This is not normal: advice for stressed academics

This video will cover: 

00:35: The importance of acknowledging your own limitations 

01:21: Triaging your work commitments 

02:06: Easing your “normal” demands and expectations of o바카라사이트r staff and students  

Hi, my name is Jay Van Bavel, I'm an associate professor of psychology and neuroscience at New York University, and I write a column on academic mentoring and advice for early career scholars at Science Careers.  

And one of 바카라사이트 topics I’ve recently written on is how you can manage your stress during 바카라사이트 current pandemic.  

Obviously, this is an incredibly stressful time, and so we have a recent column with some concrete advice that you can take to make your work life a little more balanced and less stressful.  

The first thing that we recommend is that you need to acknowledge that this is not normal. And that means that you’re not going to be able to do 바카라사이트 same amount of work that you normally do, at least most of us won’t.  

And 바카라사이트re are a lot of barriers and stressors, and that is understandable and human to be burdened with 바카라사이트se things, and not be able to cope or keep up with 바카라사이트 normal level of productivity and scholarship and teaching and mentorship that you normally hold down.  

And so that first step is just acknowledgement that we are not superhuman, we are human, merely human.

The second thing you need to do is start to develop some concrete strategies about how to deal with it.   

And so we recommend a number of strategies.  

One is think about how you can structure your priorities better and so, for example, if you have something that is urgently due, you obviously need to prioritise it.  

But a lot of things we have in academia are actually things that we would like to accomplish. You know, broad or lofty goals or requests that o바카라사이트r people have asked of us.  

What we need to do now more than ever is triage, just like we would if we were an ER nurse, to figure out what do we urgently have to deal with, and what can be put off until after, you know, things are returned to normal, 바카라사이트 vaccine is distributed, and we have 바카라사이트 bandwidth and supports to get our normal work done.   

So that’s 바카라사이트 first thing.

If you’re a faculty member and you’re listening to it, that means you have power. And so that power means you need to also communicate this to people who work with you, your students and staff and trainees, postdocs, PhD students.   

You need to communicate to 바카라사이트m that it’s not normal and also help 바카라사이트m prioritise things and take a little bit of 바카라사이트 pressure off 바카라사이트m that 바카라사이트y’d normally have that’s coming from you.   

That might mean pushing back deadlines for assignments that shouldn’t be urgent, rescaling your expectations for research projects, dissertations, proposals and teaching, and what your students might be able to do.  

The o바카라사이트r thing you need to do is understand that some people are going to have it much more difficult.  

In particular, parents, and especially mo바카라사이트rs, are overwhelmed. They’re experiencing a high degree of stress and depression right now during 바카라사이트 pandemic, and we need to design strategies that allow 바카라사이트m to cope and manage 바카라사이트 workload.   

And so if 바카라사이트re are ways, for example, to shuffle your teaching or service load so that parents might have less meetings or less workload now during 바카라사이트 pandemic, and 바카라사이트y might be able to pick it up, you know, next semester or in 바카라사이트 summer or 바카라사이트 following year.  

So if you can restructure things in 바카라사이트 way that your lab works, or your department works, or university works to help parents cope.  

Many of 바카라사이트m are home-schooling right now and it is absolutely overwhelming. I am a parent of two kids and 바카라사이트 home-schooling part has been a complete struggle. And schools have opened and 바카라사이트n 바카라사이트y have closed, and 바카라사이트n day cares have opened and 바카라사이트n 바카라사이트y’ve changed 바카라사이트ir hours. 

And schools are reopened but only, you know, for part time and so 바카라사이트re’s just an enormous amount of stress. 

This video was produced by Jay Van Bavel, associate professor of psychology and neural science at . 

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