How to create structure to succeed in your academic goals

0:00 Welcome to the Clinician Researcher podcast, where academic clinicians learn the skills to build their own research program, whether or not they have a mentor. As clinicians, we spend a decade or more as trainees learning to take care of patients. When we finally start our careers, we want to build research programs, but then we find that our years of clinical training did not adequately prepare us to lead our research program. Through no fault of our own, we struggle to find mentors, and when we can't, we quit. However, clinicians hold the keys to the greatest research breakthroughs.

0:40 For this reason, the Clinician Researcher podcast exists to give academic clinicians the tools to build their own research program, whether or not they have a mentor. Now introducing your host, Toyosi Onwuemene. Welcome to the Clinician Researcher podcast. I'm your host Toyosi Onwuemene, and it is such a pleasure to be speaking with you today. Today I'm going to be talking about how to create structure to help you succeed in any academic goal that you set for yourself. And I will tell you that one thing I had throughout my training, and I'm going to bet you had to, is structure.

1:23 And structure in medical school, I knew exactly which electors were being held when, where I had to be at any given time was very clearly laid out. It was helpful to have that structure. A lot of the things I accomplished in medical school, I accomplished because there was structure that supported my doing that. And similarly, when I went to residency, oh, there was a structure. Every month there's a new rotation. I know exactly what the rotation is. I know who my attendings are. I know who the residents I'm working with are. I knew everything I needed to know because there was structure. And then in fellowship, there was clearly structure. There was a 12-month rotation for my rotation schedule for my first year. And then in my second year, I knew exactly what clinics I was going to be in, and I knew what research I was going to do.

2:10 And then I became a faculty member. Ooh, and all that structure goes away. The structure around your clinic doesn't go away because, wow, there it is. Every Tuesday and Thursday, I'm in the clinic, and these are the patients who are coming. So it's really nice. You have structure in the clinic. You have structure around consults, too. It's like, this is the number of patients you've been called about. These are the ones you need to see before the day is over. So in everything we've done in our clinical training, we've always had structure. And then all of a sudden, we come to faculty careers, and we're supposed to accomplish academic things, but then we find that there's no structure. If you're lucky, you have a mentor who meets with you every week to help you create the structure that you need.

2:55 If you are like most people, you don't have a mentor who can give you that structure. Many of your mentors are hoping that you can figure it out because they are really busy and they don't necessarily have the bandwidth to help give you the structure that you need. They can give you targeted feedback about specific things, but they may not be able to help provide the structure. And maybe for some that do, sometimes trying to give you the structure means maybe badgering you or nagging you so that you can do the thing and move your goal forward. So today, I want to talk to you about creating the structure for yourself. And I want to invite you to think about structure as your friend.

3:38 Think about the success you've had because of structure that you've had. So think about the structure you had in medical school, how it helped you win. Think about the structure you had through residency and if you did fellowship, fellowship. Think about how that structure was helpful to you. And recognize that even when we hate structure, even when we love to be free and spontaneous, there is value in structure. And if you're going to accomplish academic things within the academy that for you as a clinician is mostly focused on helping you do well as a clinician for the most part, if you're going to be successful doing the academic things that lack structure, you're going to have to create the structure for yourself.

4:24 And if you don't create it for yourself, you're going to go find the structure and be a part of it. And so in this episode, I'm talking to you about how you create your own structure, how you stop waiting for somebody else to tell you what to do or tell you where the structures are and to create it for yourself. Because here's the thing, in academic medical centers, there's so much of the priority around patient care and so much accountability around patient care. That's the easiest thing for people to give you feedback about. It's the easiest thing for people to create accountability and structure about for you. But you don't need any more structure in clinical care.

5:06 You're pretty good around that structure. And to be honest, the structure will always be there. The clinic schedules will always be the clinic schedules. The consult schedules will be the consult schedules. But what you really need help with and what most people don't have help with is a structure for their research and writing accountability. Okay, so that's what we're going to talk about. We're going to talk about seven ways to create structure to help you succeed in any goal. So yes, my focus is on your research and your writing goals. But I'm going to tell you that this is really around any goal that doesn't have its own inbuilt structure. So the very first thing you want to do is to clarify what direction you're going in.

5:47 Now what I didn't say was to clarify your destination. Because for many of us, we don't know the destination. We have a general sense of where we're going. But we don't know exactly where we're going to end up. We look around us and we look at those who've gone before us and we're like, I really love that this person is successful in this way. But I hate the life that they live. I don't want that life. But we look at this other person and we say, wow, I love that this person is a Nobel laureate. And I hate that they've maybe suffered a lot of financial challenges along the way. Or maybe they've lost some of their important relationships along the way. I don't want to do that.

