[Monday Motivator] Why Aren't You Writing? - June 1, 2015

This is an excerpt from the Monday Motivator Program of Center for Faculty Development and Diversity. Please find the original document here. The National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity is an independent professional development, training, and mentoring community of over 71,000 graduate students, post-docs, and faculty members.

I met a faculty member several years ago at a conference (I’ll call her Claire) who wanted advice about writing. Our conversation began like many I’ve had recently, with tears in response to a negative and critical annual review. Claire is a brilliant social scientist, incredibly hard-working, and passionately committed to her scholarship, her institution, and her students. While Claire is an award-winning teacher, and far exceeded her college’s service expectations, her publication record was significantly below her department’s standards. Her chair was clear that her lack of publications was problematic and she left the meeting feeling an almost desperate sense of urgency to move several manuscripts forward this summer.

Of course, I suggested she make a summer plan and join a writing group that would motivate and support her throughout the summer. Last week, when I was writing about resistance to writing I couldn’t help but think of Claire, so I reached out to see how she was progressing. Unfortunately, she had done very little writing. When I asked Claire what was holding her back, she had difficulty identifying anything specific. She readily acknowledged having more free time and fewer responsibilities than she did during the academic year. But despite knowing that this was an important summer for her to be productive and having a general sense that she should try to write every day, somehow her days kept flying by without any progress on her manuscripts.

I think there are lots of Claires out there. For me, she typifies both the most common and the most basic type of resistance: when you have a vague sense that you SHOULD be writing and you NEED to write (in order to finish your dissertation, get a job, win tenure, be promoted to Full Professor, etc.) but you’re not putting conscious, direct, and intense energy into the actual act of writing. As a result, lots of other work gets completed and other people’s needs get met, but at the end of the day your manuscript is left untouched. This type of resistance is grounded in relatively simple technical errors that academic writers frequently make. The good news is that this type of resistance is the easiest to resolve because a few simple tips and tricks will get your fingers to your keyboard (or pen to page).

What’s Holding You Back?

If Claire’s story sounds familiar, then I want to encourage you to reflect on your writing habits and gently ask yourself: What’s holding me back from developing a daily writing routine? I like to start with people’s writing habits first, and then move down into the psychological blocks (I’ll be tackling those one by one for the rest of the summer). For this week, I want you to focus on your writing behaviors. Maybe you haven’t set aside a specific time for your research and writing, or you’ve set aside the wrong time to write, or maybe you just have no clue how much time particular writing tasks take so you consistently underestimate the amount of time that writing requires. Maybe you imagine you have to do everything yourself and therefore very little gets done. Maybe the tasks you’ve set out for your writing time are too complex, so when you sit down to write you’re spending all your energy trying to figure out what exactly you’re supposed to be doing (instead of actually doing it). Maybe you don’t know what you need to do, or you knew but you forgot because you think planning and list-making are for anal retentive people and you’re more of a creative type. Or maybe your space is just so disorganized that you keep spending your writing time looking for things you need on your hard drive, in your files, or in your office.

Claire was committing all of these technical errors! Like Claire, many early-career academic writers remain steeped in writing habits that were formed when they were undergraduates. Because student writing is largely driven by external deadlines, few of us developed consistent writing practices, and instead, we end up waiting until shortly before a deadline, engaging in multi-day writing binges, and then avoiding writing again until we face another external deadline. This week, I want to encourage you to observe your current writing behaviors for these common technical errors. If you identify one of them, consider trying one of the following strategies:

Error 1: You haven’t set aside a specific time for your research.

Block out at least 30 minutes in your calendar each day, Monday through Friday, and show up at the appointed time. Treat it with the same level of respect you would a meeting with someone else (start on time, end on time, turn your phone off, and only reschedule for an emergency).

Error 2: You’ve set aside the wrong time for writing.

Too many people treat their writing as an activity they "hope" to have time for at the end of the day, after everyone else's needs have been met. If writing is the most important factor to your long-term success as a scholar, it should be given your best time of your day. If you’re just starting to develop a daily writing routine, try writing first thing in the morning (even if you’re not a morning person).

Error 3: You have no idea how long writing tasks take.

The most common complaint I hear from academic writers is that everything takes far longer than expected. Keep track of your time, particularly for repetitive tasks. This will not only give you an accurate assessment of how long writing a proposal, constructing a table, or reviewing the literature actually takes, but it will also help you to set realistic expectations for the future.

Error 4: You think you have to do everything yourself.

Ask yourself what tasks must be done by you and what tasks can be delegated to other people. Often there are many writing and research related tasks that can be delegated or outsourced to others (checking citations, proof-reading, editing, etc.). Don’t use "I don’t have a research fund or research assistants" as a reason for doing everything yourself. Sites likeUpWork.com and Elance.com can provide quick and incredibly inexpensive assistance on a wide variety of tasks.

Error 5: The tasks you have set out are too complex.

Take a piece of paper and pencil and map out whatever it is you need to do. When I feel overwhelmed by a big task, I write the big-overwhelming-thing on the right side of the paper and a stick figure (me) on the left side. Then I work my way backwards from the overwhelming thing to myself by asking: What are the steps that need to be accomplished to complete this?I keep breaking it down into smaller and smaller steps until I’ve reached the tasks I can do today. It will also help you to uncover if there are aspects of a project that you don’t know how to do, so you can pinpoint areas where you will need to seek assistance.

Error 6: You can’t remember what you have to do.

Make a list. Get all of the things you need to do out of your head and onto a piece of paper in one place. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy, electronic, or synced with some gadget or gizmo. A note card, post-it note, or your paper planner will do fine to capture all of your to-do tasks. Start the week with a 30 minute planning meeting where you determine what needs to be done for the week and place each of those items in a specific time block in your calendar. If they don’t all fit (and they won’t), then figure it out how to delegate, delete, or renegotiate the deadlines on the least important items.

Error 7: Your space is disorganized.

Set aside time to organize your writing space in a simple and easily maintainable manner. I recommend Julie Morgenstern’s Organizing from the Inside Out. It’s a quick read and will help you to develop a simple and sustainable way to organize your office. If you find yourself working on multiple computers and can’t keep your electronic files straight, consider ways that you can either access your other computers when you’re away from them (GoToMyPC) or keep all your computers automatically synced (www.dropbox.com).

Each of the strategies will be super-charged by attaching support and accountability. For example, daily writing is easier when you have a writing buddy or accountability partner. Organizing your office doesn’t have to be drudgery or a solitary task: partner up with another disorganized colleague and help each other. Or better yet, find a highly organized person (they often love to organize others) and offer to exchange their organizing skills with some skill that you have in abundance. And as always, there are tons of professionals who are happy to nag,coach, edit and/or organize you if you have more money than time. Once you learn and implement a few new writing strategies, you will either be off to the races with your writing, or your resistance will resurface in new and more frightening ways (more on that next week).

The Weekly Challenge

This week, I challenge you to:

• Write every day for at least 30 minutes
• Identify what (if any) technical errors are holding you back from writing each day
• Experiment by trying one new strategy this week
• If you feel reactive to trying new strategies to increase your writing time, ask yourself: what beliefs are keeping you from experimentation?
• If additional resistance emerges, welcome it with curiosity, engage it in conversation, and identify the behaviors and the feelings associated with it (you may even want to keep a resistance log).

I hope this week brings you a spirit of curiosity about your writing habits, a willingness to try new techniques, and the increased engagement that comes with spending time each day with your summer writing project.

[Monday Motivator] Meet Your Bodyguard - May 25, 2015

This is an excerpt from the Monday Motivator Program of Center for Faculty Development and Diversity. Please find the original document here. The National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity is an independent professional development, training, and mentoring community of over 71,000 graduate students, post-docs, and faculty members.

Greetings,

This summer, I'm dedicated to walking alongside all of you who are tackling big writing projects, trying to establish new writing routines, and needing to experience explosive productivity. If you’ve been following this column so far, you have a clear summer plan that you’ve discussed with your mentors and you have created some form of writing support and accountability. By now, you’re very likely facing a new challenge: the intense difficulty of actually writing every day. Unlike the academic year, when we can attribute any lack of daily progress to teaching and service, summer lays bare the reality that daily writing brings up all of our stuff. This week, I want to describe what happens to many people when they engage in daily writing and give that "stuff" a name and a face.

