A life in academia

A graduate of two Masters degree's and now a laboratory manager in a London University. I will share my experiences and perspective on the various subjects surrounding English academia and life.

[benjamintimm]

Commuting in London - the nine to five

The general consensus - “Oh my god what a colossal pain in the neck!”. After having my first major delays with the trains, having them feel like they’re about to burst when you’re inside, a sudden realisation occurred to me, commuting to and from work is one of the highlights to dislike working in London.

Though I can’t fault TFL (the London transport service) considering they have essentially no money to use, the service is often strained to the point that it collapses on itself. When this occurs, it quickly results in an absolute mess, where the platform is seemingly packed to the rim. This is not to mention when the tube arrives, where people will spill out of it like some sort of compressed air is pushing them out, only to have the crazy number of people outside try and push in seconds after. It’s all an uncomfortable mess but one thing I’ll give the brits is that most people will respect the said and unwritten rules of transportation; no pushing, wait for people to get off and let old/disabled people have the seats. Basically, be polite!

Now that’s not to say this is all the time. I would say usually during rush hours (the times when most people commute), is when it’s bad. The rest of the time people give, minimum, a seat between the next, leave their newspapers for others to look through and again, remain polite with the unwritten rules.

Hilariously though, it just feels like you’re always in a rush in London. If you were out of the city, the amount of patience one has, rises exponentially. Particularly if you’re new to it, you find yourself getting caught into that rushed mindset and occasionally stop yourself to say “wait, why am I almost trying to run to work??”.

There really isn’t much of a conclusion to this public but the mad rush of living in the big city is very apparent. You will feel uncomfortable when it’s rush hour and it will make you late at times. I suppose we can just aspire to not needing it one day.

[benjamintimm]

Stressing about things out of your control - unreasonable expectations from both externals and yourself

Something highly relatable to quite a few of us. The idea that all expectations placed on you (from yourself or others) are reasonable, is a blatant fallacy. What do I mean by this? That’s a good question I ask, other me. I mean to say that it is often found that the thoughts and expectations of what you will be sometime in the distant future, are usually extreme variants of what you will actually become (broadly speaking). This is in mind of others expectations on you, but also, very much from your own mind (I say judging entirely off my own experience). An explanation for this would be that an angry or unruly kid is often but silently seen to amount to little or nothing, where on the flip side, bright children are often expected to have brilliant and equally bright futures. This is a common occurrence in the education systems I have been in all over the world that simply don’t reflect reality. It can also be mimicked as adults, though not as blatantly obvious. The only difference is that the adult is typically more consciously aware of this evaluation, whereas a child may subconsciously take it on and wear it as baggage further down the line. Neither of which are totally healthy mindsets and should be addressed appropriately to the situation they’re in. Now these expectations, typically made by yourself, can reflect quite often onto your regular tasks and current objectives. Which can then be unconsciously placed into your practice as a manager/supervisor of others. It is at this point, the cycle repeats onto the younger generation.

Now as always, the subject can really rabbit hole here into several areas! So I’ll try not to but I find myself having to mention that these elements are usually stemmed from issues such as unconscious bias and pressures that you, the affected, will never realise (boss has trouble/company has its own problems/strangers are arses). They build up as what many of the free willed would call bad energy (I like the term “bad juju”), and then place that’s same energy upon you. It’s good to know that this is nearly never an intentional matter and that the key to overcome is to acknowledge it. Then to keep it in mind when reacting to the very same pressure being put upon you. But that doesn’t necessarily mean you can get rid of the bad juju. Many say talk to someone to throw it away and move on is an effective method, however, unless it’s a professional, the same pressure can be unconsciously placed upon the friend who is only trying to help. Again, an unintentional matter but sometimes a reality. Does that mean you shouldn’t rely on your friends to vent? Of course not! It’s just something to keep in mind when you are as they could be struggling with something as well.

Working in a university seems to be generally relaxed in comparison to commercial or otherwise. Nonetheless, deadlines and other external stresses will still apply to everyone. A critical factor to remember as a supervisor, or anyone for that matter, is that stress affects everyone differently. A minor amount to you could be quite significant to another and at the same time, could have alternative effects from one person to the next. Being a successful supervisor often comes down to effectively navigating this issue without being overwhelming to your staff.

