I wanted to share a bit about the experiences I’ve had in “peer mentoring groups” where you meet up with people at your career stage, regardless of their research focus, and just vent… They became a thing for me during the pandemic since everyone was zooming and I really loved the writing group zooms where we would meet up, share what we’ll be writing on for the hour, then keep our cameras on and write for an hour, and share our progress by the end of the zoom. Over time we kinda ended up chatting more and more and realized we needed venting groups. So, the peer mentoring groups became my thing and I absolutely loved them. I wrote a grant and met up with another friend who was writing a grant on a weekly basis, we would share our progress, complain about whatever’s not going well and keep each other accountable since we shared our weekly to do lists for the grant to one another. It really made the grant writing easier because I tend to lose track easily and I felt responsibility to my friend to keep pushing as she was leaning on me too. Then I joined a couple different peer mentoring groups after the grant adventure (I got the grant too, woohoo!) and met early career researchers from different universities and departments. We would share our quarterly to do lists for the accountability and vent about anything & everything. Somehow the struggle became easier when you hear others struggling more or less the same, regardless of where they are and what they work on. It felt silly at first since I’m sparing a huge chunk of my time on a weekly basis but it really gave me the push I needed during and after the pandemic. Because let’s face it, we may love our jobs and the community we work with, but stuff gets tough. Just as I strongly suggest to people living with Parkinson’s & their care partners to check out support groups and spend time with other people in situations they can relate to, we need that as professionals too. It doesn’t have to be an official group or anything either, just a couple researchers that you may know well or not at all, and no structure needed. Meet up routinely, share your own frustrations or wins, and support others as they also support you.
Did anyone also dive into such groups? How was your experience???
Thanks for sharing, @ecebayram! Totally agree, those groups were super helpful and useful both during and after the pandemic. I was about a year and a half into my PhD when the pandemic hit, and some scientist friends and colleagues of mine had a group chat / weekly videocalls. Sometimes it was looking for help with technical questions in one’s work, but often it was like you said, just venting and sharing what you’re actually doing. I always got extra motivation towards my own work after seeing / hearing what others were up to!
This is a great suggestion, and a very interesting comparison with support groups for those with Parkinson’s!
When I was an early career academic I was asked to represent my department on a faculty-level committee. It turned out that most of the other departments had also sent early career academics, so it turned into an accidental network of peers for me! I found it very valuable to get insight into how other departments or research groups do things. If I ever wanted to push back on how things were done in my department, I had evidence and examples for alternative ways forward, rather than just blindly pushing against “how it has always been done” or “that’s just the way it is”. It’s always easier to see alternatives when you have models in front of you, rather than coming up with whole new approaches from nothing!