Scientiae post: Change is the only constant

I wasn't sure I was going to write for the Scientiae topic this time around, but I saw this article by David Brooks in the NYT and thought it was an interesting topic. I think I have written about this in various forms before, so in that sense, maybe my view has changed, or maybe it is constant. Maybe I am at least partly repeating myself. But the David Brooks article is full of fun factoids, anyway.

The gist of what he's saying is that previous generations were taught to be modest, specifically

a culture that emphasized self-effacement — I’m no better than anybody else, but nobody is better than me .

He says our culture has shifted towards thinking we're better than we really are.

Now, I find this particularly interesting.

I'm in my mid-thirties, so I'm not a college kid (the ones he says are particularly proud) and I'm not as old as David Brooks himself (presumably the more self-effacing bunch).

So where does my generation fit into all this? I feel like I'm damned if I do and damned if I don't.

But allow me to explain.

I went to a very competitive school when I was growing up, and one of the things that the school best illustrated was that no matter how good you were or how hard you tried, somebody was better than you at something, but everybody had something they were good at.

So while we were taught to have self-confidence (or try to, anyway), we were taught to be realistic about our abilities (or try to, anyway). In other words, you're probably better at some things than you are at others.

I am pretty good at the bench, for example, but I'm not good at basketball.

At all.

And that is OK.

I think it is ok for me to be confident in my lab bench skills, because I have worked hard for a long time on that particular skill set. And I think it is ok for me to say "I suck at basketball" because I really do and nobody would disagree with me.*

Having said that, I have received very strange reactions, both on this blog and in real life, when I exhibit any form of self-esteem about anything OR express any self-doubt.

In other words, I should probably just keep my mouth shut!

But let me give you a couple of examples of "Damned if I do or don't".

I have worked with scientists who said I was "arrogant" if I pointed out why certain experimental plans would not work, citing the literature and technical pitfalls and suggesting alternative approaches.

I have gotten similar reactions on this blog when I said I think I would be good at running a research lab of my own. That is my subjective assessment and prediction. Sure, I might be wrong. All I ever wanted was a chance to try.

On the other hand, I have worked with PIs who said I lacked confidence if I expressed frustration of any kind or, god forbid, asked for any kind of help or advice.

Similarly, I have had commenters tell me that I am too negative, and that I am too insecure, because of things I wrote on this blog.

And I've been told that I haven't been able to get a job because I'm either

a) not as good as I think I am
b) not selling myself well enough.

You can see my conundrum. It's a fine line to walk, and it's something that affects any job search. I still have not figured out that balance of explaining what I'm good at, and where I want to improve, but that I'm still the best hire even though I'm neither arrogant nor openly admitting to be lacking in any areas of the job description (even though I am).

Yeesh, that's nearly impossible to do. Especially for someone who is as compulsively honest as I am.

Ideally, in academic science, you would have someone (maybe a few of your former PIs) saying how great you are, so everyone knows and you don't have to sell yourself at all. Right? Isn't that the ideal?

But we all know that was not what happened for me. Does it mean I suck? Does it mean my PIs are arrogant and/or insecure themselves?

Maybe. Maybe they think I'm not as good as I should be, and that I would make them look bad if they helped me get a job. Or maybe they feel like it would be too arrogant of them to brag about their trainee? Nah, that can't be it. They have no problems bragging about themselves! Even though they're supposedly of the earlier generations that were taught to be self-effacing. They are very good at self-promotion. But I can't just mimic them, because that would be considered arrogant from a person my age. Right?

Now, everybody knows it's entirely possible to be both arrogant AND insecure, but I feel like I have a pretty healthy concept of what I can and cannot do.

Maybe I'm completely wrong about that, but I could make a two-column list and tally up all the ways I am competent or incompetent at certain tasks.

And anybody who knows me is aware that quite often I will say I can't do something and then succeed at doing it anyway. I come from a long line of people who love to vent, and I have a stubborn streak. I will admit I have a hard time giving up and grad school only reinforced my belief that I can sometimes do the impossible if I just try hard enough.

Does that mean I lack modesty? I'm sure some people think so.

*although I am good at Wii basketball, but that doesn't count.

Disarmament

Lately I've been hearing a piece of advice given for formal presentations: to disarm your audience with a self-deprecating joke near the beginning of your talk.

The idea is, your audience will be less defensive and less likely to attack you if you acknowledge that you

a) may be wrong
b) may sound arrogant, but you don't mean to be
c) don't really want to be attacked.

I heard it more than once, thought it was stupid, and perhaps more importantly, a waste of a slide when you could be showing data (which should also, supposedly, make your audience less likely to want to chase you with pitchforks and torches).

And then I saw somebody do it. And thought it was stupid and clumsy and a waste of a slide, but I still found it sort of cute in spite of my thinking that. Which I guess is the point?

So my question is, does everybody think this is a necessary part of scientific presentations? Is it a new requirement?

I mean, it's one thing to start with a joke. I especially love it when someone uses a cartoon that has a double meaning for real life and the philosophy of science. Especially for an hour-long seminar (not so much for short talks, then it is definitely a waste of a slide!).

But a joke specifically aimed at yourself - isn't there a risk of coming across as being weak, like, "I'll pick on myself first! Please don't pick on me!!!"?

Note also that I got this advice from men; and the person I saw who did it was also a man. So I'm somewhat skeptical as to whether this would work for women, but especially for junior women. I'm afraid it just comes across as unprofessional, even more arrogant (who can afford to waste data slides??), or weak (and therefore even more attackable).