As one of those staff, the struggle is usually on the receiving end of this problem. The typical solution of communicating to your manager is one that could cause more stress and actually, could end up with consequences if they are the unreasonable type. Though this isn’t always the case, the possibility in itself is a big enough deterrent for most that trying to fix it is just not worth it. A tried and effective way to overcome the unnecessary pressures from above is to simply not work 100%. It seems silly but giving it your all means you’re burnt out at the end whilst at the same time, the manager might just see you as an effective worker, resulting in a disposition to push you harder. Thus, starting a cycle of discomfort and eventual conflict. Obviously, there are exceptions to this with certain “crunch times” occurring or something of similar measure, but having an open mind and not forcing yourself to go on overdrive every time you work will solve much of your stress. A way to make this seem less obvious to colleagues or your manager yourself would just be to relax incrementally.

Now there are a thousand arguments against this but when it really comes down to it, your health is more important than any single job. Having an outlook that prioritises this should at the very least slow down the grey hairs for now!

[benjamintimm]

Starting a career in academia: Struggles, growth and small victories - Month 3&4.

As the 5th month starts I reflect on the last couple of them. My limited experiences so far have highlighted factors of this role that whilst intricate in nature, are reassuring in the fact that time and experience can solve most problems.

Over these months my role as middle management has largely been reactive and hugely directionless. This is due to the majority of staff being on holiday and the summer time promoting a more relaxed approach towards work, however, for an individual that strives for direction to then give it their all, it was kinda stressful! Regardless, throughout this period, each request that came through was dealt with quickly and in turn, leaving a sense of pride that I was able to be so on top of things. That was until I had a meeting with two important people in the department, who asked whether or not three of our major projects (that have not had any progress since I first started) had any updates on them. A sense of dread flooded over me as I am largely responsible for them, yet I knew nothing could have been done to them over the holiday period (a subject I would like to discuss in detail later). They were told about the situation and lack of progress and in turn, an event was planned.

The event was in short, the other department managers coming together and getting their act together, as such, we all drafted out a plan of what we all want doing in our respective areas opening up to the much longed for idea of an objective to work on. A relieving thing to hear, to say the least. Even after a few weeks, I’ve been able to focus so much more as the objectives have provided a sense of clarity towards the role and the intricacies behind it.

Now on the flip side, the concern of this situation is that my role is entirely restrained by the whims of the other managers, something I mentioned previously. It’s not that you cannot focus on other areas or your own growth, but when you are employed as a technician for a lab or the resident engineer, your purpose is to largely support, rarely spearhead, in turn, leaving you feeling a little lost when you’re done with a task. Funnily enough though, at the same time, everyone relies on you (almost a little too much). Unless you give your go ahead or confirm things are okay in certain projects, absolutely nothing happens in the respective project areas. I feel that this is one of the root causes as to why academia can be seen as so painfully slow in comparison to industry. A solution to this? God knows. It’s a little difficult considering everyone is at the pinnacle of their field, leaving any sort of cross over to be a bit of a joke in respect to each individual level of experience (with exceptions of course).

Nonetheless, I digress. The conclusion to these thoughts and concerns is simply to allow time to continue and for experience to flow in. To focus on handling issues that you can deal with and when coming to a block, either due to a lack of experience or something being out of your knowledge base, you should prioritise the communication of this issue to the people you feel are relevant to the task. Most of the time it’s really out of your hands when you’ve passed it on but that does depend on your ability to hand over the relevant material to the relevant person. I do believe that communicating with your managers is a skill in itself, one that is made far more complex when the mentioned managers are specialists in an entirely different field.

This blog seems to represent the increased chaos in the role as I too feel a little frazzled with all the things to do. It’s not necessarily a bad thing as long as I get the job done to a standard I deem acceptable (usually unrealistic I admit). Also, got a uni wide raise! Nothing much but it always helps!!

[benjamintimm]

The varying approaches of creativity

So I went off-grid for a few weeks as I was on holiday! Was enjoyable but I’m raring to work now.

