[OLS-2] Cohort call 7 - Week 12 - Career Guidance Call

Yo Yehudi: out now. Okay, so as I mentioned earlier, we have four fantastic speakers today for the OLS week 12 careers call where we look at careers both inside and outside of academia. But some of those answers there to what what careers you might have answered you wish to do as a five year old are fantastic. So keep them coming if you hadn’t haven’t added one yet. And so we have a code of conduct and community participation guidelines, this generally means treat one another with the respect that you would like to receive. And if you’ve witnessed anything, at any point, then you can report this to team at OpenLifeSci.org.

And or if it’s something that myself Malvika or 01:10 - any of the other OLS co founders have actually done, then it’s okay to just approach one of us directly so that you don’t reach all of us, which is where the team address would reach. Hopefully, there won’t be any need for that. So we have several speakers today. Emmy, can we get you to do the first introduction, please? Emmy Tsang: Yo, thank you. Yeah. So today, it’s about careers. lucky and privileged to have our speakers here with us. I have the pleasure to introduce Rachael, who is the research software Community Manager at the software Sustainability Institute. Introduce yourself.

01:57 - Rachael Ainsworth: Thank you so much, me and everybody. I’m sorry, did you say that you prefer us sharing our slides in Chrome? Or does it matter? Malvika Sharan: Sorry, Chrome would be good because you can enable cc in that. Unknown: I will do that Natasha Wood: now. And share Unknown: and then move all my windows around. Sorry about that. Emmy Tsang: Okay. Unknown: Are the captions Sorry, I haven’t. Rachael Ainsworth: Ah, there we go. Okay, see the back. Okay, sorry about that. Hello, everybody.

Thank you so much to 02:46 - the organisers for inviting me. And today I’m going to talk about a career in community building. So my name is Rachael Ainsworth. And like I said, I’m the research software Community Manager at the software Sustainability Institute. I had a look through the notes before writing this presentation. And there were a lot of really great kind of questions that the cohort was asked to think about. So I’m going to try and answer some of these throughout my presentation. So my official title is a community manager. And what that means is that I have sort of two major responsibilities for the software Sustainability Institute. The first is that I project manage the recruitment process of new fellows each year. So that involves doing things like publicity and content creation in order to promote the application call.

I 03:31 - also organise the review of applications shortlisting and selection. And then once we do recruit those fellows, it’s been my job to make sure that I can support the fellows with their fellowship plans and their goals. And I also facilitate community building and encourage collaboration within the SSI fellows community. And we do this in a few different ways. You know, in normal times, we have in person events where we get the fellows together so that they can collaborate and meet each other and work on various projects. But we also have virtual community calls, we’ve just started doing these monthly, which is a really great opportunity for the fellows community to network with each other.

And then we also write a 04:08 - monthly newsletter to compile all of the fellows activities and really showcase the fellows and encourage collaboration between the projects. And just a heads up for this community. We do have the call for applications opening on December 7, so a lot of you would fit into our fellowship programme very nicely, so I encourage people to apply. And then my second main major responsibility for the SSI is to project manage their annual three day unconference series which is called collaborations workshop. And so basically what this means is that I’ll chair various meetings such as organising and steering committee meetings. I’ll work to design the programme invite speakers, facilitate the call for submissions and other contributions from participants and make sure that it’s a very participant led agenda and programme and I also So work on publicity and content creation to encourage people to register and attract sponsorship.

And 05:08 - then you know, in pre COVID times, this would also involve organising things like the venue, catering, travel and accommodation. But now it involves sorting out all of the infrastructure for online events. And then of course, there’s the documentation of process and reporting, and then running the event itself and facilitating the the community interactions within the event. And kind of making those connections in between participants. And the next collaborations workshop is actually in March 2021.

And it 05:42 - will be online and registration is now Unknown: open. Rachael Ainsworth: But how did I get here? So I have a very typical academic background, my background is in physics and astrophysics. And one of the questions was, you know, how did you decide on your career and I never actually decided to be a community manager. When I was doing my bachelor’s, I wanted to be an astrophysicist, and someday work for NASA. But kind of as I progressed, in my career, I found a lot of pitfalls within the traditional sort of academic and research environment.

So I burnt out pretty badly after the end of my 06:21 - first postdoc. And that is, when two things happened. The first is that I started looking at alternative careers in tech and attending meetups. And one of these meetups was a community for for women looking for data roles. And so what ended up happening is I ended up starting my own once I moved to Manchester, and it’s called surplus data. So I really enjoy sort of volunteering in my spare time to make connections between people and organise events.

So that’s just something that kind 06:48 - of happens naturally. But the other thing that happened during this time, is I discovered the Open Science community. And it was such, the community just really resonated with me. And I really loved attending events. Having virtual calls, just like this one, in the Mozilla open leaders community, I was the project lead on round four, and then never left. And kind of plugging into this community, making connections collaborating with other people on various projects just really re inspired me and really kind of invigorated me to stay within the academic environment, although that’s when I started kind of realising what I enjoyed a bit more than maybe traditional research itself.

So then after that, that’s when I 07:33 - saw the the advertisement for a community manager position with the software Sustainability Institute. And it basically was about advocating for openness in research and better research practice full time. So I applied and but how did I get skills in community building and I, I got most of my skills, if I’m perfectly honest, in this programme, and the Mozilla open leadership programme, so if you’re interested in a career in community building, you have the most inspirational cohort leaders who who are complete pros at community building and leadership. And so when I was attending the Mozilla leadership programme, we learned all about you know, making sure that your projects and communities were inclusive about organising, welcoming events. And these are all things that I that I’ve brought with me into my career.

