Self-Compassionate Professor

Dr. Angela Gist-Mackey explains that her career journey began in advertising, but eventually she realized that not only was academia a better fit for her, it paved a path for her to fulfill a larger purpose. While in her advertising career, she experienced bullying by supervisors and was struck by the sharp differences in the organizational cultures in which she worked. Angela was fascinated by these organizational dynamics and so began her PhD in organizational communication some years later. Now, as a tenured professor at the University of Kansas, Angela has much wisdom to share about the career wellness lessons she has learned over the years. At the core of it all though, her sense of legacy and purpose steers her career as both a professor and co-founder of her family business. Find Dr. Angela Gist-Mackey at https://angelagistmackey.weebly.com/ or https://www.mackeyconsultingllc.com/. 

Sarah Dobson tells her story about how her health challenges changed her career trajectory, how she maintained a foot in her research even after leaving the traditional academic path, and how she ultimately turned that work into her own business: helping researchers to write strong and persuasive grant proposals. Sarah also discusses how she has learned--and continues to learn--about self care. She explains that we live in a challenging moment in history, where we are all at great risk of burnout and in light of this, she offers advice about how to approach our work with wellness in mind, from listening to our bodies to working within our own unique zones of genius. Find Sarah Dobson on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/sarahcdobson or Twitter at @sarahcdobson.    

Michelle Wilson describes her own experiences with toxic workplaces and bullying as well as her research and coaching on the topic. She explains that people who find themselves in such environments should do four things: 1) find a support system, 2) document, document, document, 3) engage in self-care, and 4) create an exit plan as soon as possible, even if it's ultimately not used. Find Michelle Wilson on LinkedIn and/or email her at [email protected].  

Dr. Jane Jones discusses her work as a book-writing coach to academics, how she came to create and build a business, and the identity work she did in order to feel strong and stable in her new work. Jane talks about why academia was not a good fit and how once she left, the heaviness of the burnout she had accumulated in academia dissipated quickly. Jane also explains why "alt-ac," as a term, is problematic and argues that her career pivot was simply a career change, not an "alternative" to academia. Find Dr. Jane Jones at http://www.upinconsulting.com/. 

Dr. Jennifer Scott tells her story about turning down her dream job for her "dream life." She also discusses how her love for teaching sustained her while she was on the difficult academic job market and describes how her post-ac job presented itself after someone who liked her tweets, offered her a job. Jennifer also imparts invaluable wisdom about creating and sustaining a career/life vision including feeling your way into a vision, living the vision in bite-sized portions even before it's come fully into fruition, and giving the vision structure. Find Dr. Jennifer Scott at https://www.jenniferejones.work.  

Angela Han talks about how she navigates two careers: lawyer and life-coach. She also talks about how breakthroughs often come after breakdowns, the discomfort of listening to and following your intuition, how she has found a way to rest on a foundation of self-trust, how personal growth is ongoing, and the importance of challenging your closely held beliefs. Angela's philosophies and practices are both practical and inspirational for anyone who feels stuck in their career/life. Find Angela Han on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/itsangelahan/.  

Dr. Nicole Papaioannou discusses her journey from academia, to full-time work in instructional design, and finally, to freelancing/consulting work in instructional design. She discusses the wellness gap in her life when she was an academic and how, in her first full-time post-ac job, she was able to finally not only meet her needs for meaningful and challenging work, but also satisfy her needs for financially secure and stable work. Nicole offers interesting tidbits about instructional design as a career and describes what she misses about academia. She also explains how today, her entrepreneurial work offers her freedom to strike a work-life balance--a type of freedom she believes she would not have had in academia. 

Dr. Kemi Doll explains that we need to clear our own compasses so that we know how to navigate our academic careers with meaning and purpose. She describes how she keeps her own compass clear with self-care, self-examination, taking time with herself, as well as planning and prioritizing her academic work according to her own true north. Kemi notes that many academics lose themselves to academic culture and institutional expectations, allowing external pressures to cloud their purposeful reasons for wanting to be academics in the first place. In this way, as they settle and allow the things that were once personally meaningful to them to be stripped away, Kemi explains that they experience burnout in slow motion. She also offers rich and focused advice about how academics can find and dust off their internal compasses. In addition to her academic work, Dr. Kemi Doll also coaches women of color faculty in academic medicine and is the creator of the weekly podcast, Your Unapologetic Career. Find her at https://kemidoll.com. 

Dr. Emily Crookston describes her reasons for becoming an academic and her realization, in a yoga class, that her life as an academic was one of suffering. In this episode, Emily describes the joys and challenges of pursuing an entrepreneurial path, including the freedom she has to create anything she wants and live wherever she wants as well as the uncertainty that characterizes such a path. She describes the important role self-examination plays in building and sustaining a business, how her work day is freeing and usually very focused on the present moment, and how she is working toward securing for herself more time and space to create more of what she wants in her life and career. Find Dr. Emily Crookston on LinkedIn or at https://www.thepocketphd.com. 

Dr. Brandy L. Simula explains how pandemic burnout is still very much with us and that it's important for us to give ourselves space to be human as opposed to expecting ourselves to show up fully--with 100% effort and totally on top of it--in everything we do. She explains how to make choices about what we put full effort into and what we don't, how to acknowledge to ourselves and others that life is often messy and hard, and to connect to people that can support us as we navigate the challenges of being human in the midst of a pandemic. Brandy also discusses her own career pivot and the moment she realized academia did not offer her the life she wanted--that it was too much of a sacrifice to continue down that path. Find Dr. Brandy Simula at https://www.brandysimula.com.