What do you think?

open-mindedness.

I have found a new pet peeve.

I hate scientists who hear about work second- or third-hand, and dismiss it without having seen it.

The ones I particularly hate are good at coming up with realistic-sounding technical arguments for why it must be wrong.

Without considering that, not having seen the work, they don't know which controls have been done and which haven't. It somehow never occurs to them that those issues might have already been addressed.

I also hate the ones who, when asking questions of any kind, always manage to make them sound like royalty addressing the lowest, slave. It's like they wear a neon sign that says, My IQ is bigger than yours!

When, from the content of their questions, it clearly isn't.

Oddly, I don't know any women who do this. This isn't to say they don't exist. But even the women I know who ask withering, incisive questions don't do it in this type of condescending tone.

In fact, I never met anyone who did this until relatively recently, and the two I'm thinking of right now are a grad student and an unrelated young PI.

I wish I knew a fitting way to get back at them for things they've said to my friends or about my friends' work. It just infuriates me that they would be so arrogant, and that they don't realize that unless you've done similar experiments yourself, you probably don't know what you're talking about.

Fuckers.

Very quick post- more later

Went to a fabulous talk today by a young female PI.

Hooray! Don't get to see nearly enough of this kind of thing. Another role model! They are so hard to find.


Also, a note to stubborn students:

I don't know what to tell you besides this. If you ask for my advice, and don't take it, I will be annoyed. Similarly if you complain all the time but don't ask for my advice, or ignore it, I will be annoyed (You are annoyed already).

However, please DO retain that attitude of thinking you know better than me (and everyone else). In some ways, you do.

Put it in a lockbox, because you will need it again someday soon enough when you have to ask yourself,

"Do I have the balls to a) send my paper to a High Impact Journal? b) apply for faculty positions?"

You will ask yourself, What happened to my Know-It-All Attitude? How do I get it back? So make sure you write down the combination to your lock box in a safe place.

In the meantime, I will try to remember not to beat it completely out of you.

Sincerely,

Your Mentor

Up... and then down.

Yesterday was a Pretty Good Day (PGD). I don't have a lot of those. I set up an experiment, helped a student, went to an interesting seminar, emailed some people about reagents and they REPLIED RIGHT AWAY, and I read some papers. All around, it was a good balance of thinking and doing, alone-time and interaction-time, faith in ideas and faith that there are some people who actually are willing to share both ideas and tools, so we can actually get some work done.

Sigh. Why can't they all be PGD?

Today started out as a PGD and went downhill. I managed to do almost everything I needed to do before a meeting, managed a non-rushed lunch and actually found some people to eat with!

After lunch things got a little hairy. I had to do some running around looking for stuff I didn't have at the last minute (e.g. in the middle of the experiment)- poor planning on my part, mostly. Okay, fine. Disaster averted.

But I got interrupted by someone needing help, and didn't have the heart to just say NO when I should have... am still working on that skill.

Then at the end of the day, a couple of guys in our lab were sitting around talking. Every once in a while I would say something and notice that the one guy was rolling his eyes at the other one, like "When will she shut up?"

Maybe I'm just being hypersensitive. Maybe the guy had something in his contact lens, I don't know. But I could really do without that crap. hint: If you don't want to talk to me, don't have your conversation right next to my bench.

And I was struck by how typical it was: the guys are sitting around chatting, while the only female in sight is working her tail off.

Again with the math: we literally have to be 10 times better than our male peers to get the same job.

I was thinking about this today, how we get hit with bullshit stereotypes all the time. You know how they claim that women have fewer publications because we tend to collaborate more and have lots of middle-author papers? There was an article in Science recently (sometime in August, I think) about how women, on average, have fewer patents than their male peers. The explanation? Women collaborate LESS.

How can we both collaborate TOO MUCH and TOO LITTLE??

Oh, they always find a way to screw us over.

Anyway so at the end of the day, I heard from a PI friend that his wife, a postdoc, has some job offers. He was telling me this since they will probably move. Now, here is what my little brain thought when I heard that:

Now his position will be open, right?

Is she getting offers because he helped her shop her CV around to a bunch of schools (and they get him as part of the bargain)?

Who the hell is getting job offers? This woman better walk on water, or I'm going to be PISSED.

Lately I've been going to a lot of seminars by senior-ish postdocs, and it's quite clear to me that I'm among the top postdocs who have similar levels of experience. So I'm left with trying to logic my way out of a very illogical, very black box:

Assumption 1: My CV does not suck.
Assumption 2: I deserve a job.
Assumption 3: There are no jobs.

Observation 1: I'm not getting offers.
Observation 2: Other people are getting offers.

Conclusion 1: I must suck.
Conclusion 2: There are no jobs for people like me.

I'm either working in the wrong field, not supported by politics (which I knew), and/or it's just that nobody can picture having me as a colleague. I'm not likeable enough.

Goody. Not much I can do about any of that. Despite my efforts to meet people in positions of power, I think my un-likeability prevents them from, you know, bending over backwards to help. So it all comes back to the cult of personality.

I've read the body language books, the communication books, the management books, the managing-up books. I've mellowed considerably, believe it or not, since I started grad school, and I've made a serious effort to learn how to be more patient and give people the benefit of the doubt.

But there's only so much you can change about yourself.

So I'm a bit of an arrogant bitch.

Let's say I can't get a job in science that I would actually like, because people find me unbearably opinionated. Is there any kind of job where that isn't considered a liability?