6:27 Or like recently someone told me, she said, I looked around at all the women around me and many of them had lost their significant others in one way or the other because they were just so consumed by their work. And so many times, we have a general sense of where we want to go. But when we look around, we're like, I don't want that. And I don't want that. And I don't want that. And sometimes that might deter you. You're like, well, if everybody I see is heading in a direction that I feel like I don't want a destination, like if everyone I see is heading to a destination I feel like I don't want to go in, then maybe that's not the destination for me. So many times, we're not sure what the destination is.

7:08 But we have a sense of the direction. And that's the most important thing. And the reason it's important that you have a sense of the direction rather than the destination is that who you're going to become has not yet been defined. You are creating it in the process of your career. You are literally every day adding one building block to the next building block to the next building block to create who you're going to be. The challenge for you is you look ahead to people who've gone on before you, and you're like, oh my gosh, they're so successful. When you ask them, they tell you the story as if they planned every step of the way. But if they're going to be honest with you, they will tell you that they took opportunities as opportunities came to them.

7:50 And some opportunities they never imagined until the opportunity was literally staring them in the face. And so now they can look back on a 30, 40 year career and say, oh yes, and I did this and I did that. And this is what you should do too. And in reality, everyone's creating in motion. And if they're creating in motion, you're creating in motion too. What you're going to become has not yet been defined because you're creating it right now. You are literally defining it on the go. And so getting a sense of the direction you're going in is important because then you just start to head in that direction. You start to ask people, you're like, hey, I am going this way. How do I get there?

8:31 And yeah, there are people who look at you and say, you mean you don't have a final destination? Like I don't have anything to do with you. You're confused. And it's okay. You move away from those people and you find the people who are excited for the adventure that you're on because you are on an adventure. Your academic career is an adventure. You don't know where you're going to end up. You have a general sense of it. It's an adventure. And so you find people and you say, hey, this is a general sense of direction that I'm going in. Can you tell me how to get there? And people who are going to support you on the journey will be excited for this adventure that you're on and they will support you. And people who are not going to support you, you're going to leave them behind no matter how accomplished they are because they're just not the supporters for you.

9:15 It's very simple. It's not personal. It's just, oh, okay, you're not one of my supporters. Got it. So, yeah, you want to make sure that you clarify the direction you're going in because then that allows you to ask for directions. But it also gives you a little bit of freedom because you don't have to finalize the destination and you don't have to feel like you know exactly where you're going to end up. You know that this is an adventure and you just go with it. You enjoy it. So clarify the direction that you're going in. Okay. Number two is ask, how will I feel when I get there? Like how will I know?

9:58 How will I know I'm there when I get there? And it's a beautiful thing. It's like what feeling will you have that helps you recognize that you're where you want to be? Now, remember, you haven't clarified your destination. So you're really, it's like what's the feeling that tells me I'm heading in the right direction? And this is important. How do I want to feel? Because for many of us, when we look around, are people who've gone ahead of us and we're like, wow, they're so successful. Oh, but their life sucks. They're so successful. Oh, but they're so sick. They're so successful. Oh, but they don't talk to the adult children. You know, there are a lot of things that you see and you're like, I love this, but I don't love that. And so you are clarifying for yourself what's important to you, how you want to feel when you get there.

10:43 So perhaps what you're saying is I want to have this successful career. And at the end of it, I still want to be married and talk to my children. Or you say, I want the successful career. And at the end, I still want to know my mother. I still want to have conversations with her regularly. Or you say, I want to have the successful career and I want to have time for my hobby of spelunking on weekends. Whatever it is for you, how do I want to feel when I get there is important. The reason you want to focus on that and the reason you want to make sure you clarify for yourself what that feeling is, is because you can easily lose sight of what you want going after all the things that you're supposed to have.

11:31 For example, there's a list, there's a number of manuscripts you're supposed to have at the end of your six to 10 years of assistant professorship and you go after it and you make it. And at the end of it, it's like, oh, congratulations, you made it, but you feel so empty. You're like, I don't know, I made it. Why do I feel so empty? And that's exactly it. The challenge is that in academia, the receipts, the things we're supposed to have at the end are so clear and sometimes people tell you to go out of your way to make it no matter what, no matter who you push out of the way, no matter what you do, go for it.