In response to my last blog @codeandcognition commented on a topic I have been hoping to discuss for a while! I wasn’t planning to post it now but will push it forward due to its sudden relevance. I entirely agree with their points that engineering requires far more creativity than many would expect and that the importance of multidisciplinary subjects is paramount to the successful progression of any modern field. Though I will say that the previous post was not to focus on the dynamics of creativity in engineering and artistic fields but the struggles of communication between the two. Regarding the element of creativity in various fields, I feel that it is so much more complex than a mere mention and deserves its own post. So I’ll get started!

Similarly to what was mentioned before, when creativity is thought of, the immediate reference for most would be a painter, dancer or musician, but the reality is that creativity encompasses every field within human reach. It is the spark that has reached any start or change to every creation and has been quintessential to every project I have been in as a musician, biomedical engineer and now as a neuroscientist. I speak with experience from these fields and can once again agree with @codeandcognition that each of these fields is heavily reliant on their own element of creativity, but the approach towards them is totally different. This in turn has made each field highly unique and in many respects “beautiful” in a sense, (a reason why being a specialist is so much more than just knowing certain things) but can cause issues in communication between themselves when being approached blind. See my previous blog for more details there!

The approach towards creativity in an artistic format: (Once again I will say this is from my experience and therefore, largely my opinion!) The traditional format if you will, largely starts off with that blank screen so many artists often find themselves staring at. It’s the worst thing in the world for me and has time and time again prevented any form of creation when all you really have to do is start with a single note on the paper. I’ll explain why this is slightly different to the approach of engineering later, but while all fields experience this simple block between nothing and something, the block artists experience is truly prolific in the sense that the only way to overcome it is by feeling your way around it. For me, it was orchestral composition and the difference between a successful piece was down to whether the sequence of notes within the score felt right or not. While the technical aspects of composing were certainly necessary, needing to know how things worked to make it sound a certain way, the feeling of whether or not something was right or wrong, truly defined the product. Of course, people have developed systems based on logic, reason and various forms of technicality to fully justify why artists define their work as good or bad, it is the unique creativity of these people that dictates the approaches they have on their own masterpieces.

Now despite what is next, I feel I should continue to say that this “feeling” can also be translated into other fields. There is no exclusivity when it comes to creativity and its approaches. However, it should be noted that artistic compositions are so much more often based within a feeling format whereas other fields that are much less traditionally creative (engineering), have been developed in a way that fundamentally differs and thus promotes a different form of thinking.

The approach towards creativity in an engineering format: A very interesting concept and one I think is rarely discussed between and outside of engineering circles. While I feel I may be a little biased as my experience in engineering has largely been in research whereas my experience with art has been as a student and freelancer, the element of creativity in engineering (in my opinion) is intrinsically tied to the understanding of the individual and the extent of which the field they sit within has grown. While this is not to say engineers do not require that element of creativity to go from nothing to something in a project as previously mentioned, artists will push boundaries from their own imagination and feelings while engineers will push the boundaries using their imagination and tools provided. The distinction between these two sets are the root causes between the fields differentiation. Progression within Engineering has always been set in a systematic fashion, using the ideas, the proofs of concept and then the tools that have all been thought of and constructed within a similar process of imagination. The only exception to this is the theories that are constructed, but even this can largely be based on our current understanding. Anything outside of this can sometimes be called science fiction which in itself blurs the lines between science and art.

This is why there is so much more of a need for multidisciplinary work within the fields of engineering as the system that we stand on requires it to expand to other forms of thinking. It cannot simply become flexible without the push for progression and will merely be fixated within the confines of its own limitations if not pulled out by others that are willing to extend an open hand and collaborate.

Once again I will say that these methods of thinking are absolutely not exclusive to themselves but instead are indicative of the systems that have promoted their thinking for longer than any of us have been alive. I can only hope that the further we progress over time, the more multidisciplinary work becomes a norm, and in turn, promotes alternative thinking.

I welcome anyone to discuss this further as I find these concepts fascinating and would love to hear others perspectives.

[benjamintimm]

The troubles of communication - Interactions between creatives and engineers

Though this feels like something all of us heavily relate to, particularly the further you are into your career or uni, it also applies to pretty much everyone. Nonetheless, this blog particularly relates to the struggles of someone coming from a varied background that has grown in both environments.

