Working Scientist

In the penultimate episode of this six-part podcast series about career planning in science, Julie Gould discusses some of the setbacks faced by junior researchers, including political upheaval, financial crises and a change in supervisor.Shortly after embarking on a PhD at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany, Katja Loos’ supervisor relocated to the University of Bayreuth, taking his team with him. But weeks later he died of an aggressive cancer.Loos, who is now a polymer chemistry researcher at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, describes how she worked through the various choices and challenges she faced as a result of her supervisor’s sudden death, and why she abandoned plans for an industry career.Funding struggles in Argentina led to paleontologist Mariana Viglino relocating to Germany. But before moving she describes how a very prescribed career path denied her the opportunity to think about her long-term plans.Tomasz Glowacki says abandoning a rigid career plan helped him to better navigate the various challenges he faced after completing a PhD in computer science at Poznan University of Technology, Poland, in 2013.Finally, Julia Yates, an organizational psychologist and careers coach at City St George’s, University of London, reassures early career researchers facing a sudden disruption to their careers. It’s fine, she says, to put career planning on hold. Sometimes paying bills and putting food on the table has to take priority. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the fourth episode of a six-part podcast series about science career planning, Julie Gould investigates "planned happenstance," a theory which encourages workers to embrace chance opportunities during their working lives.Holly Prescott, a careers guidance practitioner at the University of Birmingham, UK, suggests a slightly alternative approach, whereby a professional reflects on their experiences to decide what they would like more or less of in their current or future role.Listing the things you want to keep, lose or add in a job description, she argues, enables researchers to have happier working lives.In her view, the technique is preferable to devising a plan at the early career stage and then slavishly following it. This course of action, she says, does not account for new skills, technologies and life events that can open up fresh opportunities. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this discussion, Sam Smith, a behavioral oncologist at the University of Leeds, shares insights on shifting career aspirations to focus on impactful funding rather than job titles. He reflects on how family needs redefined his professional goals. Milicia Radisic, a professor at the University of Toronto, emphasizes the importance of strategic planning in research. She highlights how her experiences as an immigrant shaped her approach to balancing high-risk and steady projects, ensuring resilience and consistency in publishing.

Uschi Symmons, a former molecular biology postdoc turned programme manager at the European Innovation Council, shares her transformative journey with Individual Development Plans (IDPs). She highlights how crafting her IDP illuminated skills gaps and broadened her career horizons. However, she notes that IDPs often overlook personal values, stressing the importance of balancing family and career. The discussion also contrasts IDPs with personalized career coaching, emphasizing the need for tailored action plans that consider personal circumstances for better career alignment.

In this insightful discussion, Sarah Blackford, an academic careers coach, shares frameworks for long-term career planning, including her PhD Career Choice Indicator. Julia Yates, an organizational psychology professor, highlights the importance of informal career strategies used by recent grads. Theoretical physicist Robert Dijkraaf discusses interconnections in scientific careers and the necessity for adaptability in a changing environment. Together, they emphasize reflection, investigation, and preparation as keys to navigating meaningful scientific career paths.

Women are woefully under-represented in Nepalese science, says Babita Paudel. She blames a combination of gender stereotyping, a paucity of female role models and mentors, poor networking opportunities, institutional discrimination, and a societal pressure that pushes them towards other professions.  To tackle the challenge, Paudel developed the Women in STEM Network Database, a resource aimed at building a strong mentoring community of female scientists across the Himalayan kingdom. Paudel also runs workshops, training sessions and seminars to help equip women with technical skills, research methodologies and leadership training.   Her advice to female colleagues? “If you face barriers, also break them, not just for yourself, but for the next generation of women in STEM. Your journey can inspire change that that also you need to think.  And most importantly, enjoy the process. Science is about curiosity, discovery and innovation. So stay passionate, keep learning and trust that you are making a difference.”  Paudel, who is based at the Centre for Natural and Applied Sciences in Kathmandu, is the final researcher to feature in this eight-part Changemakers podcast series. It accompanies an ongoing Nature Q&A series that highlights scientists who fight racism in science and champion inclusion at work. Listen to launch editor Kendall Powell discuss the series' aims and objectives with Deborah Daley, global chair of Springer Nature's Black Employee Network.   Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