12:16 And if you take this advice, you end up at the end of a very successful run and you feel empty because while it looks successful to other people, it does not feel successful to you. And that is why you do not ask other people, how should I feel when I get there, you decide for yourself so that as you're going on the journey, you get to say, I don't like the way this is feeling. I see that I'm succeeding, but I don't like the way this is feeling. I don't like the way I feel icky inside. And it allows you to pause and remember that you want to get to the space of success without feeling like you've lost your values, without feeling like you've transgressed your moral values.

13:02 You want to feel a certain way. And so you want to clarify for yourself what that feeling is so that every time you start moving in a direction that transgresses your feelings, that makes you feel like not aligned with the way you want to show up in this space, it becomes very clear to you. You can take a step back and say, okay, how can I do things differently? So ask yourself, how will I feel when I get there? You want to know in advance, you want to prepare in advance so that you are not taken by surprise. Okay. Number three, who do I know who's already there? And this is a really important question.

13:43 It's kind of a trick question because sometimes what we do is we look ahead and we look to our chairs, we look to the deans, we look to the presidents of the organization or the CEO of the hospital and we're like, yes, I want to be right there. But what you're saying is that I want the success they have, but I don't like the things about their life that's not working exactly. And so those are not the people you're looking for. The person who's already there, the person who's already CEO, if they don't have a full life that represents the kind of life that you want, then that's not who you want to be. Who you want to be is a person who has a success in the health at the same time, the one who has a success and relationships at the same time.

14:31 Because you may be looking at them and saying, I don't want that. And they're like, I'm having a blast. This is exactly the life I want. You know, that's them, right? They've made decisions for themselves. But you want a certain outcome that helps you know you're successful and it's a holistic success. It's not just I have the requisite number of grants or the requisite number of publications or the requisite number of invited talks and therefore I am now chair of this department. Good for me. You want that and more. You want that in a full life. You want that in friends. You want that in your family intact.

15:11 You want that in a rich full life outside of the academy. And so ask yourself, who do I know who's already there? Who's there not just in terms of the success on paper, but is there in terms of the success in life? It is not worth any journey to get to the end of it and to find that you accomplished all these things, but you don't even feel successful. And so you want to know exactly what success means to you. And then look around and say, who is there? Who is in that place right now where they have the thing that I want and then some.

15:55 They have the papers and then some. They have the invited talks and then some. You want people who have wholeness and you want people who have peace in their lives. There is a thing that's attractive to you. I don't know what that is, but you want to identify who do I know who's already there? Who did it in a healthy way? Who did it where they're still enjoying their lives? Who did it and they're not miserable? Who did it and they're not crying at night? Who did it and they're not eating themselves for having embarked on a journey where there is no end? Because whenever you make it about the stuff, there will be no end to chasing stuff.

16:38 And that's why you want to ask, who is it who's already there in the place of holistic experience of their career in the way that you want to get there? The number four is to ask, what did they do to get there? Now this is another trick question because you know there's the what did they do to get there? Okay, they submitted five grants a year and therefore they were able to get one big grant every year or they submitted manuscript after manuscript to journal after journal and therefore they were able to publish six manuscripts a year. It's not that. In reality, that's the easy stuff, right?

17:20 That's the stuff that you can probably read in a handbook. You need X number of manuscripts to be associate professor. You need X number of grants to be able to be promoted with tenure. You can read that in the paper. And then you can read that where people tell you exactly how you go about trying to do that. And that's great. But the people you found that are whole, the people who you found who have both the career success and the life success, you want to ask how did they do that? How did they accomplish all the stuff? How did they check all the boxes and still have their joy? How did they check all the boxes and they're still going to activities with their kids?

18:02 How did they check all the boxes and their siblings still talk to them? Those are the people you want to ask. What did you do to get there? How? How did you get there? And again, we're talking about succeeding in any goal, but I'm also talking about succeeding holistically. You can succeed in any goal, not holistically, but I hope that's not the journey that you're on. It's certainly not the journey I'm on. And so ask what have they done to get here where they're still sane and they still love life and they're still full of joy because that's where you want to be. Okay, so the moment you've asked what did they do to get there, then you're going to define your steps.

18:43 You're going to define your steps. Now along the way, you're going to find people that you thought were so full of joy and zest for life and then you go talking to them and you're like, wow, this person is really crabby. Oh, they seem miserable and oh, I didn't know that that had happened to them. And you're going to say, maybe I crossed this one off. I mean, in terms of the directions that they're giving you, but you don't have to do that. What you can do is recognize that, okay, these are the steps they took to get there, but these are some of the pitfalls that I see that they made. And so you want to make sure you're not going to end up there. And so you're going to take the directions they give you and modify them for yourself. What are the steps you need to get to your goal?