Identify Your Resistance

It's an odd situation, isn’t it? You’ve been waiting all year for the summer so you can have the time, space and energy for your writing. You've been fantasizing and yearning for three months of quiet and solitude so you can finally finish your Big Unfinished Project. You planned to write every day and maybe even imagined losing track of time while immersed in your writing projects. And yet, when you actually sit down to write, all of a sudden you experience an unquenchable desire to ____________ (fold your laundry, check your e-mail, organize your pens), or you suddenly realize you need to read one more ______ (book, article, report) before you can start writing, or _________ (insert seemingly urgent crisis) appears and distracts you, or maybe you find yourself gazing out the window and realize that life is too __________ (short, painful, unpredictable) to spend a sunny day inside writing. In short, procrastination, avoidance, and denial arise to distract and derail you.

Why is it that we so often find ourselves wanting to write, but then end up not writing at all?Most academic writers I know genuinely want to share their ideas and findings, and also need to complete writing projects in order to finish their degree, get a job, and/or obtain tenure. And yet, whenever we put our butt in a chair to write, along comes our resistance! Barbara Sher describes resistance (when you want to do something, but you just can’t seem to do it) as an innately human defense mechanism that is uniquely designed to protect us from doing anything dangerous. In other words, our resistance is like an internal bodyguard that rises up to keep us from any risky situation.

Having an internal bodyguard is mostly a good thing! On one hand, it keeps us from engaging in potentially harmful activities. On the other hand, our inner-bodyguard can't tell the difference between physical danger and emotional danger so he gets activated whether we are standing at the edge of a cliff or sitting down to write a book. Both feel dangerous and raise anxiety. In response, our bodyguard leaps into action to stop us from engaging in this activity in the form of procrastination, avoidance, and/or denial. He will do whatever it takes to stop us from jumping off that cliff, or engaging in what feels (for many of us) like an equally dangerous act: the production of knowledge.

Fear Drives Resistance

Wherever there's resistance, there's fear underneath it. So it might be helpful to ask yourself:When I sit in front of the computer to write, what fears emerge? It may be fear of success, fear of failure, fear of being publicly judged, fear of not being good enough, fear of being revealed as an impostor, fear of speaking truth to power, or fear that writing about other people’s pain will trigger your own. There’s no need to analyze or judge these fears, just to identify them, because knowing what you’re afraid of will help you to design strategies to maneuver around them.

Over the next few weeks, I’m going to go into greater depth about the different types of resistance that are common among academic writers for the purpose of suggesting a broad array of tips, tricks, and strategies you can use whenever your bodyguard shows up for duty. If you keep in mind that he can't quite tell the difference between real and perceived danger and that he genuinely wants to do his job of protecting you, then you will quickly realize that the trick to sneaking around your resistance is to keep your inner bodyguard in a nice, comfortable, and relaxed state. For this week, it’s enough to imagine your resistance as a big bodyguard that's always ready to protect you, identify when he’s present and what he’s up to, and then look him in the eye, shake hands, and get acquainted.

Personally, I love the idea that my resistance is really my very own built-in bodyguard at work! First of all, it brings me a sense of compassion and understanding towards the procrastination, avoidance, and denial I experience when I sit down to write every morning. Each time I feel an irresistible urge to check Facebook, a sense I can’t write until I color-code my sock drawer, or suddenly imagine my current writing would be better if I read someone else’s book first, I can recognize that resistance as my bodyguard at work. Secondly, it frees me from the debilitating idea that if I could just fix one of my many personal flaws, then I would be free of any resistance to writing. There’s no sense in believing that if only I were more disciplined, more motivated, and more focused, writing would be quick, easy and enjoyable. That’s just not how it works. And finally, it's helpful to me to understand that my resistance is ALWAYS going to be with me, because it's part of my human packaging.

The Weekly Challenge

This week, I challenge you to:

• Write every day (Monday through Friday) for 30-60 minutes.
• Notice what happens when you sit down to write.
• Consider what it would be like to understand your procrastination, avoidance and denial as protective impulses.
• If you can’t seem to start writing, gently ask yourself: What am I afraid of?
• Identify all the ways your resistance manifests this week without judgment, shame or self-recrimination.

I hope this week brings you the willingness to identify your resistance as it occurs, a spirit of openness toward new ways of understanding your procrastination and avoidance behaviors, and a sense of compassion toward yourself in the process.

[tutorial] How to setup Virtual Host using WAMP

In order to run PHP on your local Windows computer, you need to install a server stack - either WAMP orXAMPP. Either will do, but for the purposes of this tutorial we're going to stick with WAMP.

If you have your php project in another directory, this tutorial will help you to setup virtual directory in WAMP to point to your php project directory. As an example, if you have your php project under eclipse directory, you need to enable virtual host in Apache configuration to run your code from the eclipse codebase.

Now, you could just do a basic install of WAMP and be on your way (using wamp\www to keep all your php files), but being restricted to just one directory in an obscure location on your computer is awfully limiting, especially if you're working on multiple projects at a time using other IDEs. That's where virtual hosts come in. By configuring virtual hosts on your WAMP server, you'll be able to run as many separate sites as you want, from any location you want.


This tutorial should work for machines running either Vista or Windows 7.

10 STEPS TO VIRTUAL HOST BLISS WITH WAMP

STEP 1

Download and install WAMP, then start the program. Pick a location on your computer where you want to set up your virtual hosts, like "C:/Users/Sampath/git/my-project". We're just going to work with one folder for now, but when we're finished you can set up virtual hosts in as many directories as you want.

As a sanity test, create a basic index.php file with some text ("Hello World!") and place it in the "My Site" folder. When we're finished, you'll know you've done it right when you can view your page in a browser using your virtual host's URL.

STEP 2

Go to "C:/Windows/System32/drivers/etc" and open the "hosts" file in Notepad. For Windows 7, open the properties and remove read-only option before you open it in Notepad. Also you can Right-click on Notepad and select "run as administrator". Then select File>Open and at the bottom right of the dialog box, select "All Files" from the dropdown instead of "Text Documents (*.txt)":

Then navigate to "C:/Windows/System32/drivers/etc" and open the "hosts" file.

STEP 3

At the bottom of the hosts file, below all the other text, add a new line with the following:

127.0.0.1        mysite.localhost               #My Test Site
:: 1

"mysite.localhost" is the domain name that will be used for your local site. You can name this whatever you want, like "johnnyfooball.tamu" or whatever. "#My Test Site" is simply a comment to help identify the site, which will be helpful once you start stacking up a lot of virtual hosts. Again, you can put whatever you want here, just don't forget the hashtag (#) beforehand, which is what makes it a comment.

Save the file.

STEP 4

Open "C:\wamp\bin\apache\apache2.4.9\conf" (your Apache version number may be different)

Just to mess with your head, there are 2 files - one called "httpd.conf", and one called "httpd.conf.build":

Open "httpd.conf".

STEP 5

At line 467, under "# Virtual hosts", un-comment (remove the hashtag [#]) before the line "Include conf/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf":

This tells Apache to include the file "httpd-vhosts.conf" (the file where we set our virtual hosts) when configuring its settings.

STEP 6

Go to "C:\wamp\bin\apache\apache2.4.9\conf\extra" and open the file "httpd.vhosts.conf". It should look like this:

STEP 7

We need to give Apache permission to look in our "Projects" folder for websites. Remove any dummy virtual host examples in the file. At the bottom of the page, below all the other text, add the following:

<VirtualHost *:80> 
            DocumentRoot "c:/wamp/www"
            ServerName localhost
            ServerAlias localhost
            ErrorLog "logs/localhost-error.log"
            CustomLog "logs/localhost-access.log" common 
            <Directory "c:/wamp/www">
                      AllowOverride All
                      Options Indexes FollowSymLinks
                      Require local 
            </Directory> 
</VirtualHost> 

<VirtualHost *:80> 
             DocumentRoot "C:/Users/Sampath/git/my-project" 
             ServerName   mysite.localhost
             <Directory C:/Users/Sampath/git/my-prject/>
                        AllowOverride All 
                        Options Indexes FollowSymLinks
                        Require local
             </Directory> 
</VirtualHost>


The DocumentRoot should be the path to the folder where your site lives, and the ServerName should match the domain you entered in your hosts file in Step 3.