JoAnn Trejo co-leads the Faculty Mentor Training Program at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) medical school, where, thanks to her efforts, the number of tenure-track faculty members from under-represented groups shot up by 38% from 2017 to 2022.  Trejo, a pharmacologist whose research helps to develop drugs to treat vascular diseases, says her mentor colleagues understand that their mission and responsibility is training the next generation of scientists and providing opportunities for them. She describes the people who supported her at the early career stage, and the impact they had. “When I reflect on my life and I think about how a poor Mexican American farm worker kid from an impoverished background, became a scientist professor, it’s actually extraordinary,” she says. Trejo is the seventh researcher to feature in this eight-part Changemakers podcast series. It accompanies an ongoing Nature Q&A series that highlights scientists who fight racism in science and champion inclusion at work. Listen to launch editor Kendall Powell discuss the series' aims and objectives with Deborah Daley, global chair of Springer Nature's Black Employee Network.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Joslynn Lee seeks to bring Indigenous values and heritage into her chemistry and biochemistry teaching at Fort Lewis College. The institution in Durango, Colorado, is a Native American-serving non-tribal institution where 30% of its student population identifies as Indigenous, Native American or Alaska Native.Lee’s efforts to bridge the Native American worldview with Western science stem from childhood walks with her nálí (paternal grandmother), who pointed out the medicinal properties of plants, and an undergraduate professor who was interested in Lee's background and how Indigenous values and culture could be applied to organic chemistry. Lee, an associate professor whose research focus includes the microbial makeup of acid mine drainage in the mountains and rivers surrounding Durango, is the sixth researcher to feature in this eight-part Changemakers podcast series. It accompanies an ongoing Nature Q&A series that highlights scientists who fight racism in science and champion inclusion at work. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Arezoo Khodayari and Laurie Barge started a mentoring collaboration more than a decade ago, providing students at California State University Los Angeles (Cal State LA) with paid research opportunities at Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), in nearly Pasadena, where Barge is based. Khodayari, an environmental scientist at Cal State LA, a minority-serving institution where more than 75% of students identify as Hispanic, says their partnership came about when they co-hosted a student intern who was seeking to turn her summer research project at JPL into a master's thesis. Barge's JPL lab explores the potential for the emergence of life on other worlds, more than a decade ago.The pair realized they could create more projects that are focused at the intersection of astrobiology and environmental science. ​​​​​​Khodayari, a first generation college student who grew up in Iran before moving to the US aged 24 for a PhD at the University of Illinois, at Urbana-Champaign, describes her passion for teaching and research, and how the two scientific disciplines are a good fit. They combine a focus on ecosystems and habitability of planets, she says. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Vukosi Marivate helps to build scientific communities and networks for African researchers in machine learning and artificial intelligence. These include Deep Learning Indaba, an events and awards programme inspired by the isiZulu word for gathering. Marivate, a computer scientist at the University of Pretoria in South Africa, says Indaba came about to “bring together the African community to strengthen machine learning, so that we can contribute, shape and ultimately be our own owners of these coming technologies.”Marivate also co-founded the startup Lelapa AI, inspired this time by the Setswana word for home. An early project for the company, which aims to be a home for the top AI talent and researchers in Africa, was to build natural language processing systems for Africa languages. There are more than 2000 of them, he says.The computer scientist, based at the University of Pretoria in South Africa, is the fourth researcher to feature in this eight-part Changemakers podcast series. It accompanies an ongoing Nature Q&A series that highlights scientists who fight racism in science and champion inclusion at work. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.