project.     “The benefit of templates is that they stop you wheel-spinning by making sure you never start with a blank page.” -Cathy Mazak     Schedule time for project management. For people short on time, it might seem counterintuitive to add time to the calendar for project management. But this is a short, focused planning session that will save you so much time and energy later. You can use Trello or another project management tool, sticky notes in a calendar, or a bullet journal. The idea is to begin your week with the big picture of what needs to get done.        Trust the System. Once you’ve set up templates for repeatable tasks and taken the time for project management, you need to trust the system and try it out for at least two weeks. Sometimes if I get stressed it is tempting to push my carefully laid plans aside. To combat this, I’ve adopted the mantra “trust the system.” When I want to ditch the plan I made the day before in response to something new that’s come up, I just tell myself to work on the things I planned to work on and deal with fitting in the new task when I get to my project management planning time at the end of the day.     Need Help with Implementing Academic Project Management? I use Trello for my project management needs, and I am offering a course to show you how to use Trello to organize all of your academic projects. The course is called Organize Your Academic Life and includes a complete set of academic project management templates, made by me, for you. In the course I walk you through how to personalize and set up these templates and workflows for common academic projects on everything from co-authoring to communication with students and colleagues to research and writing. To find out more and sign up for the course, click here.    Connect with me: Website Facebook Group Facebook Page This episode was first published at cathymazak.com/episode3

Explore why writing every day may not be the best approach for academic productivity. Learn about 'tiger time' as a unique method to optimize writing routines and overcome guilt. Discover how tracking energy levels can lead to peak writing hours and prioritize writing for academic success.

Are you an academic woman ready to amplify your voice in your field, say goodbye to burnout and overwhelm, and harness focused energy to reach your writing goals? You’re in the right place.    In this introductory episode of the Academic Woman Amplified podcast, I’m sharing my story with you from my first love of writing to becoming a fully tenured professor while raising a growing family. I share lessons I’ve learned as an academic and a woman and how those experiences have shaped my life and career.    On this podcast, we’ll talk about writing as the currency of your academic career, and I’ll share advice on how to manage all the moving parts each semester.    My Beginnings as a Writer I have always loved writing and reading. From the time I was a little girl I’ve wanted to make my living writing, but didn’t know how I would do that. In college I followed my love of writing and teaching from being an ESL teacher to earning my PhD in English language learning. After that, I went on to become a tenured professor at the University of Puerto Rico Mayaguez.   Tenure Track, Pregnancy, and Learning How to Make it Work   As I was starting on my tenure track, I became pregnant. Having a baby during this process forced me to figure out who I wanted to be as an academic. I also had to figure out how to do things efficiently to accomplish the necessary writing and publishing.    Because I had to navigate the pressures of new motherhood and academia, I was able to develop a writing system that wasn’t normally taught, but that worked for me. I developed a way to harness my best focused energy and use that for writing.   “Motherhood really forced me to figure out how to get the job done in a more efficient way.”   What I Want for You as an Academic Woman Due to uncertain circumstances at my University, I started to reflect on what I wanted to do with my life and career. I realized that colleagues often asked me how I was able to write and publish prolifically despite a heavy course load as a professor and the demands of family.    Through these questions, I recognized that sharing my knowledge with other academic women was what I really wanted to do.    “My favorite part of this work is talking to academic women about writing.”   For the past four years I have been coaching academic women. Because of my own experiences as a woman in the current academic culture, I am on a mission to help women like me to harness focused energy, create writing systems and pipelines that work without the burnout, write to secure resources, and amplify voices in their academic arenas.    Connect with me: Website Facebook Group Facebook Page   This episode was first published at cathymazak.com/episode1

This podcast explores the challenges faced by academic women, including gender disparity in higher positions and the importance of writing in challenging the existing culture. It also discusses the need for inclusive knowledge-making processes and the importance of creating a sustainable writing practice and connecting with supportive communities.