Important: The DocumentRoot must be inside the directory that you gave Apache permission to access in Step 7. Also the "/" at the end of   <Directory C:/Users/Sampath/git/my-prject/>  is important. See the difference in DocumentRoot and Document. There is no "/" at the end of DocumentRoot.

Save the file.

STEP 8

Click on the green WAMP icon in your toolbar and select "Restart all Services", then wait for the icon to turn back to green.

STEP 9

Open your browser and navigate to "mysite.localhost", or whatever your domain name is. You should see the test page you created in Step 1. 

STEP 10*

*Optional. Enjoy. Run around and scream "Eureka!!!"

Thanks to https://www.kristengrote.com/blog/articles/how-to-set-up-virtual-hosts-using-wamp for the original version of this tutorial.  

Best of BBC Funny Talking Animals Collection

Credit By Exam (CBE) Test - Kindergarten Acceleration - Iowa Test of Basic Skills (ITBS)

[Monday Motivator] "Shut Up & Write" - May 18, 2015

This is an excerpt from the Monday Motivator Program of Center for Faculty Development and Diversity. Please find the original document here. The National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity is an independent professional development, training, and mentoring community of over 71,000 graduate students, post-docs, and faculty members.

Last week I received lots of mail about ending post-summer regret. Many of you were able to make a summer plan without difficulty, but it was the development of a support system that left you confused. All the queries seemed to all boil down to three questions: 1) What types of writing groups exist? 2) How do I figure out which type of writing group is right for me? And 3) If I were just more motivated and disciplined then I wouldn’t need a group, so how can I change myself? Because having a support system is critical to actually executing your summer plan, I want to dedicate this week’s Monday Motivator to the many different kinds of writing groups and what makes them either flounder or flourish as support systems.

Faculty development researchers have demonstrated that accountability and support increase writing productivity among new faculty members. And yet, when graduate students, post-docs and new faculty talk about needing support that goes beyond substantive feedback, they’re often met with some form of shaming: "Why do you need a support group?" "Can’t you just motivate yourself to write?" "This is your job dear, so if you don’t want to write there’s plenty of unemployed people who would love to be in your position." In short, many are advised to "shut up and write". And because shaming moves people into action, that may actually work for a week or two. But true needs have a way of resurfacing. So instead of taking the tough-guy, ignore-your-needs, shut-up-and-write approach, I want to suggest the opposite. In other words, I believe that embracing your needs will help you to develop a support system that will move you from the occasional shame-induced writing binges towards a healthy, consistent, and sustainable daily writing routine.

While it should go without saying, it’s OK to have needs. In fact, if you wait until you are perfectly motivated, flawlessly self-disciplined, free from anxiety, utterly fearless, intellectually energized, and emotionally resolved before you start writing this summer, you may never begin! Instead, I want to encourage you to release yourself from the idea that having needs means there’s something wrong with you. It’s OK if you need support and accountability. It’s OK if you’re not productive in isolation. It’s OK if you need community, feedback, a safe space to take risks, and a group of people who genuinely celebrate your accomplishments. It’s OK because meeting your needs for community, support and accountability will not only increase your productivity, but also your enjoyment of summer writing.

What do YOU need?
If you can accept the fact that you don’t have to change who you are in order to be productive, then I want you to dig just a little deeper by asking yourself: What do I need to maximize my writing this summer? Academic writers have lots of different needs. For example, some people need to physically share space with others while writing, some need a stern authority figure to answer to, some need solitude and the kind of support that is silent, some need a quantitative accounting of their progress, some need to be in groups with similar others, some need to be regularly inspired, some need ongoing substantive feedback by those in their specialty field, some need regular cheerleading, some need therapy, and some need an occasional exorcism (from the demons of bad academic socialization). It’s even OK if you need all of these things at different times! The important thing is to identify what you need without judgment, shame, or self-flagellation. Knowing what you truly need to maximize your productivity is what will allow you to construct a writing support system that is effective for YOU.


Connect with a writing group that meets your needs.
Once you have identified your basic needs, start to imagine the best way to get them met. I’m going to describe a few different types of writing groups for the dual purpose of expanding your sense of what a "writing group” looks like and illustrating the importance of letting your needs guide your selection of an appropriate group. It’s really quite simple: Writing groups flourish when everyone’s needs are getting met and flounder when they don’t meet the primary needs of members.

Traditional Writing Groups
When we use the term "writing group," the most common form that comes to mind is a small number of people who commit to a specific period of time (e.g., a summer) to meet face-to-face, once-a-month, for the purpose of reading, critiquing, and providing substantive feedback on each other’s written work. This requires a commitment of 5-8 hours per month to read other people’s work, draft comments, show up and engage during the meeting time. Such groups tends to work well if participant’s primary need is substantive feedback and if members are able to provide that for one another. This structure is less effective when participants have other more pressing needs (support or ongoing accountability) and/or the feedback is the sort that could be obtained more efficiently from a professional editor.

Writing Accountability Groups
If your primary need is to have a committed group of people to answer to each week, then writing accountability groups may be worth trying. The structure is fairly simple: four people agree to meet once a week during the summer (either face-to-face or by conference call, Skype, or Google Hangout). The groups meet for exactly one hour per week and each person gets 15 minutes to discuss the following items: 1) my writing goals for last week were _______, 2) I did/did not meet them, 3) if I didn't meet them, it’s because of _______ and 4) my writing goals for next week are _______. Developing a daily writing routine tends to bring up all people's stuff and the group helps to support one another by identifying the limiting beliefs and behaviors that hold members back from productivity. Nobody reads anyone else's writing in this type of group. Instead the focus is on the writing process and moving projects forward so they can get into the hands of people with subject matter expertise (not group members). This structure works well when the primary needs of participants are accountability, support, community, and peer mentoring. It is ineffective when individuals cannot sustain the weekly commitment to the group or daily writing, and/or their primary need is for ongoing substantive feedback.


Write-On-Site
If you’re someone who needs to be around others when you’re writing and/or feels isolated, a Write-On-Site group may work well for you. It’s also very straightforward: an organizer selects a time and place for meeting and disseminates that information to a group of interested others. At the appointed time, people descend on the designated space and everyone writes. Every thing else is optional: there can be a weekly attendance commitment (or not), the group can range from two people (writing buddies) to as many people as the space will hold, and it can occur in a public or private space. There's no reading each other's work, there's no discussion during the writing time, it’s just about getting into the same physical space and actually engaging in the act of writing. The collective writing energy of the group is energizing and people are free to come early and stay late for socializing. Like every structure I’m describing, this works well when participants are getting their needs met (everyone comes to write). It doesn’t work well when people arrive and their primary needs are support, substantive feedback, or processing why they are stuck.

Online Writing Groups
There are a variety of online writing groups that are designed to provide support, accountability, and tracking progress over time. Some are free and some cost money, but essentially the structure is the same. Participants commit to a period of daily writing, check in each day at the end of their writing time, track their daily progress over time, and engage in discussion about writing with other participants. If you subscribe to a fee-based service, your progress will be automatically transformed into beautiful charts and tables. This support system works well for people who need daily support and encouragement, feel isolated in some way, and/or for whom electronic relationships are genuinely satisfying and significant enough to elicit the feeling of accountability. This support structure is less suitable for people who need face-to-face contact and interaction in order to feel a tangible sense of accountability and community.


Coaches and Nags
It may be the case that you have a variety of needs but your schedule disallows you from committing to any kind of group for the summer. Or alternatively, you have no idea what you need and you would like to work with a professional to figure it out. There are a variety of writing coaches out there who will consult with you weekly (for fees ranging from $75-$150 per hour) to increase your awareness of what’s holding you back and help you to develop and implement strategies to move you forward. I have also worked with "professional nags" who will call you each day at the beginning of your writing time, make you state clearly and succinctly what you will do that day, and connect with you at the end of your time to hear whether you completed your work or not. Nagging is great for people who have trouble getting started with their writing each day, but are fine once they get into the flow. Coaches and nags work well for people who either aren’t clear what their needs are or need more personalized and intense accountability than a group can provide. Of course, this doesn’t work for people for whom the mere idea of being nagged feels oppressive.