Interacting with engineers from a creative background - from my experience, this occurs when one is trying to enter an engineering environment or when is trying to actualise an idea. Engineers tend to think in a very systematic fashion and this often causes creatives to struggle with their blunt and inflexible attitudes. What I mean by this is that a creative will come to an engineer with an idea and the engineer will respond with ideas on how it can work, what it logically can produce and lastly (the usual conflict starter), what problems there are with the system hypothesised. This blunt response from engineers on what will work and will not is fairly common and whilst it is problem that engineers have which needs to be addressed, creatives should also ensure that they too, are flexible with the advice and have the capacity to take on the realistic limitations of their idea, only to provide more creative matter to use and possibly mould the project into a success.

Interacting with creatives from an engineering background - Personally the more challenging of the two as you can nearly always learn about engineering, whereas you cannot always learn to be creative. This depends on the context but the challenges remain for engineers where they may feel bombarded with ideas that could very well seem ludicrous to them. This will spark frustration in their own right where they would rather see a tangible and solvable problem than a concept that can only be described with loose suggestions and at the most, theoretical tests that often come out incorrect due to missing parameters in the creatives design. Although the struggles here can be incredibly frustrating, the engineer must remind themselves that this loose and scattered approach is the usual and once again, patience is key to the project's success. Listening to the creatives ideas and being honest with its limitations is good but it is also critical that the engineer does not take total control of the project, instead, acting as the tool for the creative to realistically fabricate the project.

In short, flexibility and patience on both sides are paramount for successful communication. If you come from a mixed background like myself, you can identify the aforementioned issues but will equally struggle with one, if not, both of those sides. Learning to communicate effectively is a skill in itself, one that takes time and practice to become good at. Looking at courses and tutors is certainly a good option but in my experience, direct interaction by jumping into the middle of it is the best way to address your inadequacies. The key is to regularly reflect on how you handle situations.

[benjamintimm]

Finding the time for projects in a 9-5 job (pt.2) - Healthy hustle culture.

So continuing from the last “work smart & hard” blog. I had a conversation recently with a friend that is both brilliant and genuinely grounded as a person, a rare combination to find. Discussing the blog of smart working and more, he identified and honestly shared that what I was discussing, was a form of hustling and that he as an individual, would rather find happiness in his role and normal day to day life before he expanded any further. I went to argue this because just as I said in my last blog, it is possible with a number of options, but decided against it and pondered on the concept of this supposed “hustle culture”.

After some thought I found myself realising that the line between a hustle and a personal project is very easily blurred. This obviously depends entirely on the individual but I would agree with my friend (to a point) in saying that finding happiness in what you do throughout the majority of your week is paramount, but I would also state that side projects are equally important to expand yourselves, build friendships and develop oneself in a way that the main role in your time cannot contribute to. The trick to it seems to be the outlook towards opportunity. I’ll say again, there is nothing wrong with hustle culture If you wish to make it your focus, but if misdirected and without the right mindset, you could easily find yourself over-investing your time and efforts for meagre results but also, find yourself easily disappointed without a correct and healthy perspective of failure in said projects.

So, instead of just being selective towards the type of hustle there is, and going through different categories, I would also suggest you ask yourself, what is it that you genuinely want out of your project? Furthermore, how can you find happiness in the process instead of the product? Just to affirm, asking these questions sound like the opposite of leading to working smart/hard but the reality is that a positive perspective will significantly improve productivity and improve satisfaction with your own personal life.

Once you’ve gathered a solid enough idea towards what you want the end of this project to result in and are genuinely happy with that vision, you must address the next question. How does one work on a project or hustle without it taking over any more time than you originally planned? Well, it’s really there in the sentence. You’ve got to be strict with yourself! Both in respects to you reminding yourself to work on the project but also to prevent you from running overtime. Secondly, plan.it.out. Yeah, it sounds really obvious but organisational skills in this area is paramount to its success. I covered this a little in the last blog but you really need to have a consistently strong plan and organisational pattern and most importantly, constantly reassess whether the plan is fitting to your desired vision! The last thing you need is to lose track of what you’re actually doing this for and you’d be genuinely surprised how often people start something and end with a product that isn’t really what they wanted. Hence a meagre result.

Going about this sounds dull to many, exciting to the questionable few but being on top of it visually, either through spreadsheets, notes and other means will definitely help you keep in tune with your project. Either when you’re working with it or, as a tool to remind you where you were when you’re starting again from a short break.