And then because I organised 08:29 - community events in my spare time, that was also something that I sort of gained skills in. And a lot of what I’ve learned is been, you know, self taught or on the job, but now there are programmes that are sort of designed to help community managers gain skills. So a resource that I’d like to point you to, if you’re interested in community building is the Centre for scientific collaboration and community engagement. And they are a community of practice for community managers. And they also provide resources and training if this is something that you to pursue a career in.

And then the final question that 09:05 - I wanted to answer that was on the list in the notes was on a scale of one to 10, how much do you enjoy your current work? And I have to answer within 11, just because I really enjoy making connections with people, facilitating events and community calls and attending events like this. So I will stop there. And I’m happy to take any questions. Emmy Tsang: Thank you very much, Rachael. Sorry, Mike. Do we have are we waiting till the end to have questions or do we do the individuals one by one? Yo Yehudi: One by one. Emmy Tsang: All right, any questions regarding community management? Or the SSI? Or Rachel, you could put them in the chat or there is a queue and open q&a part on the agenda as well. There is a question that I just saw. So, Rachel, what are the collaboration workshops for and what kind of topics are discussed? Rachael Ainsworth: Yes. So the collaborations workshops are to bring together pretty much all stakeholders of the research software community.

So we’re interested in researchers, 10:47 - software developers, funders, policymakers, pretty much if you work with research software in any way, if you’re a user or developer, what this workshop does is it brings people together to kind of identify and collaborate on solving some of the key issues within this space. Our themes for 2021 our fair research software, so how to apply the FAIR Data principles to software, as well as diversity and inclusion, like what how can we address issues such as systemic discrimination and accessibility within the research software space to make it more inclusive and, and attract a more diverse, more diverse community members and be able to retain them? And then we also cover topics on software sustainability, so careers in in software and research as well as credit for for writing software, and various things like that. Emmy Tsang: Thanks, Rachael. Yeah, I can highly recommended. So one of my first events as a community manager as well, and had a lot a lot of fun. And met a lot of great people. So highly recommended. Please check out the link that Rachel listed on the agenda. Join! Malvika. Unless Do we still have any other questions? Oh, I saw on chat. Sorry.

How easy? Did you find the shift in 12:15 - career? And do you still get involved in research as well? Or are you happy to leave that behind? Rachael Ainsworth: And so I found the shift really easy. And I think it’s because I was doing something that I really enjoy doing. But I do still get involved in research as well. And I and I try to keep a foot in the astrophysical community, because that’s where I really wanted to shift the culture. And so I’ve actually been invited to join a working group on a data and software archive for a telescope that’s about to come online. So I’ll be spending a small percentage of my time kind of Unknown: applying open and reproducible principles to that working group and kind of waving the Open Science flag there. Emmy Tsang: That’s great. Yeah. Yeah, it’s really really important. Valuable work. So thank you very much.

Um, do we have any other questions for 13:14 - Rachael, are more than welcome to put them in the q&a section of the google doc or the chat? In zoom? Okay, in that case, yeah. Malvika over to you. Malvika Sharan: I’m very excited to welcome Natasha Wood. I’ve known Natasha for a few years. Now. I’m a big fan of her work because she also designs everything she does around people and help how to connect people. She’s a very successful computational biologist, and done academic work, and then startup and then community orientation. So I think there’s a lot that I have learned just by watching her some very excited that she’s going to share her journey with you. Natasha, over to you.

14:07 - Natasha Wood: Thanks, Malvika Sharan, it’s so nice to see your face again and some other familiar faces in the audience. And yeah, when Malvika asked me to chat to you guys, and I thought about the path and how convoluted it may have seemed from the start to the finish and knowing that it’s not finished so that this is also a journey. So the way that I thought about it, and especially in this them quite interesting year, sorry, let me first introduce myself. So I’m Natasha. Malvika Sharan: Natasha, Can you quickly activate your cc? Natasha Wood: Oh, yes. Can you explain to me how to do that. Malvika Sharan: If you click present? Natasha Wood: Yeah.

14:51 - Malvika Sharan: And if you hover over your slide, it should show you see. Natasha Wood: There we go. Caption gets to that on the bottom. There we go. Is that working? Malvika Sharan: I don’t see it. Natasha Wood: Let’s allow. There we go. It should be working. There we go. Perfect. Sorry. Okay. Sorry. Um, yes. So my name is Natasha, I’m currently working for Hyrax BioSciences. It is a startup that came from the University of the Western Cape. Hi, Peter. And, and we were originally working on HIV research.

And what happened was that it was during the time that 15:36 - the government’s encourage people to pay to before publishing, so they wanted to generate some some revenue from the publicly funded money going into university. So we were in a very fortunate position, for many reasons. We were a very tight knit group working together. And, and it was at the right time at the right place at the right time to do HIV research, similar to people doing viral research at the moment during this year. So instead of walking you through my specific career path, because after my PhD, I went into law for a year and I also worked in industry at Roche for a year before going back and doing a postdoc. And what I wanted to do given this interesting and quite strange, yeah, it was to look at everything that is similar.

So 16:35 - the things that are universal to to my career path. And I kind of like thinking about it, as this infinity or the circle. So it doesn’t matter how much you diverged, you kind of come back to the same points again. And I’ve found this very useful this yet to look back and think about the things that I have been universal in life. And if I’m still moving towards that goal in a career, so it doesn’t matter what career move you make it whether you still working in towards this, this the same direction. So for me, these things are curiosity.

So 17:12 - throughout, whether it’s an academia or startup, I’m very intrinsically driven by curiosity. And this is often the question and then, so what comes next. So this has been universal, whether that’s set of startup or an academia, the second thing is learning. And learning is slightly different to curiosity, because in the startup, specifically, they can be learning and in things as wide as company structuring in terms of hiring new people, which is somewhat similar to academia, where you are managing people. And so so learning AI, for me, is specifically also during the times when you feel like you’re not gaining knowledge, necessarily doing the same thing every day.