Bootcamps
Some people have tried various groups but keep running into the same problems: they struggle to find others who will stick to their commitments and/or they don't know what do when they face their own resistance day after day. The advantage of bootcamps is that they provide a professionally facilitated group, intense structure, and are filled with people who have made a commitment by investment. That's a nice way of saying that in groups where everyone has paid to participate, commitment to the group tends to be very high! This high level of commitment, structure, and accountability combined with the attention of dedicated mentor-coaches tend to result in tremendous transformations in productivity. That said, boot-camps are not for everyone because they require a willingness to experiment with new writing behaviors, continually question your beliefs about writing, and force you to explore the fears and anxiety that underlie your resistance to writing.

I currently use all of these mechanisms at once! I have a coach, participate in an online group each day, have a weekly accountability group meeting, attend Write-on-Site as needed, and I run a Bootcamp. I know that if left to my own devices, I will not write. I’ll be very productive in every other imaginable way, but I won’t write. Over the years I have come to accept the fact that I need community, support and accountability and instead of judging myself negatively for having those needs, I embrace them, create mechanisms to meet them, and find that participating in these types of supportive systems brings me increased productivity and tremendous joy. You may have different (and fewer) needs than I do, but the key to having a productive, fulfilling, and enjoyable summer is to ask yourself: What do I need and what kind of writing group will best support my needs?

The Weekly Challenge

This week, I challenge you to:

• Ask yourself: What do I you need to support my writing this summer?
• If you’re reactive to the idea of having needs, or to answering this simple question, gently ask yourself: Why?
• Consider what it would mean to accept your needs as part of who you are (as opposed to trying to deny or judge them).
• Imagine a support structure that would meet your needs and support your writing.
• If it already exists, join it. If it doesn’t create it.

I hope this week brings you the clarity to identify your needs, the freedom to embrace them, and the creativity to connect with mechanisms of support that will allow you to maximize your productivity this summer and develop a sustainable daily writing routine.

[Monday Motivator] The Biggest Mistakes New Faculty Make - May 4, 2015

As the NCFDD transitions into our Summer Session, many of our members have asked for a simple recap of the this term's Monday Motivator series. Since January, we've been working on the theme "The Biggest Mistakes New Faculty Members Make".

Just in case you missed any of the Spring Session Monday Motivators, here's a complete list with links to each one!

Mistake #1 Your Semester Has No Plan
Mistake #2 Your Time Isn't Aligned With Your Evaluation Criteria
Mistake #3 You Believe Balance is a Myth
Mistake #4 You're Investing in Long-Term Institutional Change at the Expense of Your Research Agenda
Mistake #5 You're Reactive Instead of Proactive in Your Professional Relationships
Mistake #6 You've Put All of Your Eggs in One Institutional Basket
Mistake #7 You Don't Know How You Spend Your Time
Mistake #8 You Haven't Set Up Any Feedback Loops
Mistake #9 You're Over-functioning on Teaching While Under-functioning on Your Research
Mistake #10 You're Ignoring Your Body
Mistake #11 You Internalize Rejection and Negativity
Mistake #12 You're Trying to Do Everything Yourself
Mistake #13 You Avoid Conflict
Mistake #14 You're Looking for A Guru-Mentor
Mistake #15 You Don't Have Strategies to Relieve Stress

The Weekly Challenge:

• This week I want to challenge you to:
• Read through the list of common mistakes
• If any of them resonate with you, try re-reading that Monday Motivator and implementing one of the suggested strategies this week
• If you don't have time to re-read, just make sure you're writing every day for at least 30 minutes.
• If many of the mistakes resonate with you, consider enrolling in our 12-week Faculty Success Program. Our summer bootcamp is a great way to establish positive work habits and increase your productivity this summer.

You may agree or disagree with our list of common mistakes, but I hope seeing it all in one place is helpful to you as a way of assessing what you did (and did not) accomplish this Spring and making some important adjustments as you move into the summer months.

Let's Get Ready for Summer Writing (Monday Motivator for Faculty for the Future, May 11, 2015)

This is an excerpt from the Monday Motivator Program of Center for Faculty Development and Diversity. Please find the original document here. The National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity is an independent professional development, training, and mentoring community of over 71,000 graduate students, post-docs, and faculty members.

For those of you on the semester calendar: happyy end of term! Happy Graduation! and CONGRATULATIONS! You survived another academic year! And you know what that means: the summer writing season is right around the corner. Throughout the spring term, I kept hearing from beleaguered faculty, post-docs, and graduate students who couldn’t wait for summer so they could "get some serious writing done." And yet, every August I hear from just as many folks lamenting about how another summer has passed by and, once again, they failed to make progress on their intellectual projects. As we head into the summer session, I’m feeling motivated to help eradicate end-of-summer regret among academic writers! To that end, this summer's Monday Motivators are designed to be your week-by-week support system for your summer writing and productivity.

Summer Writing Challenges
While we often fantasize about the freedom that summer represents, there are some important challenges to consider during the summer months. The most important challenge is the deception of unstructured time. Freedom from teaching, committee meetings, advising, and the day-to-day drama of campus life can create the illusion that we have lots of time. Imagining that we have infinite time can lead us to procrastinate and/or belabor tasks unnecessarily. Additionally, for those of you who aren’t daily writers during the academic year, you may experience the challenge of heightened expectations. In other words, putting off writing until the summer can create intense pressure (particularly for tenure-track faculty) that you must complete a year’s worth of writing in 12 weeks.

Childcare poses yet another challenge to summer writing. Changed schedules for school-aged children, gaps between the end of school and beginning of summer camps, and the increased expense of additional childcare during the summer months can leave some parents struggling to manage additional childcare and a rigorous writing schedule. Finally, some of you are simply exhausted from the intensity of the academic year and, more than anything else, feel the need to address all the neglected areas of your physical health, social life, and personal relationships during the summer months.

While it’s important to understand the challenges academic writers face during the summer session, they also point to the keys for a productive summer. I believe those are: 1) knowing what you need as a human being and what you need to accomplish as a writer and researcher, 2) creating a realistic plan to meet all of your needs, and 3) connecting with the type of community, support and accountability that will sustain you through the summer months. I think every block of time (quarter/semester/summer/sabbatical) should start with a plan, so for this week I want to encourage you to set aside 60 minutes, grab your calendar and a piece of paper, and develop a clear and concrete plan for the summer.

How to Create a Summer Plan
If you have a plan for your writing and personal goals this summer, you automatically lower the possibility of experiencing end-of-summer regret because you will have proactively and consciously chosen activities that lead to specific endpoints. A summer plan allows you to define your goals, identify the activities that will help you achieve them, and provide you with the confidence that when August rolls around, you will have accomplished all the things that are important to you and your future success.

Step #1: Start with your goals
Start by writing down all of your personal and professional goals for the summer. I make sure all of my goals are SMART goals. In other words, I try to state my goals inSpecific Measurable, Attractive, Realistic and Time framed statements. So, instead of listing "make progress on my book" and "learn how to cook" as goals, I write "complete the first ugly draft of chapter 2 by July 1st" and "take one cooking class each month." Listing your goals is the fun part, so enjoy it.

Step #2: Outline the tasks that are required to achieve your goals
For each of your end-of-summer writing goals, determine all the tasks necessary to achieve the goal. For example, if one of your goals is to submit that R & R that's been sitting on your desk all year, then ask yourself: What specific tasks do I need to complete in order to revise and resubmit my manuscript? Your list could look something like the following:

• Read the editor's and reviewer's comments.
• Cry a little.
• Create a list of necessary revisions.
• Read for revision.
• Re-analyze data.
• Revise the writing and update tables.
• Submit to a professional editor.
• Draft a cover letter explaining how you addressed the reviewers comments.
• Mail/upload the revised manuscript to the journal.
• Celebrate the submission.

Each of your goals will require specific tasks in order to be accomplished by August. If you’re a visual person (as opposed to a list-maker), than try mapping out a flow chart of each of your goals. Some will be simple and others will be complex, but the main point is that if all you're doing is setting goals without identifying all the small steps that are necessary to achieve them, you are unlikely to finish the summer with much progress or productivity.