19:26 Because again, you've clarified the direction you're going in. You've asked how will I feel when I get there because you don't just want to get there and feel empty. You want to be sure that you're full. You want to ask, who do I know who's already there in the way I want to be there? You asked them, what have you done to get there? You've discovered some surprises along the way. Now you're going to sit down and plan your roadmap. You're going to say, this person did X, Y, Z. Therefore, I'm going to do X, Y, Z, and I'm going to subtract Z because Z doesn't get me to where I think I want to go because this person was in the office every day and every night and every weekend.

20:08 And I don't want to do that. Right. So define the steps that you need to take to get there. And the number six, maybe the most important thing you do is to create the accountability that you need. Who's going to ask you when you forget to do the thing? Who's going to ask you when you have forgotten about the thing completely and you're just now doing your own thing without moving forward in the plan that you set for yourself? You're not moving forward in the steps you set for yourself. Who's going to have the courage to ask you, hey, what's going on with those goals that you set for yourself? You need accountability.

20:48 It's interesting that as humans, we need accountability. We need someone to ask us. We don't need them to yell at us. We don't need them to whack us on the side of the head. We just need them to ask us because what they're going to ask us is they're going to say, you set this goal for yourself. Where are you with this goal? And then it's going to trigger your feeling of wanting to be the kind of person who says a thing and then does what they said they would do. And because of that, the moment you have someone who just asks you and they don't have to judge you, they don't have to yell at you, they don't have to say, I can't believe you didn't start.

21:29 All they have to do is ask you and it helps you knowing that they're going to ask you again next week prepares you so that you take steps to do what you said you would do. And so just the mere act of creating the accountability, having somebody ask you, did you do what you said you want to do is so transformational. And in whatever goal you set for yourself, it changes your ability to succeed in that goal. Create the accountability that you need. And then number seven is to build the community that supports you. You have to be strategic in building the community. Many of us come into the communities that we're in and we just accept the defaults.

22:13 And unfortunately, in academia, there's a lot of unhealthy success. There is a ton of unhealthy success. And if you're not careful, if you follow the default strategies, you will be one of those unhealthy successful people or successful people who are unhealthy. And so do not accept the default environments. Do not accept the default communities, no matter how attractive they may seem. Because if you're going to be realistic, you recognize that not everybody has the health and the wealth in their lives like you want. So don't accept any community where people are not healthy, because guess what?

22:55 You're going to become like them. No you're not the one who's going to go in and change their way of thinking. You're going to be the one who's going to go in and become like them. You're going to adjust to their temperature. You're going to adjust to the climate of the room. And you're going to be miserable, miserably successful like them. So you want to build a community that supports you in the goals that you set for yourself. You're very clear about how you want to feel when you get where you're going. You want to build a community of like-minded people, because they will support you in the goal that you have chosen for yourself. And so I just encourage you, if you do not already have that community, I'm inviting you this week to think about who is in that, who is one person, one person who is like-minded like you are, who says, I want the manuscripts, I want the grants, but I don't want to be miserable.

23:46 Who is that person? And connect with them and see if you can start building a community. It only takes two to start a community. It takes two. And the moment you find two like-minded individuals, guess what? You're going to find two more, because each of you finds one and then you become four and it begins to grow exponentially. Find a community that supports you so that you can create the structure to help you succeed in any goal. Okay, so I'm going to just recap, clarify the direction you're going in, ask how will I feel when I get there, ask who do I know who's already there, both in the numbers of things that they've done, but also in their life success. Number four, ask what they've done to get there.

24:28 Number five, define your own steps to get there, one that's specially crafted and tailored for you. Number six, create the accountability you need. And number seven, build a community that supports you. Okay, so these are some of the things I'll be talking about in a webinar that I'm hosting on Monday, November 20th at 6 p.m., talking about five critical steps you've got to take if you're going to make the transition from clinician to research scientist. And actually, I said research leader. So if you're interested, please join us. Go to our website, goitecoach.com and go to events and you'll find a way to sign up or you can just go to the podcast website, clinicianresearcherpodcast.com and that will have information about our next webinar, if for whatever reason you've missed it.

25:12 All right, it's been a pleasure to talk with you today. Thank you so much for being part of the show. Please share this with someone if you have not already subscribed or leave us a five-star review. We would appreciate it so that other people can find us and continue to advance in their careers even as you are doing as well. All right, it's been a pleasure to talk with you today. I look forward to talking with you again the next time. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Clinician Researcher Podcast, where academic clinicians learn the skills to build their own research program, whether or not they have a mentor.

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