If you look very clearly, you are 18:02 - always learning and if you define it for yourself, then you will feel that you’re moving forward and in whatever you’re doing. And then the next thing is collaboration. And this is something that Malvika touched on. And it’s it’s something that’s that that I really enjoy, and whether that’s an academia trying to work with different research groups, or within the startups specifically where we’re such a close knit team, and we work together on a daily basis, and we want to share our work and build a successful company. So collaboration is a really strong one. And and these are the things that are similar between academia, and and and startups. And then the last one is the positive impact, and with a positive impact, and this can be from teaching.

So when you see students have it that that 18:48 - aha moments and up to users of software of your software, where they can now produce the results for a drug resistance results for patients that they couldn’t do before. So So and also this. So these things are the things that I’ve found that are very similar between academia and the startup and where people often try and define the differences and try and say that one is better than the other. Like I’ve preferred looking back and going and looking at the things that are universal for me and and defining that as the path that I’ve been following. And I hope that I can keep doing that moving forward. And I it’s always interesting to to provide career guidance when I still feel like I’m on the journey myself.

But based on that, and 19:45 - this image is a little bit more issue like so even though I’ve spoken about the spiral and that you keep getting back to the same kind of universal theme. It’s also your you’re allowed to acknowledge that you can change things And yes, you can jump between these staircases from time to time. And, and for me, I have recently moved to with with the COVID pandemic, our company has gone, completely distributed, and therefore I have moved to Amsterdam. So things have changed for me quite a bit. But in terms of moving to a new country, those themes remain the same the curiosity, the learning about new cultures, and, you know, collaborating and making new connections, and then having a positive impact in everything that I do. So with that, I will take any questions. Malvika Sharan: Thank you so much.

20:44 - Like, with the previous talk, please go ahead and either add your questions on the word doc or in the chat. I’m gonna just quickly Have a look. So I can actually start because I think in a way Yo and I also did sort of a startup, it was a project that we ran, and we are quite like invested in it, though we are also working full time. How was your transition from working in academia as a group leader, and then moving into becoming one of the founders of the startup? Natasha Wood: So this is a it ties in with the question of From on a scale of one to 10, how much you would enjoy a job. And it’s similar to to answering the question how how’s the transition from academia to a startup, or from a group group leader to being part of a team. And, and it’s, again, it goes up and down for all of us.

So there are certain decisions that are 22:08 - easy that we feel that we feel, you know, we’ve contributing, and we’re making a positive impact from a day to day. And then there are some times where it’s where it’s a lot harder. So the transition from academia to the startup was very easy. But on a day to day basis, there are new challenges that you that you face, every day and some weeks, some weeks are phenomenal. And then some weeks are very challenging. And I think that’s part of the journey. Malvika Sharan: I’m not seeing any more questions.

But I’m 22:46 - gonna ask another one, which is about knowing what you know, now. What would you wish that you had known while you were working in academic institution, and probably not explicitly preparing to bring your knowledge to the startup situation? So if people in the crowd are planning the same or are not sure yet, what would you advise them? Natasha Wood: So the one thing that I did well, was to tell myself after the PhD after my PhD, that you have time you have time to go and explore, and if something else will work, and I still tell myself that it’s like he had time, it you don’t have to know everything right now. And you can always go back. Research doesn’t move as quickly as you imagine it is going to move. If you’re out of academia for a year or two and the same other way around, you will always have the opportunity to go back. So I wish I told myself not to worry as much. Malvika Sharan: Thank you so much, Natasha. I’m gonna move on.

But just so you all know, there would be a big panel at 24:04 - the end, Natasha Knight might not be in the full panel, but Natasha has left email and Twitter to get contacted. So I’ll leave it to Yo Unknown: Okay, Yo Yehudi: folks, I just realised that because we’re running late, Andrew, I used to locate a present. I know you said you had to leave at 6am Andrew Stewart: Yeah, I’m fine. I can smell nice cooking smells came from the kitchen. So during my talk, you might actually hear my stomach rumbling for which I apologise.

24:37 - Yo Yehudi: Okay, well, in that case, I would love to introduce Andrew, who apparently still can present and I’m very glad for that. And he’s also software sustainability fellow. And he is actually our academic representative today. And so Andrew, I’ll let you tell people what you do. Your set better than me. Unknown: Yeah. Thanks very much. So I didn’t have any slides actually. So wonder if maybe your movie if you share your story. Andrew Stewart: Whether the transcript will come up, hopefully it can coop with my accent All right. Well, not not not too bad. Okay. Thanks for much. Thanks for thanks for inviting me.

So yeah, so I’m an I’m an experimental psychologist 25:17 - by training. I’ve been at the University of Manchester for 17 years now. And this was actually after I spent, but three years working in industry and doing a couple of postdocs. So I’ve kind of, you know, shifted around a lot, but over the last few years, and I think talking about academia today, and this, you know, brief overview of my view of academia today is pretty quite different from what my view would have been just just, you know, three or four years or so ago. I’m currently Senior Lecturer in the Division of neuroscience, and experimental psychology.

And I guess, within the UK, there’s always been a 25:54 - sort of difference between universities in terms of their focus on teaching, and research. And I’ve noticed over the last few years, actually, there’s a secular shift in terms of University’s engagement with open research practices. At one end of the spectrum, universities such as attract and UCL are very much and a few others are very much leading the way in terms of open research and adopting open research position statements. On the other end of the extreme, you’ve got many universities, who, you know, think that open research means no more than open access publications. And so it’s interesting seeing universities at different stages of this journey.

