Big goals are facilitated by good processes.

I have never had more emails before about a blog post. People seemed to really resonate with this notion.

Big goals are facilitated by good processes.

Roll that one around a bit.

Goals and Deadlines=Anxiety

Does motivating with a mental health condition sound like a wise idea? When you use goals and/or deadlines as your primary tools for motivation for writing (or anything else), that is just what you are doing! This does not mean that we should not have lofty, big, audacious goals (I love those!!), and that deadlines are not real. However, as I have explored in this blog for well over a decade now, developing healthy, sustainable processes allows you to forget your goals in the moment of writing in order to focus at the task at hand.

Big goals are facilitated by good processes.

Roll that one around a bit.

You don't need to use anxiety as a motivational tool: there is another way.

I am responsible for living a joyful and purposeful life: Happy B Day to me

 And that is that :)

Do Hard Things....

With no judgement or expectations.

That is it...

Weekend Email Verses Weekend Writing

Checking your university email over the weekend is a far greater cognitive load than having a healthy writing session. Not saying you should write on the weekend, but most certainly am saying not to check your email if you are trying to not work.

Are You Checking Your Email Over the Weekend?

 Then yes, you actually are working.

Academic Job Talks Are NOT The Most Important Part of the Process

From coaching doctoral students, faculty and academic leaders

for the last 17 years, my experience is that many scholars see “the job talk”

as the most important part of the academic job interview. It is not. Period.

Full stop. It is important, for sure, and you should spend time developing

and practicing it, but if your preparation stops there,

you are not giving yourself your best shot at getting a position. 

Note: If you want to work on your actual job talk, check out the work of Tiffany Green--she is awesome. Click here to find her on LinkedIn.

The most important part(s) of the interview are everything else, but in particular, your ability to connect, listen, validate and share with everyone you come into contact with. Your capacity to demonstrate that you want to join them, that they are special--their community, their university, their department, their curriculum, who they are as humans--that is key!

So many people do good job talks (and many do bad ones), so the scholars and leaders who get the jobs are often the ones who are able to manage the other parts of the dog-and-pony show that is an academic interview. 

To prepare, you need to really drill responses to questions about your vision, your teaching, your research, who you are as a university citizen.  You need feedback from someone who will be honest with you about how you are coming across, and you need a process for maximizing your strengths and working on some of your barriers. You need to work on your “stuff.”

Too frequently I have worked with people who come to me frustrated that they have had several interviews (zoom or campus) but no offers. At some point you have to ask the hard question: Is it only the academic job market or perhaps do I have things I need to work on? If you are willing to ask this question, you may wish to seek some coaching! If you are not, you may wish to seek some coaching.