I suppose in conclusion, organisation, keeping to your vision and lastly, a part I haven’t mentioned enough, patience. Things don’t get sorted in a day. You’ve gotta take your time with a personal project and remind yourself to take breaks and try not to get frustrated with the work.

You’ve got this! And if you not sure yet, it’s okay, take your time learning about yourself( what you want and how a side project can be worth your time, both financially and personally.

[benjamintimm]

Taking 5. A reminder to myself.

Not a long post here, just a reminder. Look after yourself by challenging that anxiety or dismissal of going out to enjoy life.

Live. We don’t have long and it could go at any second so despite the insanity of daily life, try take a second to appreciate the beauty of what’s around you.

[benjamintimm]

Starting a career in academia: Moving and handover - Month 2

Well, unsurprisingly and as usual life only got more complicated. Thankfully this time was in a good way! I moved to London, started dating and also realised that it’s very expensive to just be here (I’ll discuss this another time). What I will discuss now is that the lab manager position has progressed steadily throughout its handover phase and its come with its own challenges.

So, handover. I’ve had little experience in starting a role that has such a large handover but that’s the whole point of a new job, to challenge you. From what I know now, the transition will largely depend on two factors, the first being what your predecessor left you. If it was vague advise and barely anything tangible, you’ll likely be learning as you go along (much more so than another). Whereas if they left you with a comprehensive list of matters to address, then life will be much easier! You’ll still learn on the job but at least you’ll have a racing line while you’re going along. The second is your colleagues. Thankfully everyone is really nice, either out of disposition or the possible fear that I’ll be a nightmare that I’ll hold their experiments up as lab manager (mwahaha). Either way, decent colleagues will give you advice and tips on the fly that make a huge difference to how well you pick up the pieces. A bit of advice from yours truly, remember, no question is a bad question. If they are decent people as well as colleagues, you’ll find yourself naturally dropping into conversations between whatever your work talk was originally for and they’ll casually slip in handy quips of experience if you ask. All you need to do is ask. Now for the ones providing said advice, this might seem pretty standard but the reality is that those short conversations make a huge difference to the environment of this new staff member. An unconscious welcome if you will but also small building blocks that genuinely improve the work life and work flow of your colleagues.

The tasks are also ramping up, with the opening of a PhD lab coming about and various coding projects starting to creep into effect. It’ll be a challenge starting to juggle things at the same time but if you’re the right person for the role, you’ll enjoy it. Or at the very least you’ll be in the right mindset to handle it in a levelheaded manner. I’d like to say owning your own inhibitions and struggles will make this process a million times easier. If you feel you’re struggling with something, talk to your manager. They’re in that position for a reason and it’s not only to judge/assess you. Take advantage of that as transparency will nearly always get you further in your tasks than struggling silently.

[benjamintimm]

Finding the time for projects in a 9-5 job (pt.1) - Working smart & hard.

This issue still has me stumped at times. It seems to be constantly evolving and is highly specific to both the role you’re in and the project you’re doing. Having said that, I’m going to throw all of that out the window and be generic as hell! Just like any advice but particularly this, take everything said as a template instead of gospel, its effectiveness is all hugely dependent on who you are.

Now, to the question. How is it that some people can work full-time jobs and still manage to accomplish all of these incredible feats? Feats being: running small companies, developing apps, becoming life coaches and finishing degrees on the side. The answer: They’re all aliens. I joke of course, the reality is much simpler actually and it’s intrinsically tied with the saying, “Rome wasn’t built in a day”.

Despite it feeling mildly pointless in the moment, small, consistent contributions to your project over an extended period will have an equally powerful impact when compared to any focused effort. The key, and I will say this again, is consistency. That means if you spend a half-hour every day after work contributing to this effort, after a year you’ve managed to complete 120 hours of your task, that’s even skipping weekends! This amount of time equals to the number of hours to officially complete various minor qualifications, well in the range of learning a new skill and a huuuge amount of time to consider what the hell you want to do next! If you can spend an hour, this obviously doubles and so on but the gist of what I’m saying is that this method is an underrated but very effective way of getting your job done.