And that’s one of the biggest distinctions that I see 26:39 - between universities at the moment. And one thing I should say, if you’re interested in staying within academia, if you end up in a more research focused university that hasn’t yet engaged with open research, or hasn’t yet adopted an open research position statement, it’s actually a great opportunity to share points, and you can put your open leadership skills you’ve developed on this course into practice. So you can kind of educate others about what openness means to you, and have that broader discourse. And one of the challenges I think, is also having conversations with people in very different disciplines. In a couple of weeks time, I’m giving a talk to colleagues that will include people with backgrounds in Humanities Research.

So again, it’s just understanding kind of 27:25 - the language that they use, that actually describes the same things you’re interested in, but just their differences in terminology. Unknown: If you end up in a more teaching focused institution, it’s a great opportunity as well, to teach open and reproducible skills to students. within the UK. It’s interesting to many undergraduates are no starting University have actually had practice coding in python unscratched. At school, my daughter learned how to code in Scratch when she was about six or seven years old. So, you know, these foundational skills, you know, students are now coming into university with I guess, within the context of my own experiences, the different talk that I would have given four or five years ago, I would probably reflect that my disillusionment with academia, as much as anything else, you know, as I’m sure people can attest to, academia was certainly was and still is highly competitive.

Some universities really focus on big 28:30 - grants and papers in high impact journals, rather than doing robust and reproducible science. So out of out of my disillusionment that kind of encouraged me to engage with the broader open research and reproducibility conversations that were going on on twitter at the time, you know, two or three years ago. And coincidentally, that comes that occurred when the UK reproducibility network was funded. So the UK reproducibility network funded by Marcus manabu at Bristol University is focused on encouraging universities within the UK to do more reproducible research, adopt more open practices. And as a function of the UK Rn developing along with colleagues at Manchester and ritual was one of them actually, we find that the open research Working Group, which is a grassroots Working Group, within academia at Manchester, the crosses disciplines we’ve got, you know, I’m a psychologist, computer scientists, we’ve got biologists, I work about statisticians. We’ve got people in the social sciences as well.

29:41 - And I think that’s one of the really important things to do is actually to build a community that crosses those traditional academic disciplines. And one thing that’s very useful about the open research working group activity that we’re all engaged in is it really raises the profile of open research and reproducibility within the university. Andrew Stewart: The university knew that they needed to do more to promote open and reproducible research practices. But they didn’t know how to do this. So the VP for research at Manchester has been hugely supportive of what we’ve been doing. Because in a sense, we’re doing the hard work, we’re actually getting the the community started, we’re getting the conversations going.

So I sit on the university level, 30:22 - open research Strategy Group, because up until, you know, when I joined, the group have mainly focused on open access side of things, because they weren’t really sure what open research was, apart from that. So I think finding your community is really important or creating a new community, within your academic environment, it’s important as well. And one thing that’s critical, no matter what career stage you’re at, is try to find some senior academics in your home institution who will effectively be vocal supporters for you and introduce you to people, I’d a lot of luck at Manchester. Because I discovered the SSI, the software Sustainability Institute, has been transformative for both my career and my mental well being, I have to say. So meeting people in the context of the SSI has been fantastic.

And having you know, somebody like Carole 31:14 - Goble, or somebody to go and talk to, and ask for advice is just fantastic as well, because Carole is just a hugely important, influential and wonderful mentor to have. And just as these more senior academics will amplify your voice, it’s always important to remember that you can amplify the voice of others in your community. And you should do that, because there are always voices that we can, we can amplify because of our positions that we’re in. So just to finish off early wants you to kind of recognise the fact that you’ve all got a very unique skill set. You’ve got disciplines, specific knowledge, as well as knowledge about the kind of computational tools needed for openness, and reproducibility.

And actually, 31:57 - not many people have these skills. And certainly not many senior academics have these skills either. So in academia, showing that you’re somebody who can actually solve problems in new ways are the solutions align with your goals and values, is really powerful ability to demonstrate. And you could end up being you know, almost the go to collaborator for other academics wanting to adopt and reproducible practices. So my final three points, I’m just gonna, I’m just gonna make Okay, happy to take questions, obviously. Yo Yehudi: Thank you so much, Andrew. Just a quick check.

33:01 - Malvika is the Otter still working? Malvika Sharan: Otter is working, I’m going to reshare the link, again, with just to make sure that folks who need it can access. Andrew Stewart: I’m slightly worried I broken Otter Malvika Sharan: Otter can’t get anybody’s name right. So Yo Yehudi: I was very pleased with how well it did with your accent. Yeah, thank you so much for sharing that. It’s also really nice to hear that even when there have been troughs that there have been ups that have come as well. So does anyone have questions for Andrew at this point? And it’s also okay to unmute your microphone, or to write them in the chat or in the Google Doc. Kendra Oudyk: I have a question. If that’s okay, go ahead. Hi, Andrew.

It’s Kendra and 34:08 - I have a question about hiring practices. Do you see them changing now or in the near future regarding like how hiring committees see Open Science activities? Andrew Stewart: Really good question. Yes, I think things are already changing actually. within the UK, I think recent adverse events from the University of Glasgow and Keele University, requiring all applicants to provide a statement as to how they have adopted open research practices in the room research areas. And it’s something that I’m trying to do at Manchester as well, because I think universities realise that this treadmill that academics have been on for the last couple of decades, really isn’t leading anywhere other than in terms of sort of, you know, stress And burnout.

And in 2015 Wellcome Trust, one of the major 35:07 - funders in the UK, organised an event to discuss the fact that about half of all journal articles simply can’t be replicated. So about half of all journal articles and biomedical and life sciences are just strong. And funders realise that they don’t want to be funding research. So it’s going to turn out to be wrong. So funders have really led the way actually, in terms of requiring applicants for funding to adopt open and reproducible practices and their own research on universities are starting to, you know, require that as well, actually, because obviously, research costs money. And certainly in these times, universities don’t want to be spending on money, money on research, that’s, you know, 50% of the time is going to turn out to be incorrect. So I think things are changing.