Step #3: Map your tasks onto time
Here's where it always gets ugly. Take a long hard look at your calendar and make sure you have blocked out all of your summer commitments (vacation, moving, conference travel, childcare, summer teaching, etc...). What is left is the time you realistically have to complete all the tasks necessary to accomplish your goals. Use your best estimate as to how long each task will take and find specific weeks in your calendar when this work will get done. I estimate the tasks associated with the R&R example would take me four weeks. So I have to find FOUR WEEKS in my calendar to complete all the tasks in order to meet my goal.

I believe that this is where things get ugly because inevitably, you will have more tasks than will fit into 12 weeks. In fact, your summer break may suddenly seem shockingly short! Don't worry, this happens to everyone, and the point of this exercise is to force this realization in May (as opposed to August) because now you can proactively make decisions about the work that doesn’t fit into your calendar by scaling back your goals, re-negotiating deadlines, requesting additional support, prioritizing, delegating, and/or letting some things go. Whatever you decide, you will feel far more empowered making your decisions in advance then simply hoping you'll meet all of your goals and then ending another summer disappointed and frustrated over all the work that didn't get done.

Step #4: Execute the plan on a daily basis
Once you have a plan for your summer activity, it's up to you to actually do it! I sit down at the beginning of each week to review what writing tasks I have planned for that week and figure out what specific day and time I will complete them (aka The Sunday Meeting). We are all motivated by different things, so try to figure out what motivates YOU and build it into your daily life. Personally, I am motivated by treats, so when I finish my writing each day, I get a treat. My treats don’t have to be expensive or extravagant, they’re just a little dose of personal pleasure for a job well done.


Step #5: Create support and accountability
Summer is a time when you will need extra support and accountability because the structured activities of the semester (events, classes, and meetings) cease. This is an ideal time to start a writing accountability group, create a write-on-site group, join the monthly writing challenges on the NCFDD Discussion Forums, set up a google group with friends, or join the next session of our Faculty Success Program. Whatever you do, don't try to go it alone! There are many wonderful communities of support that already exist and you have the power to create them in your own local environment.

As always, adapt these steps to fit your life circumstances and personal needs. And once you have a plan, I encourage you to share it with your mentors to get their suggestions, feedback, and ideas. This way, no matter how your academic year ended, you (and your departmental mentors) will know that this summer, you are a scholar with a clear plan!

The Weekly Challenge

This week, I challenge you to:

• Take 60 minutes to sit down and construct a plan that provides all the rest, fun, support, and community you need to be productive this summer.
• If you want to work with me in creating your summer plan, register for our May core curriculum webinar: Every Summer Needs A Plan.
• Find or create a community of support that will keep you motivated throughout the summer months.
• Share your summer plan with at least one of your mentors for advice and feedback.
• And if you want to participate in our Summer bootcamp but missed the deadline, go ahead and add your name to our waiting list.

I hope that going through the process of making a summer plan will help you to identify your priorities, clarify how all of your personal and professional needs can get met, and energize you for the summer months.

Evolution of Music - Bollywood and Hollywood

Heres couple of most popular evolution of music videos in the Youtube.
Evolution of Bollywood Music - Penn Masala, and

Mime Through Time by SketchSHE. 

Enjoy, and comment if you know any other relevant ones..............

Transitioning To The Summer (Monday Motivator for Faculty for the Future, April 27 2015)

This is an excerpt from the Monday Motivator Program of Center for Faculty Development and Diversity. Please find the original document here. The National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity is an independent professional development, training, and mentoring community of over 71,000 graduate students, post-docs, and faculty members.

I don't know about you but I love the last few weeks of the semester! I love imagining all the possibilities of the summer and celebrating all of the achievements of the academic year! I’ve been to thirteen campuses this semester and I'm spending my last week of the term giving a workshop at the University of California, Riverside. It’s been a whirlwind of a semester, but I've greatly enjoyed connecting face-to-face with so many of you and celebrating all of your success!

I also encourage you to take a deep breath as we head towards the end the academic year (even if you're on the quarter system and the summer is a little further away). As we transition into the summer term, it's a great time to reflect on your support systems. Your NCFDD Membership offers lots of great resources that you may not have been able to take advantage of during the academic year. This summer you may want to explore and experiment with some of our resources. This is a great week to ask yourself:
Do I know how my NCFDD membership works?
Am I maximizing my membership?
Am I getting what I need or do I need to go deeper into the available resources?


Our annual membership is designed to operate as a year-long virtual mentorship program. That means we have set up the resources to move you through a 12-month process intended to increase your writing productivity and work-life balance. Each of the following resources are available to you, at your convenience:

MONTHLY WEBINARS: Every month we offer a core curriculum webinar AND guest expert webinar. To attend the webinars live, just register online and we will send you the link, a call-in number and PIN. If you want to experience the webinars on your own schedule, they are available online to view at your convenience. You can access the audio and video files, slides and transcripts from one central location: click here.

THE BUDDY SYSTEM: During each of our monthly training calls, we match up accountability buddies. This is designed to support your implementation of whatever strategy we have just taught in the webinar, provide you with a peer-mentor, and to expand your network. If you want a buddy at any time, all you need to do is email Buddies@FacultyDiversity.org and put "I want a buddy" in the subject line. We match people as the requests roll in...

DISCUSSION FORUM: The NCFDD discussion forums are a private place where our members connect, share information, peer-mentor, problem-solve, and celebrate each others successes. In other words, it's the "safe space" for our online community engagement that is available to you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

RESOURCES AND REFERRALS: Summer is a great time to do some reading to enhance your professional development and/or try out a new support resource (professional editor, developmental editor, writing retreats, dissertation coaches, etc...). Our resources and referrals page contains all our favorite books, articles, and preferred vendors listed in one convenient place for you.

The Weekly Challenge
This week, I challenge you to:
Write at least 30 minutes each day.
Take a moment to ask yourself: how does my NCFDD membership work? Am I maximizing my investment? Should I try experimenting with a resource I haven't tried before?
If you've missed any of our webinars and they sound interesting to you, head over to our webinar page to download whatever topic will enhance your productivity!
If you want a buddy for the month of May, email Buddies@FacultyDiversity.org
If you want to work with me to draft your Summer Plan, register for our May core curriculum webinar: Every Summer Needs A Plan.
If you want this to be your most productive summer ever, consider joining us for our Faculty Success Program Summer Bootcamp (the early bird deadline ends May 1st).

If you're already maximizing the NCFDD membership resources and benefiting from them, why not forward this message to a friend and encourage them to become an Individual Member this summer or to the appropriate administrator at your university to establish an Institutional Membership. We love your referrals!

I hope this week brings each of you an opportunity to take a deep breath as we transition into the summer to make sure you have all the support and resources you need.

It's Crunch Time (Monday Motivator for Faculty for the Future, April 20, 2015 )

This is an excerpt from the Monday Motivator Program of Center for Faculty Development and Diversity. Please find the original document here. The National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity is an independent professional development, training, and mentoring community of over 71,000 graduate students, post-docs, and faculty members.

The end of the semester must be near because nearly all the new faculty members I met last week were holding their breath, trying to keep their heads above water, and praying for the end of the term! The feelings of exhaustion and frustration I heard repeatedly were both intense and predictable. For those of you on the semester-calendar, let's focus on some concrete ways to deal with Common New Faculty Mistake #15: Failing to Recognize and Adjust to the Rhythms of the Semester.

Each semester has a natural energetic rhythm. We share our students' high energy at the beginning, it flattens out during the middle (as reality sinks in), and the end of the term finds most of us dragging from some combination of disappointment, frustration, exhaustion, and/or departmental drama. While most new faculty members feel tired, cranky, and completely out of gas the last two weeks of every term, the end of the spring semester is particularly difficult because it's also the end of the academic year. So if you find yourself feeling bone weary, that’s perfectly normal! This week, I encourage you to recognize the current intensity you’re experiencing for what it is: a predictable rhythm of the semester. Knowing this is a recurring pattern should enable you to be gentle with yourself and make behavioral adjustments that will allow you to not only survive, but thrive during the end-of-semester crunch time.