Now there’s a clear argument here, finding the time in your incredibly busy schedule. Whether you’re a parent, your current job is ruling your life or any other reason under the sun. It’s a difficult subject to broach as there is no comfortable way around it; you need to sacrifice some element of your current life for your “new” project/ambition. Although the word “sacrifice” does sound a little dramatic, I say it because many, including myself, easily slip into their life schedules and will find it incredibly difficult “sacrificing” any part of it. The key to this part is being smart about it.

What I mean by being smart is by selectively and carefully reducing time-wasting or grindy tasks through the combination of time management and delegation. The time management part being that you have to have a plan or at the least an idea of what you want to achieve throughout the week. You would be surprised by how much time is wasted by staring into space and thinking, “hmm what is it I need to do?”. The second is delegation, it might seem weird to hire someone to do your cleaning or chores but you need to assess how much you think your time is worth. If you believe it’s higher than said cleaner, you would be better off applying that time to a project that will eventually make you more money than the costs of your cleaner. Naturally, you need to be on top of how much these costs add up but when it comes down to it, it’s all a numbers game.

Continuing on from being smart about choosing your work, you hear people saying hard work gets you places and to a degree it does, but you will also notice that some will work themselves to the very bone, only to achieve meagre results/achievements. Similar to selective delegation, you must consider that the combination of smart and hard work is what gets people from the basement of the parents to multibillion-dollar corps. The discussion of choosing your focus and where to place your efforts is a subject in itself but in short, you need to find a project you’re passionate about and sure that you’re able to commit consistent pressure on. You shouldn’t be randomly shooting for any cash opportunity that you’ll think will land you a quick buck. Sure they might work from time to time but unless you want to make your project “side hustler”, you’ll only find yourself losing interest and getting frustrated with a lack of results. I’ll continue on this later.

[benjamintimm]

The experience of learning to code - An intermediates perspective

Ah coding, you get admired for doing it by anyone who doesn’t and interrogated by those who do, mostly about what language you use despite the large majority of them being equally disgusting and amazing at the same time.

If you’re new to this, a language is as literal as it sounds. You’ll choose yours depending on what you’re using it for, or what the people you’re working with use for ease of communication. Some include Matlab, Python, Java and so on and so forth. Thankfully they don’t all look totally different, I think they did that favour for us to prevent the worlds mental hospitals from being overloaded with new admissions. Though to contradict myself, the differences between each of them will be the tiniest details such as changing what a 0 and what a 1 means, all of which seems innocent enough until you try to run your code and are met with lines of red text and error messages of doom. You need to be careful with this if you’re planning on using more than one language.

Now you’ve started, got the thing up and running, you’ve even done the “hello world” and 5+5 entries which do give you a little boost in confidence, I mean, it’s not a big deal so far right? Well, this is where it gets fun.

No matter the project, you’re going to start noticing a theme, one that takes a good while to get out of, if ever. You find yourself starting a task, you need to make a graph or have to change some small entry in a large project, but you don’t know what to do, so you'll naturally turn to the doc/help function. This gives you a whole list of info that you scroll through and nitpick the parts you think are relevant. If it gets any worse and you’re really stuck, you either turn to google or that friend who seems to know a scary amount about coding but ironically not the specific thing you need help with (you’ll become that person). The process will repeat endlessly until you either click with sudden genius (if that’s you, I hate you) or if you find a clean solution to all your current queries.

This makes it sound like most people who code are amateurs who live off the help of others and in all honesty, it’s true, and even better, it’s perfectly fine! Unless you’ve done the same code a bunch of times before, it’s really common to rely on other peoples packages or recommendations. The only thing I would suggest out of this is that when you do use other people’s code, either genuinely attempt to recreate it on your own or try to learn it through and through so that you don’t have to repeat the same process.

When you get to the real tough stuff (for me it’s the analysis of neurological signals which does sound interesting but will be my primary cause of hair loss), you need to understand, simple is better. If you can structure a list or an argument as plainly as possible, do it. If you don’t, you could find yourself trying to solve a hundred different error messages that you thought were fine until that new line of code changed everything. Obviously, there are exceptions to this but trying to make a load of fancy code to impress yourself or others will only make it more difficult for you and others to read/use in the future. Save yourself that hassle.