And they 35:57 - have changed last evening, just last couple of years. And I can see, you know, those changes only accelerating. That is really inspiring, actually, and really encouraging. I think for many of us to hear that Open Science isn’t like extra salt that we sprinkle on afterwards, because we care that actually other people might care as well. Yeah, pretty much, definitely. Yo Yehudi: Amazing. So we have another question from Emma. Thanks, Andrew. That was great. Can you make a comment about how you think REF will change to reflect broader academic outputs from Open Science work? Andrew Stewart: Fantastic question. So I did the test.

But 36:43 - I’m also the REF lead at the University of Manchester for UI4 for which is psychology, psychiatry, and neuroscience. And it was at a meeting a raft meeting done in London. It’s either a year ago or two years ago, my sense of time has just gone out the window recently. But it was a rough meeting in London, where the chair of the UI 4 panel actually explicitly said they would, they will welcome they will encourage, and they will reward engagement with all aspects of open research on that was just amazing to me, because I don’t think of organisations like ref as moving particularly quickly. And my understanding is that the next graph will only have more of this and with a more emphasis placed on the importance of the research environment, within institutions, and less importance actually placed on outputs and high impact journals.

So think REF is really going to be looking at that 37:38 - broader research culture. And I just think that’s fantastic news for all of us. Yo Yehudi: That is also what we like to hear. And thank you Malvika. she realised that perhaps people who are recording not from the UK might not be familiar with REF. And they actually basically, it’s the way that academics are measured in the UK is the shortest way to sum that up. There’s a lot more complexity than that. So thank you very much, Andrew.

It’s been delightful, and 38:14 - hopefully we didn’t actually hear any time will tell me rumbles. Hopefully, you can go and enjoy your dinner. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you. Um, so the next speaker is actually my colleague ekin. So I realised while we were talking, that I myself have been through a career transition, because when we did our last one, I was working in academia, and I now work for a funder. And so we’re very lucky to have Ekin today, she’s going to talk about the transition, again, from working from academic academia and now working more in the funding level. Ekin over to you. Ekin Bolukbasi: Hi, everyone.

Um, okay, so I’m going to try to 38:57 - share my screen. Is that working? Yo Yehudi: perfectly. Ekin Bolukbasi: Okay, excellent. Okay. Hi, everyone. And your thank you so much for this introduction. So my name is Eikenberry, Portia, and I work as research funder for Wellcome Trust. So this is not what I have always done in my career path.

And I would like to start 39:26 - by giving you a quick overview of how Actually, I like how my career path has unfolded like over the past almost 15 years. And I also would like to share with you perhaps the top three highlights over this path as well as my top three mistakes because I think they’re also important, and I really hope that these may somehow inspire some ideas and trigger questions that we can hopefully discuss later on during the q&a session. So I spent my the majority of my career in academic research and in so called the wet lab settings I graduated from my undergrad in genetics at the University of Edinburgh. And at that point in my life, I was very much into cells and, and, you know, genetics and basically model organisms. So everything had to matter and on microscopic level.

So with all the software genetics themselves, I ended up 40:21 - by getting a PhD in cellular biology and more specifically, I worked on insulin signalling pathway in fruit flies off of that. And then pretty much right after I graduated from my PhD, I started a postdoc at University College London. And I still wanted to keep my beloved model organism, Drosophila and my signalling pathway. But I started getting more interested in the effects at an organismal level and overpopulation. So my postdoc research focused on the effect of insulin on ageing and lifespan control and Drosophila.

And I guess my focus somehow 40:54 - upgraded from the macro level to a macro level because I was done looking at longevity in populations. But I remember that at some point, throughout my postdoc, I realised that if I was to stay in academia, then that one specific question was probably going to be what I was going to build the rest of my career upon, and it would be very difficult to pivot significantly down the line. And somehow that really didn’t sit well with me. And with my personality, I really missed having a broad overview over research landscape, and having the flexibility to change interests significantly. And whenever I you know, I felt that it was needed.

And since I was 41:35 - also working at the very much discovery and of things, the impact of the outputs was very hard to observe, which also kind of demotivate demotivated me. So then I thought about what I needed to change. So I wanted to have a job which allowed me to have a broader view over biomedical research, shorter timelines, impact and also something with the people factor that enabled me to network and, and engage and, and basically, with people. So I apply for a job as Portfolio Manager at welcome, which I was then offered. And I changed my career probably after 10 years in academic research.

And actually, 42:18 - I also very much recently changed my job from Portfolio Manager, and I started working as data challenges manager was in the same team as yo. And so somehow, even within the research funding landscape, my job is very much recently changed. So as part of my current job, I keep a strategic overview of the global hot research landscape. And with main, my main focus being the health data, I look out for opportunities to advance welcomes mission as a funder. And also I create networks, I engage with the research community and other research funding stakeholders, I build partnerships, I enable platforms to improve health globally.

And 43:02 - overall, I have to say it is actually quite exciting. And so then I guess that Oh, okay, maybe like one thing I have to add at that point is, and the kind of somehow the power dynamics, I was involved and changed quite a lot as well, ever since I shifted from being a researcher and I started working for a funder. In a way I was at this end of the spectrum, where I was constantly asking for money to fund my research. And now I, I became part of this organisation where this kind of decisions are made. And if I’m fully honest, I do actually really enjoy this change in dynamics is a is an easier place to be, you know, in all honesty, and Okay, so then what I thought about three highlights from the past 15 years, I think it is really important to acknowledge this intellectual freedom and space for curiosity that academic research has enabled me I think, I think that’s, that’s really that’s a, that’s a phenomenal opportunity, I have to say, and, and similarly, this kind of analytical skills that one acquires while doing research are so transferable.