10 Tips for Thriving During Crunch Time
I believe that stressful times call for unique coping strategies. The following tips are the collected wisdom from my own mentors about how they maintain sanity during the end-of-term crunch time. The underlying theme is that when you’re pressed for time, you must be proactive, strategic, and clear about how you spend each moment. Too often, when things get hectic we sacrifice our own needs so that everyone else’s can get met. Instead, each suggestion is aimed at minimizing the things that don’t matter so that you can move through the busiest time of the year without surrendering the things that do matter (your health or productivity).

Tip #1: Clearly communicate to others that it is crunch time
Let those who live with you and/or are impacted by your behavior know that the next week (or two) will be difficult, assure them that it's a finite period of time, and let them know you appreciate their support and understanding. I find that people are willing to assist me when I communicate my needs ahead of time.

Tip #2: Lower your standards in non-essential areas of life
I'm what's known as a neat freak. During crunch time, I give myself permission to be a slob. It's OK because it's only one week. I love to eat out, but during crunch time, I'm OK with peanut butter and pickle sandwiches because I don't have time for anything else. And that's OK because it's only one week. Typically, I sleep nine hours per night. During crunch time, I sleep nine hours per night. And that’s because sleep is not negotiable for me! The point is to ask yourself: what can I let slide a bit for the next week (or two) without negative consequences?

Tip #3: Ruthlessly assess what grading ACTUALLY needs to get done
Many students do not read comments that are given on final papers and projects. Upon the suggestion of one of my mentors, I developed the habit of asking my students ahead of time to indicate if they want me to write comments on their final papers. Fewer than 10 percent requested the comments and I saved hours of grading that would never have been read while concentrating my comment-writing on the students who genuinely want feedback.

Tip #4: Say NO to EVERY SERVICE REQUEST from now until the end of the semester
If you are struggling to find time to complete all of the things on your to-do list, it makes no sense to add more items. In other words, when your time is scarce, one of the worst things you can do is to take on any additional responsibilities. Say "no" often, clearly, and without guilt.

Tip #5: Every day needs a plan
Take 30 minutes on Sunday night to get your to-do list out of your head and onto a piece of paper. Then force yourself to place each of your tasks onto a specific time in your calendar. If you don't have enough time for the tasks, then delegate them, re-negotiate the deadline, or let them go. This Sunday Meeting will clarify your week and force you to make the tough decisions in advance. Then each morning, you only need to spend two minutes reviewing the items you must complete for that day. This will keep you focused and confident that the truly important things will get done.

Tip #6: Write for at least 30 minutes each day
When new faculty feel crunched for time, one of the first things they are ready to sacrifice is their daily writing! This semester, put yourself, your future, and your daily writing time into the non-negotiable category (along with classes and meetings). There are MANY other ways to be efficient besides eliminating the one activity that is central to your promotion, tenure, and long-term professional success.

Tip #7: Only check e-mail one time per day (max)
E-mail begets more e-mail. When you have little time, the least effective way to spend it is writing e-mails. I'm only able to restrict my e-mail to once a day during crunch times. But for one week, it's unlikely to cause a crisis and typically works out just fine.

Tip #8: Eliminate Unnecessary Electronic Distractions
If you subscribe to any listservs, sign off until the semester is over. Many people sign off during the summer, so why not just do so now? Listservs create lots of e-mail in your in-box, very little of which is critical information that you can't do without between now and graduation. While you’re at it, why not take a respite from all electronic time-wasters: Facebook, Twitter, television, etc.

Tip #9: Take Care of Your Body
Exercise reduces stress. When I don't have time to go to the gym, I opt for using the stairs instead of elevators in buildings, take quick walks at lunch time, or just put on some music for five minutes and dance like a toddler who just found a cup of coffee. Be creative! Whatever you need to do to get your heart rate up and your body moving will benefit you during crunch time.

Tip #10: End Every Day With Gratitude and a Treat!
As each day comes to a close, take a moment to thank the universe for all the things that went well and affirm that everything in your life is working for your highest good. I insist on a treat every day during crunch time, because I deserve it. So do you!

The Weekly Challenge
This week, I challenge you to:
Acknowledge that the end of every semester is a stressful time and THAT IS PERFECTLY NORMAL!
Use the tips outlined above to proactively create strategies to manage your stress, frustration, and energy levels.
Write every day this week for at least 30 minutes.

This week, I hope that each of you find the strength to try some new end-of-semester strategies, the creativity to adapt them to your unique situation, and the comfort of knowing that you are not alone in your struggle.

There Is No Guru (Monday Motivator for Faculty for the Future, April 13, 2015 )

This is an excerpt from the Monday Motivator Program of Center for Faculty Development and Diversity. Please find the original document here. The National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity is an independent professional development, training, and mentoring community of over 71,000 graduate students, post-docs, and faculty members.

We've all heard repeatedly how important "mentoring" is to our professional success. But if you scratch the surface and ask people what exactly they mean by "mentoring," you will find a wide range of responses. Too many new faculty members I know imagine that they will have a single guru-like "mentor" who will sense their needs, generously dispense wisdom, care deeply about their success, and gently guide them along the path to tenure and promotion. Since that rarely happens, I want to focus this week on Mistake #13: Looking For A Single Guru-Mentor.

The problem with the idea that you will find one guru-mentor is that new faculty members have a wide variety of needs and it is not only impossible but problematic for all of those needs to be met by one (and only one) person. For example, if you are a typical new faculty member, you have some combination of the following needs:

Professional Development: Help in learning how to manage time, resolve conflicts, administer projects, organize your office/lab, teach efficiently and well, supervise graduate students, and make strategic decisions about service commitments.

Emotional Support: As a new faculty member, you are in the midst of a significant identity and role transition: from graduate student (or postdoc) to professor. As a result, you may need support in dealing with the common stress and pressures of transitioning to life on the tenure track.

A Sense of Community: Given that most new tenure-track faculty have uprooted their lives to move to a new area, you may find yourself seeking both an intellectual and/or social community where you feel a true sense of belonging.

Accountability: The structure of your job likely provides the least accountability for the activity that is most valued (research, writing and publication). In order to avoid getting caught up in the daily chaos, the vast majority of new faculty members need some form of accountability system for writing.

Institutional Sponsorship: You also need to cultivate relationships with people who are invested in your success at your institution. By that, I mean senior faculty who are willing to use their power to advocate for your best interests behind closed doors.

Access to Networks: Because knowledge isn't produced in isolation, it's critical for you to connect with others to discuss potential research collaborations, navigate external funding, and access opportunity structures that might not be immediately apparent to you as a new faculty member.

Project-specific Feedback: You will also need to regularly communicate with people who can provide substantive comments on your proposals, manuscript drafts, and new ideas.

I'm listing these common needs to illustrate the point that no one person could (or should) fulfill all of them in your life! Expecting a single mentor to transition you from graduate student to faculty member will inevitably lead to disappointment, over-dependence on the advice of one person, and feelings of loneliness. For example, I recently spoke with a tenure-track faculty member who had relied exclusively on her departmentally-assigned guru-mentor to guide her through the transition from graduate student to professor. The guru advised her when she arrived to "hold off working on your book for a few years so you can mature intellectually." In response to this very bad advice, she spent her first few years "intellectually maturing" instead of writing and then was shocked to receive a negative third year review that focused almost entirely on her lack of published work and minimal progress on her book. The point is that gurus are human, they make mistakes, and relying on one exclusively can put you at unnecessary risk and leave you with many unmet needs.

This week, I want to encourage you to fundamentally rethink the idea of "mentoring" by instead asking yourself: What do I need and what is the most strategic and efficient way to get it?Then, instead of looking for one all-knowing guru-mentor, you will start to realize that there are many different ways to get information, support, feedback and advice. We can meet our professional development, emotional support, community, and accountability needs by connecting with professionals, peers, friends, books, and online communities. For example, it's probably more effective to hire a professional editor than to expect your departmental mentor to copy edit your work. It's probably more satisfying to meet with friends for emotional support than to expect it from your department chair. And, it's far more meaningful to join a writing group for accountability than asking your mentor to call you every week and make sure you're making progress on your writing. Let me be perfectly clear, there are some needs (e.g., sponsorship, access to opportunities, project-specific feedback) that only senior people in your field and/or department can meet. The trick is to know the difference so that you focus the limited time you have with senior mentors on the things only they can provide for you, while finding alternative ways to meet your other needs.