Finally, you’ve sorted your code! Well done! A strong drink and a well-deserved nap is in order. The feeling of euphoria you get after finishing a project is the best and makes coders/mathematicians sound like proper masochists. Would I recommend getting into it, possibly? Coding is a brilliant tool to get things done at a speed and level of precision that would take normal people rediculous amounts of time to achieve. Equally so, I would only recommend jumping into it if I knew exactly what you want to do or if you are really a closet masochist. Thats for you to decide though, Enjoy!

[benjamintimm]

Starting a career in academia: Jumping out of the pan and into the fire - Month 1

Starting a professional career in academia is odd. In contrast to my time in corporate and government roles with brittle structures, harsh supervisors and deadlines ready to slap you around the face the second you aren’t looking. Professional academia seems to have this relaxed disposition that mirrors the very same sort of environment you left as a student. Though I note that this is the first month of me working as a lab manager, the goals of this role are to learn, attend meetings and assist the staff and student body when and where I can. One would think that this is all routine in a normal job but the reality of the situation is that everything I’ve done so far has entirely been off my own volition. In this role, the daily tasks are set by yourself and are entirely moderated by you and only you. This also extends onto various other aspects of the role, such as working times and quotas for said goals that were given. Ironically, it sounds like absolutely nothing has changed from being a student and being employed in academia.

With that in mind, it makes one think. Is this the same for everyone? Although the researchers (typically seen as lecturers to students) certainly have their moments of utter chaos, either through an email at 2am due to a stroke of genius or a meeting invite merely hours before the actual time, most seem to have an air of certainty behind them which gives the impression that they know exactly what to do and when is appropriate. I surmise the reason behind this is purely down to repetition and the fact they have gotten so good at the skill of internally screaming that they’ve started looking elegant whilst doing so.

As a result of this, I expect the role will have the same sort of timeline you would see with an assignment from university. Fun and games at the start, without a care in the world but eventually, crunch time will come in one form or another and that state of absolute pandemonium will come into effect.

So if you are in a similar place, either as a researcher or as support staff, I would wholeheartedly recommend maintaining consistency in your daily tasks. Communicate to your colleagues who’ve been around longer than you and ask for their feedback on how you think you’re doing. If you don’t know that you’re over or under working then you’ll not realise the burning effect of your actions till it’s too late.

Fingers crossed the same thought process can be applied for me!

[benjamintimm]

Starting a career in academia: Jumping out of the pan and into the fire - Month 1

Starting a professional career in academia is odd. In contrast to my time in corporate and government roles with brittle structures, harsh supervisors and deadlines ready to slap you around the face the second you aren’t looking. Professional academia seems to have this relaxed disposition that mirrors the very same sort of environment you left as a student. Though I note that this is the first month of me working as a lab manager, the goals of this role are to learn, attend meetings and assist the staff and student body when and where I can. One would think that this is all routine in a normal job but the reality of the situation is that everything I’ve done so far has entirely been off my own volition. In this role, the daily tasks are set by yourself and are entirely moderated by you and only you. This also extends onto various other aspects of the role, such as working times and quotas for said goals that were given. Ironically, it sounds like absolutely nothing has changed from being a student and being employed in academia.

With that in mind, it makes one think. Is this the same for everyone? Although the researchers (typically seen as lecturers to students) certainly have their moments of utter chaos, either through an email at 2am due to a stroke of genius or a meeting invite merely hours before the actual time, most seem to have an air of certainty behind them which gives the impression that they know exactly what to do and when is appropriate. I surmise the reason behind this is purely down to repetition and the fact they have gotten so good at the skill of internally screaming that they’ve started looking elegant whilst doing so.

As a result of this, I expect the role will have the same sort of timeline you would see with an assignment from university. Fun and games at the start, without a care in the world but eventually, crunch time will come in one form or another and that state of absolute pandemonium will come into effect.

So if you are in a similar place, either as a researcher or as support staff, I would wholeheartedly recommend maintaining consistency in your daily tasks. Communicate to your colleagues who’ve been around longer than you and ask for their feedback on how you think you’re doing. If you don’t know that you’re over or under working then you’ll not realise the burning effect of your actions till it’s too late.

Fingers crossed the same thought process can be applied for me!

[benjamintimm]

The start of something new?

So, here goes.