44:12 - And I think at that time, I was totally under estimating it but the day that you end up at a kind of a normal business meeting with people and you can use these skills and backup or arguments in a similar way that you would back up your scientific hypothesis with data, you realise that it’s actually very transferable, and it’s actually quite cool to see that. And, and I think the highlight of being a research founder is able to influence the wider landscape. And that also happens even at a quite junior level. You don’t have to be the director of something and and it is nice to see this, this short timeline to impact about something that you really care about. And three things I wish I had done differently. I really wish I had had them less than your career path and academic research.

I went from one pick, like from finishing the PhD 45:03 - right into a postdoc, like, you know, it seemed like everything had to happen pretty quickly. And I think that was a mistake, I think I should have really had a much more outward facing approach to things. And and the second thing is, I think it is okay to be picky. Like, if someone offers you interesting job in a good lab, it doesn’t mean that you have to take it, you need to think about it in the wider context of career progression, because it is important. And also, finally, when I was an academic researcher, I really wish I had done more investment into secondary skills.

And I have 45:39 - thought a little bit broader than just, you know, getting my research done getting my papers published, I think it will really help me. Okay, so I am going to stop here. And thank you for listening. And I would be happy to answer any questions that you may have. Yo Yehudi: Thank you so much Ekin. So as before, folks, feel free to either add questions in the Google Doc, which is why I’m looking over there. It’s my second screen. It’s not that I don’t want to look at you while I’m talking to you. Or you can add them in chat or as okay to unmute if you have a question you’d like to ask.

46:29 - If not, I can’t I have a question, Unknown: actually. Yo Yehudi: So you talked about the nonlinear aspect, and also about investing in secondary skills. I wonder if you could elaborate a little bit on what those are. Ekin Bolukbasi: Of course, I mean, I think somehow, at the time, just felt like everything had to like every single career steps have to happen, especially within academia, one after the other, like I somehow and actually, I don’t even know where this pressure was coming from probably self imposed. But I felt that the moment I finished my undergrad, then I had to get a PhD, I had to start a PhD right away, because that’s what I want to do.

Similarly, the 47:12 - moment I finished my PhD, I felt that I have to figure out my next step as a postdoctoral researcher right away. And I think this is really a shame. And actually, the whole investing into secondary skills fits very much within the same, you know, idea. I really wish I had taken my time, perhaps taking some time out and done other things, which might not be directly kind of academic research related. But you know, other some sort of, I don’t know, I wish I wish I had done some some degree and maybe, maybe teaching because, or maybe in mentorship, like it would have helped me at so many different kind of aspects, in any kind of career really. So. Yeah, I guess like, the whole point is, and I it’s quite interesting, because when I was listening to Natasha speaking before, she said the same thing, but it seems like she’d taken the other approach.

And I think that is the right approach, 48:06 - there is always fine, it is always good to just, you know, look at it outside, you know, figure out what might be quite interesting. on a very personal level, and, and then, you know, probably spent time in in kind of nurturing these skills. So Yo Yehudi: I find that really interesting personally, actually, also, like, partly reflecting on my own career, because by the time I graduated with my PhD, I probably be will be nearly 40. So I’ve definitely taken my time on the way. Ekin Bolukbasi: The right way of doing it. I mean, I have to say, even kind of taking time and exploring different options would have properly probably even enabled me to make different choices in terms of the research that I was investigating.

I think perhaps overall, I would have ended up 49:01 - where I am right now. But it’s not just the endpoint. It’s also the journey that matters, right. So. Yeah. Emmy Tsang: Awesome. Yo Yehudi: Are there any more questions? Anyone want to throw in there? David, was that like, scratching your head? Yeah. Okay. All right. So as I say, awkward moments was like, No, I was just I just happened to be moving. And awesome. And Georgia says she finds that really encouraging. Thank you so much Ekin.

49:36 - And so I think Emmy would you like to introduce our next our next speaker. Emmy Tsang: Definitely. Yeah. My pleasure to be introducing David. First of all, I heard your talk at C,S,V,conf this year. Huge admirer of your work, I’ll let you get on and introduce yourself David Selassie Opoku: Thank you. So Much. Um, can you hear me? Yeah, we’re gonna try to share my screen. Let me know if you can see it and whether the CC is working. Emmy Tsang: Yep, this is good David Selassie Opoku: great. All right. Thanks, everyone. And I’m really excited to hear from from the speakers, I think they’ve done most of the work for me, all I’m going to do is take take a little shifts and just highlight some things that I have come across that I’ve been essential in my journey. So I am supposed to be speaking on social enterpreneurship. So my journey started out in Ghana, I lived there for 17 years, and I highlights the things I was exposed to because some people may not necessarily have this background, I grew up in a lower middle class family, Christian farming family. And then I had the opportunity of spending two years in Costa Rica through a scholarship, which really changed my life.

And my 51:15 - perspective, at that age, being in on a campus with students from over 60 different countries is just life altering. After that went to the US where I did my undergrad in biology and had a master’s in computer science. And at that point, I was very much interested in bioinformatics research. And that was the trajectory in which I thought I was going, then life happened, though, because of a regulation which involved the visa that I had, I could stay in the US as long as I wanted. But all the jobs that I got, I couldn’t take them because now my employment authorization was taken away.

So it was either 51:52 - stay in the US and just be there, or I find something else to do. And an opportunity opened up for me to come back come to Ghana. And I took that I came to work Unknown: at a tech incubator where we’re helping startups build their companies from Nigeria, Ghana, and Kenya. And that was an opportunity to also become a local Open Data advocate, a leader because a lot of these companies were not necessarily thinking about the power of data. And an open data became the avenue to really leverage on these skills.