If There's No Guru, Then What's A New Faculty Member To Do?
Instead of focusing on any one particular person, I’m suggesting that you imagine an extensive web of support that you create by identifying your needs and proactively getting them met. If I could construct an ideal mentoring network to support new faculty members, it would include all of the following:
A broad array of mentors and sponsors that are located within and beyond your current institution.
An excellent coach (or therapist) to help you transition through your first year.
A local and extended network of friends who you can rely on for social support and stress relief.
A group of scholars in your field with whom you can share drafts and ideas.
A supportive community that meets your unique accountability needs and celebrates your successes
On- and off-campus professional development activities.
A professional development fund that you can access to get whatever needs you have met in the most effective and efficient way.

In a perfect world, your department would be organized in such a way as to welcome and support you during your transition from graduate student to professor. In reality, it will most likely be your responsibility to identify your needs and find ways to meet them. Along with that responsibility comes the realization that you have tremendous power (even if it doesn't always feel like it). In other words, you don't have to be dependent on a single guru-mentor because YOU have the power to create a network of support that is populated by people who are invested in your success. This collective will enable you to feel supported before, during, and after problems arise in your department. It will provide you with opportunities, connections, and reference groups that extend far beyond your college or university. And most importantly, it will serve as a buffer to decrease any alienation, loneliness, and stress that you may feel at your current institution.

The Weekly Challenge
This week I challenge each of you to do the following:
Review the list of new faculty needs and ask yourself two important questions: 1)What do I need right now? and 2) What is the most efficient and effective way to get it?
If you feel resistant to reaching out, seeking professional assistance, or asking for help, gently ask yourself: why?
For every need that you identify, brainstorm at least three different ways to get it met. I keep a list of resources, references, and referrals on the NCFDD website that may provide a good starting point.
If you have not yet met the faculty development professionals on your campus, ask who they are, where they are located, and what services they offer.
Write for at least 30 minutes every day (because people love to mentor, sponsor, and support productive new faculty members).

I hope this week brings each of you the energy to re-think your assumptions about mentoring, the clarity to identify what YOU need right now, and the energy to seek new and creative ways to get all of your needs met!

The Voice - Season 8 - Winner Predictions

Time for my predictions for The Voice Season 8. This is after the first live playoffs.

The 12 contestants from the 4 teams,

Team Adam : Brian Johnson, Joshua Davis, Deanna Johnson
Team Blake  :  Corey Kent White, Hannah Kirby, Meghan Linsey,
Team Xtina : India Carney, Kimberly Nichole, Rob Taylor,
Team Pharrell : Koryn Hawthrone, Mia Z, Sawyer Federicks,

My 4 finalist,
Mia Z, Kimberly Nichole, Meghan Linsey, Brian Johnson

Winner, The Voice Season 8 : Meghan Linsey from Team Blake.

Pick Your Battles (Monday Motivator for Faculty for the Future, April 6, 2015 )

This is an excerpt from the Monday Motivator Program of Center for Faculty Development and Diversity. Please find the original document here. The National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity is an independent professional development, training, and mentoring community of over 71,000 graduate students, post-docs, and faculty members.

There is a whole lot of free-floating frustration in the air lately! My inbox has been overflowing with messages from new faculty who are sick of departmental drama, tired of students’ hostility, and who are so filled with anger that they can’t focus on their research and writing. I'm not sure if all this pent-up anger is from unresolved conflicts that have been brewing all year or the result of cumulative devaluation in the workplace. Either way, it seems clear that we could use some straight talk about Common New Faculty Mistake #13: Avoiding Conflict.

Conflict is Inevitable
Academia is full of intellectual, interpersonal, political, and downright petty conflicts. While many new faculty members feel comfortable with intellectual conflicts, they struggle to effectively resolve everyday conflicts. Their discomfort in resolving conflict extends across a wide spectrum and includes people who have more power (senior colleagues and administrators) and people who have less power (students) within their institution. I believe this results directly from the fact that we all received extensive training in the art of substantive argumentation as part of our graduate research training, but few of us ever learned how to resolve inter-personal conflicts in ways that don’t harm our relationships with others.

And, if you’re an underrepresented faculty member, the dynamics of racism and sexism mean that, in addition to the common conflicts that new faculty members experience, you may also experience devaluation, disrespect, and daily micro-aggressions. Let me be perfectly clear: It's OK to feel angry when people behave badly (even if their behavior is unintentional). In my 12 years as a faculty member, I was routinely asked to make copies by people who assumed I was the department secretary, asked if I "really had a PhD" by students who couldn’t imagine someone like me was a professor, and it was regularly assumed that I worked for Professor Rockquemore (instead of actually being Professor Rockquemore). Every time these types of incidents occurred, I felt annoyed that I wasn’t getting the benefit of the doubt that my other colleagues received and angry that I live in a world where my presence requires continual explanation. Anger, annoyance, and frustration are normal responses to persistent sexism and racism in the workplace. In fact, if you receive subtle daily reminders that you’re different and imply that you only belong in the ivory tower in a supporting role, then it’s OK to feel mad about it.

The problem occurs when new faculty members (majority or minority) respond to conflicts in one of two extreme ways: 1) fighting every battle or 2) avoiding conflict altogether. The problem with fighting every battle is that you will quickly alienate yourself from everyone in your environment. The problem with avoiding conflict is that when you push anger down, it grows, deepens, and expands. This can put you at risk of publicly exploding when triggered by a minor incident, developing stress-related illness, and/or sucking up so much of your energy that you have none left for your intellectual work.

That said, expressing anger is tricky because we live in a world where there are precious few socially acceptable forms of communicating anger in the workplace (this is especially so for underrepresented faculty). Any expression of anger tends to be interpreted through the frames of race and gender. Even the smallest expression of anger from my Black male colleagues resulted in their being labeled as "threatening” or "unprofessional.” And for women, communicating frustration quickly got them labeled as "emotional," "out of control," and/or a "bitch."

Healthy Conflict
Conflict in your professional life is inevitable, so it's critically important for all of us to learn when and how to express our feelings in ways that are effective and professionally appropriate. If you are underrepresented, you’re likely to have more conflict AND to have your responses interpreted through particular frames, so you have to be extra skilled at conflict resolution. The good news is that learning how to engage in healthy conflict will allow you to express your feelings, retain your integrity, and minimize negative consequences to your professional relationships.

Here are the three questions I use when conflicts arise:

1. In this particular situation, should I push back or should I pull back?
2. What will I gain and what will I lose?
3. If I decide to push back, what's the most effective way to do so?

There are no right or wrong answers here. Sometimes pushing back makes sense; other times it's better to pull back and then go hit the punching bag at the gym. Either way, anger is energy so it has to come out of your body. In other words, don't confuse "pulling back” with "stuffing down”! Pulling back simply means releasing the angry energy in an indirect way because the costs of expressing it directly outweigh the benefits.

For the times when I decide to push back, my best trick is to use Marshall Rosenberg’s formula:

1. State your observation of the problematic behavior.
2. Describe how it makes you feel.
3. Make your needs explicit.
4. Clearly request what you want.

For example, during my last week as a faculty member, someone came to my door and said, "Excuse me, I'm looking for Professor Rockquemore. Do you know where she is?" Despite my name on the door and the fact that I was the only person sitting in the room, my visitor must have had a synaptic misfire that disallowed these two pieces of data to result in the common-sense conclusion that I am Professor Rockquemore. This happened frequently and most of the time I decided it's not worth pushing back. Typically, I pulled back, smiled, and said: "I'm Professor Rockquemore, what do you need?" But not that day! I was tired, cranky, and just sick of having to explain myself to others. I decided I had nothing to lose and much to gain by pushing back. My first impulse was to throw my stapler at the person's head, but instead I breathed deeply, paused, and asked myself: What is the most effective way to push back?