Starting something new. Anything new seems to be a daunting task that only gets more intense the closer you get to actually starting it. Like jumping off a cliff, or starting a conversation, even starting a blog. That feeling of anxiety and suspense will build up until it feels like it almost consumes you, though at the same time it still feels like theres also more room for it. 

You then have a choice. When it feels like the task in front of you is your entire focus, your entire world for that second. You either take that step, or you allow your focus to be changed by a small, almost insignificant distraction. In reality that tiny moment of you looking away or by checking insta or answering that text, youve knocked your focus just enough for you to put off that jump. 

Now this has literally happened to all of us I am sure, but the great thing about life for most of us is that we always have next time. Whether it be in a few seconds, hours, months or years. We can always try again.. for most of us.

So one of my tasks to myself was to start a blog about my life. Who for? Not sure really. Most likely for future me, but if you happen to read this and I have somehow ignored that distraction enough times to make more than one post. I hope you enjoy.

To something new.

[benjamintimm]

Blog 13 - FMP Dissertation

1/08/2018

Well, it's done. The title is: “Sound and waveform generation in the digital and analogue domains”.

It was the one suggested by my tutor in a previous FMP meeting and despite me coming up with a number of other names I felt that this one encompassed the paper the best and with the least amount of words. 

Self-reflection time.

Damn, that was long!!!!! So many panicked moments and stressed out sessions in the library. It was so extremely satisfying reaching 20,000 words on the entire document though (even though I doubt that the paper reaches 17,000). I had a lot of fun with it and tried my best to keep it all in context, with a couple of deviations here and there it seems that I came to the conclusion that it was better off for me to focus solely on the audio engineering aspect of the paper as I was clearly biting off more than I can chew. Doesn't help being best friends with PhD students as their work spans over a few years and their papers take just as long to read.

My only concern about this assignment was the lack of blogs but considering the amount of writing I have done, I feel that I can just about get away with what has been written. The website took a much smaller amount of time to create than expected and while I do feel that the practical part needs to be looked over once again by my tutor, I think the collection of data and analysis was a pretty decent job. I didn't want to overextend myself in that area and made my focus primarily on the structure of the waveforms with the spectrograms and multimeters around as a secondary set of data if anything. The only thing I wish I could have done if I had a longer period of time was to do another set of frequencies, this time being much higher and lower in pitch than the other two deviations, just to see the effects that are presented in comparison to the middle C comparison.

I would also like to thank my tutor for being an ace in the hole when around. Setting me on the right track is, of course, his job but he is exemplary at what he does and should be proud of the advice he has given.

I don't think I have anything else to say so hopefully I get a decent mark for this!  Although I wouldn't be surprised if the poor markers had a few breaks in between reading the paper haha.

[benjamintimm]

Blog 12 - FMP Dissertation

30/07/18

So the website is done. I’m afraid that I might get criticized for it not being specifically about the course as I have created it with the view to use it after in my academic work.  Small checks have been made towards the dissertation but without the tutor stating anything before the deadline I feel like there isn't anything else to add or change! 

Only thing that remains is to fully add a title to the paper.

[benjamintimm]

Blog 11 - FMP Dissertation

26/07/2018

I have finally finished writing!!!! Now its a matter of cleaning up the dissertation as best as I can. I think for the majority of the paper it will be fine, with only a small number of changes in the practical and then a couple of rehashes of titles but for the most part I think the final product is near! 

The word count went over 20,000 words in the total document so in some respects I have accomplished what I promised myself and the lecturers at the start of the year. Hopefully, all of that content being relevant as I did my best to keep it concise at times. 

Soon it will be the website but once again im still not sure what to put in that thing considering I will only have my papers to show for it. Should I have it in the form of an audio engineer for my grade or have the website for my real intentions and make it as a template to show my academic works? Should probs ask my tutor about that..

[benjamintimm]

Blog 10 - FMP Dissertation

So far the practical is 90% complete. All I need to do now is the conclusion and then possibly an overall essay conclusion but it seems that by the end of this week I should be finished with everything!

I'm assuming many minor faults will be littered throughout and I still have the website to do so I'm still far from finished but its good to know that the writing aspect is going to slow down. My only real concern now is what I do for this website considering it won't exactly be tailored for a musician or someone whos aiming to proceed into the audio industry.