I 52:28 - quickly became known as an open data person. And that opened opportunities for me to work on for the next four years after that, with first Open Knowledge Foundation, which is based in the UK working remotely supporting other organisations, journalists, civil society, organisations, governments, and really thinking about how they can make data sets open for for different purposes. And they experience through that has allowed me to work across 30 different countries in five continents. And the power of that, interestingly, is not in the technical skills theory relevant from computer science and biology. But it has been the understanding of people the ability to connect with people and the problems that you’re solving, and how to kind of sit with them on whatever journey they have, and then be able to work backwards and see what tools and skills you can provide to them to enable them to get to their destination.

Last year, I decided to leave my job to 53:38 - become a farmer. Yes. And it is because I think looking at my career trajectory of my job, or the jobs I’ve had, I’ve always been pointing to one thing, how do I help enable people become better at what they are good at. And I think from working all across these jobs, some of the things that stood out to me was that in particularly resource constraints, environments, you have very talented people dealing with very difficult challenges. And all they need to have is for people to point out what specific tools or processes they can have access to, for them to get along their journey. And for me, growing up in a family, family family, I saw an opportunity to help smallholder farmers really leverage on some of the skills that I have to really make their lives much better. So that is what I’m currently working on.

And also 10% of my time is helping other 54:37 - startups really figure out how they can leverage on data to solve problems. So one of the startups is trying to figure out how to develop simple tools to make migrant workers have better financial literacy. And another one is building educational platforms that can educate African children. Just quickly What is going goat farms working on we are working on four things solving for problems, you want to figure out ways to consistently produce healthy and affordable food is a sustainable and accessible practices, then we want to build capacity of other farms, and farmers to do so sustainably to transfer these skills on a broader distributor level. And then another challenge that a lot of smallholder farmers have is that they usually produce either one crop, depending on the weather.

So can we think of ways to 55:30 - diversify that, but also move their raw materials to processed forms. And then finally, MC farms, spaces for attraction, innovation, recreation and fun. They’re very technical problems that we need to solve on a hostess, which will leverage on computation economics, anthropology. And I think that’s what makes it exciting as a social entrepreneur, if I can call myself back now. On a typical day, I am reading about and implementing research to these problems that I’ve listed out.

So reading papers around geolocation, and how can you 56:07 - figure out that constraint of soil in order to determine what crops can grow around add without having access to internet? So these are very interesting problems to be really thinking through. I think the most powerful thing putting together an enable the team of people, you can solve this alone. So how do you sell that vision to people and allow that seem to have the capacity to really solve the problem with and then believing in ourselves, it’s he gets to the point where nobody else believes anybody deluding yourself as a team, they keep on working at it, and you get encouraged thing, and you keep on going. Because at the core, you believe that you’re solving something, at least for yourself and other people. I’m just going to quickly go through some what I call carrier anecdotes. These are just my own reasons.

be 56:55 - versatile, that’s one thing I’ve learned. One of the things that have been important for me is to initially, generalise be able to have some understanding of a broad set of different things. So if you’re a research person still understand how to communicate with people still understand how to facilitate how to even do comedy, if you want to just just be versatile, at the same time to have one thing that you’re known for, for me, is the ability to take complex things and simplified for other people to have and to be able to use and see people and lets people see you. And what do I mean by that. It is so easy to get bogged down and technical things and research and Miss people or focus on the job, those are all relevant. But I think when you see people in all the jobs I’ve done, I’ve had at least one person that I still stay in touch with, who knew me for more than what I was able to do as part of my role.

So they 57:56 - could either come talk to me, bounce ideas off me knew about my passions outside of work. And even if you find employers that will be clear about that, that is actually much more powerful. And also let people see you, especially people who are from backgrounds that are not necessarily predominant in whatever space that you’re working in. Make sure that you create opportunities for yourself to be seen speaking. And I know sometimes it can be difficult, but speak participates in events, try as much as possible for people to also know that you are more than just your title. And this is kind of like a joke.

Ground your identity in your job, no, do not 58:40 - do that do not ground the identity in your job, your job will go away, it will disappear. Let your identity be much more than that. So that when your job changes, when you want to do something else, you still have that identity that will keep you going when things fail, you still have that identity, keep going. And that’s what’s been keeping me going. And I think in the same sense, people have seen my passions and when they given us leaving my job last year, they were encouraging me, my team was saying go do it, we’ll support you in that. The last thing I’ll say brief, most important thing in this life is your life. Everything else is replaceable. And with that I say stay human or humane and be open to to whatever is possible, given the skills that you have. So I’ll stop here. Thank you.

59:25 - And I don’t know if anyone will have any questions about this. Emmy Tsang: Thank you so much, David. That is just mind blowing really inspiring. And so, so eloquent. Thank you so much. And all caps. Thank you from Sofia. I think I can agree with that. And applause from Yo as well. If, folks, if you have questions for David, please do put them in the chat and or in the agenda in the Google Doc Wait a bit. There loads of comments flooding in on the zoom chat. Very, very wonderful talk, very engaging and passionate.

00:09 - And not only David but all the speakers as well. If no one has a question I’ll take. I’ll take the chance. So So David, you mentioned that, you know, try and find one thing that you’re known for, and you’re really good at how do you identify that? David Selassie Opoku: From what else I think it starts with trying different things. So it’s part of that whole process of experiment. And I think it’s so easy for us to based on people’s opinion, to think that if I’m going to go into let’s say, Bioinformatics, this is the thing that I should do. I think the more you give you opportunity to experiment with different things, you realise what you’re not good at, which is great.