I chose to say [in a professional and non-reactive tone]:
"When I'm the only person sitting in this office and you ask me ‘Where is Professor Rockquemore?’ it makes me feel frustrated that you've looked at me and assumed I couldn't be that person. It also makes me feel angry that I live in a world where I have to keep explaining to people that I'm really a professor. Professors come in lots of different packages, so I just want to encourage you to rethink your assumptions about the type of people who fill that role. Now, how can I help you?"

This was a simple two-minute exchange, but I'm sharing it to make the point that we can choose to push back or pull back on a case-by-case basis (as opposed to always pushing back or always pulling back as our default strategy). Secondly, there are a wide variety of possible responses to any conflict and each response has a different set of costs and benefits associated with it. Third, when we let off the steam in small increments, it doesn't build up or put us in danger of exploding. And finally, because I have memorized Rosenberg's mental framework, (when you _____, I feel ______, I need _____, and I want you to _____), I can quickly and easily express myself in a way that is honest, clear, professional, and opens the space for real communication and conflict resolution.

The Weekly Challenge
This week I challenge each of you to do the following:

• Gently ask yourself: How do I manage conflict? Am I carrying around unresolved anger at people in my department? Am I in danger of exploding? Are there ways I could engage in conflict that would allow me to express myself more effectively?
• Notice how you feel when conflict arises this week.
• If you are an underrepresented faculty member, acknowledge that anger is a healthy response to persistent racial and gender inequality.
• Imagine several different ways you could respond to conflicts that arise (pushing back and/or pulling back).
• Assess what you would gain and what you would lose by making different choices.
• Try using compassionate communication in a low-level, low-risk conflict situation this week (but always in person and not over email!).
• Write every day this week for at least 30 minutes! If you find yourself unable to write because you’re upset over an unresolved conflict, that’s a good indicator that it’s time to resolve it.

We often hear the generic advice to "pick your battles." This week, I want to encourage each of us to fundamentally rethink the idea that we have to wait until conflicts reach the stage of "battle"! Instead, let’s recognize that conflict is a normal outcome of people working together in an academic community. As a result, let’s begin to imagine ourselves as professionals who are comfortable, confident, and capable of resolving conflicts in our day-to-day lives.

I hope this week brings each of you the ability to assert yourself on a regular basis, the courage to express your feelings in ways that let off emotional steam incrementally, and the deep sense of empowerment that comes from engaging in healthy conflicts that strengthen (instead of weaken) our professional relationships.

The Art of Delegation (Monday Motivator for Faculty for the Future, March 30, 2015 )

This is an excerpt from the Monday Motivator Program of Center for Faculty Development and Diversity. Please find the original document here. The National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity is an independent professional development, training, and mentoring community of over 71,000 graduate students, post-docs, and faculty members.

It's always perplexing to me that new faculty who describe themselves as physically, emotionally, and intellectually exhausted are often so resistant to trying a little delegation. I was recently at a large conference where I met lots of new faculty, most of whom told me how tired and frazzled they felt each week. Every time I asked someone why they felt so fatigued, I heard lists of work a mile long! But when I gently suggested delegating some of that work, hiring help, or seeking assistance, these ideas were met with scoffs, gasps, glares, and defensiveness. That made me realize it's definitely time to discuss Common Mistake #12:Believing You Must Do EVERYTHING Yourself.

For a variety of reasons, new faculty members often believe they must do everything on their own. This may be because they did so as graduate students, are unaware of the support services available to them, don't trust others, feel uncomfortable asking for help, and/or simply have no experience delegating tasks. No matter what causes people to feel that they must do everything themselves, it results in the same problems: exhaustion, inefficiency, and lower productivity. You have only a finite number of hours in each workday and they need to be aligned with your promotion and tenure criteria in order for you to be successful. If nonessential tasks are keeping you from research and writing, it's time to rethink the do-everything-yourselfstrategy in order to focus your energy on the things that really matter.


Evaluate Your Tasks and Delegate
If you are feeling exhausted, stop for a moment and examine your workload. Then gently ask yourself the following questions:

Which tasks must be done by ME and which tasks can be completed by SOMEONE ELSE?
Every aspect of your job is comprised of a series of tasks. Some of the tasks can only be done by you, so you should continue to invest your energy in them. But there are many tasks that do not require your personal attention in order to get done. In other words they can, and possibly should, be completed by someone else.

Where Can I Get Help?
Some of you are fortunate enough to have research, professional development, and/or start-up funds, access to motivated graduate and/or undergraduate students, and competent office staff. These supportive resources and people are in place to assist you in becoming successful and productive in your research so utilize them! Once you have identified what tasks can be done by someone other than you, imagine who else could complete them. Below I list some ways that the new faculty I work with have started to identify nonessential tasks and delegate them:

One person realized she was spending an hour printing and making copies before each class -- she decided to post half the material on her class’s Blackboard site and ask her department staff person to copy the remaining items.
Another person needed assistance grading exams -- she created a rubric and hired a grader on an hourly basis for the end of the semester.
Another couldn't find the time to get a manuscript that was 90% complete out the door -- he sent it to a professional editor.
Another still had not unpacked the boxes in her office from last summer's move and was losing too much time each week searching for things -- she hired a highly organized undergraduate student on an hourly basis to read Organizing From The Inside Out, design a system for her office, and help unpack those boxes.
Another person assumed she would have to index her own book (after learning that the press publishing her manuscript would not pay for the indexing) – instead she asked her chair for ideas and found out that her college has a "book subvention fund” for new faculty and all she had to do was apply and hire an indexer recommended by the press.
Finally, one needed to fill in the holes of a bibliography -- she asked her RA to complete this task (it was the first task she had delegated to him all year because she "didn’t want to impose” on his time).

Once new faculty members realize that they don’t have to do everything themselves, the next layer of resistance to delegation is often some form of the following: "You don’t understand! I don’t have any money and my institution is broke!” Whenever I hear this, I know to ask: "Have you actually requested assistance or are you just assuming it doesn’t exist?” Nine out of ten times, the defensive and dismissive resister has been constantly hearing about budget cuts, shrinking endowments, and various predictions of institutional apocalypse. They then assumed that there were no funds available to support anything beyond basic necessities at their college. But when they actually ask for help, they are often surprised and delighted to find that people help them get their needs met.

Sometimes it’s through internal funding that the new faculty member may not have known existed (like that book subvention fund). Sometimes it’s through a creative use of existing resources that the new faculty member simply wasn’t utilizing properly (like asking departmental staff to make copies for you). My main point is simply this: You do NOT have to be rich or work for a well-funded private institution to delegate tasks on your to-do list. You DO have to understand that doing everything yourself can lower your overall productivity on the things that matter to your long-term success. So, if you’re feeling overwhelmed and not making progress on your research agenda, it makes sense to determine what tasks can be done by someone else and find innovative ways to delegate those nonessential tasks.

I don't know what your individual needs and/or resources are, but it's worth taking 15 minutes at this week’s Sunday Meeting to review your commitments for the remainder of the semester, consider what nonessential tasks are on your to-do list, decide how they can be delegated, and who (besides you) can get them done. In other words, if you have more work than hours in a day, it’s time to take a fresh look around and ask: How can I delegate? Get creative and do some brainstorming with mentors in your department, your professional network, or on the NCFDD discussion forum.

The Weekly Challenge

• This week I challenge each of you to do the following
• Analyze your to-do list for this week.
• Determine what tasks must be done by you and what can be delegated to someone else.
• Think creatively about how to use your existing resources to move some non-essential tasks off your plate.
• If you are afraid to ask departmental staff members to do their job and/or "don’t want to impose” on graduate assistants, stop and ask yourself: What’s up with that?
• If you don’t have funds under your control for supportive services, ask your department chair what resources exist on campus to support your professional development and productivity.
• If you’re still resistant to delegation, gently ask yourself: why do I feel that I must do everything myself? What essential work isn’t getting done while I am doing nonessential busy work? Is this the best use of my work time?
• (Re) commit yourself to 60 minutes of writing every day – that’s definitely something that only YOU can do! 

I hope that this week brings each of you extraordinary clarity when analyzing your tasks, unlimited creativity as you delegate the nonessential ones, and the deep joy that comes from investing your best energy into your intellectual projects!