And then what what are you good, good at, also be open 00:59 - to to feedback and build relationships with very close people who can tell you that, hey, you realise that you’re very good at this. And that feedback really helps you think of I didn’t realise that and can own that. And so that is how I have discovered that, I was told that I’m a very good listener, I tend not to talk so much, I just listen. And then I would summarise what the person is telling me to a more coherent aspect. And then I realised that maybe I can take things that seem very complex, and then turn that into accessible.

And I 01:30 - think that’s one of the things I specialise that. Emmy Tsang: Thank you, David. We have another question. For you. I’m in a team where we are all the same in title on paper and pigeonholes. How do we be individual? Unknown: Um, I think, in title Yes, you, I still, I still argue that there’s something that’s going to be different. So I’ll take the aspects of data science, even on a data science team, despite working on different things, there are people who have specific expertise or interests that that are desperate. So I think in the same way, even if you have different titles, there are ways to really hone on specific things or understand the problem that you’re trying to solve, and really figure out ways that you can leverage on each other’s skills.

That is really what I see, I’m not gonna be able to 02:30 - give a specific answer, I think, being able to identify other hobbies that you have other things that you do outside work and seeing ways that you can bring that bring that in, maybe you are the one who, when things seem stressful, you just laugh. You can be that person, you’re known for that, or you are the one who is considered too organised. You can be that same person and all that comes together to highlight specialisations that will allow you to to thrive in specific circumstances, there’ll be my weird answer to that question. Hopefully, this is helpful. Emmy Tsang: Thank you so much. Folks, if you want to take this chance to ask David or invite some of our panellists who are still here as well, I think, please feel free to put it in the Google Doc or in the zoom chat is one that is typing, and it’s for David and others who may be interested to think about because So Rachael, David and I can still hear. Unknown: Hi, so I think I’m just gonna have mentioned my question gets taken forever to type.

Is that okay? 04:06 - Emmy Tsang: Well, definitely, Neha Moopen: I’m sure I had a question about, there’s a lot of encouragement in terms of you know, diversifying your skill sets and building secondary skills. But how do you so and you know, you when you have one job, you sort of specialise in one skill? And then you have a lot of other skills, of course, when you may be switched jobs, how do you sort of end up sort of specialising or advertising that secondary skill you had? You know, do you understand the question? It’s very late from your day. Yeah. So for example, right now, let’s say I’m a researcher, but I want to go and work in. I’m a researcher, but go work somewhere else, and I’m just trying to sell it basically on this very small side skill that I have, but then I would be competing. Maybe Someone who actually was very much specialised in that. Yeah.

How would you? Sort of? It’s 05:08 - transferable? And I know it’s transferable. But how do you then sort of cash in on your secondary skills? Is it defensible question? I feel like it is but phrase writing, Malvika Sharan: I think you’re very clear. I’ve just paraphrased your question on the check. Thank you. Yeah, no, Emmy Tsang: I do think that’s a very, I like to ask that too. Um, how do we do this? If you Ekin? Are you ready to give an answer? Maybe? Ekin Bolukbasi: That’s a good question.

I guess all depends on 05:53 - the job spec that you’re applying to. But then I think if you are going for something for a job, which requires some sort of, like, big picture, and, and kind of like high level overview, then in a way, they won’t be looking for people who have been so specialised in that one skill, but they will be looking for someone who had previously shown interest to be kind of like quite, you know, multi talented person and see this whole kind of bigger angle and wider approach. And they will be really keen on having someone who can show interest put these different skills together, and, you know, use them to tackle different problems. So I guess, yes, it all depends on the pool that you’re competing with and everything. But I think as long as you go for jobs that look for like this kind of kind of wider perspective, then these secondary skills, although you might not have nurtured them hugely, I think they will always become handy.

And you know, it 07:02 - will be up to you to kind of market them and sell them, like you’re in the interviewer in your cover letter. But I will always say, just, you know, kind of try to sell it from this perspective. Like, I might not have done this, I might not have used this specific skill for the past 10 years of my life. But I you know, I’ve shown interest, and I know how to use it when it’s needed. And does that make sense? More or less? Or is it to Astra? Unknown: It makes sense. Can I can? That’s okay, Emmy Tsang: yeah, no, that’s perfect. Unknown: Yeah. Adding to what I can see, I think there are different approaches. So with regards to jobs, sometimes startups are quite helpful in this kind of present transition, because usually when they do startup, they’re looking for generalists to help with all the different things happening. They usually require thresholds, skills, fundamental skills that everybody on the team, we understand the problem you’re trying to solve, we understand how startups work. And then as they grow, then you start specialising, right? So they tend to be great environments, if you are kind of not necessarily a specialist, but want to go into one to be in.

08:21 - The second thing that I really say is going back to that relation to the startup, for me, I find the most interesting companies to work in and not those who are looking for specific technical skills all the time, or do you know this to or do you have this technical skills? But do you have the ability to learn these skills? Right? So I think in when you’re applying to these things, demonstrating that you are that person who is able to take any problem is able to learn the skills that are required to become the person who can serve the best person to solve that problem is the most vital thing there are some organisations who say no, we will still wants to see somebody who’s done the previous work. Sometimes I think that that is some of the least ideal places to work because then it means that you always be boxed into a specific aspects. And I tend to go for organisations that believe that people have fundamental skills and an ability to learn so that is the thing I’ll see and I think in the meantime before you make that switch, volunteering on other things, so for for instance, I volunteer to help other companies with things that are not necessarily related to my role. I will volunteer in my high school really mentoring people and I think all those become relevant and and actually make you much more of a specialist or something when when the time comes. So that’s what I’ll add to it. Emmy Tsang: Thank you so much, David. And Rachel. And Rachael Ainsworth: yeah, David pretty much hit the nail on the head with with all of that I Definitely recommend, if you have time volunteer volunteering, just to just to make sure that you do want to kind of pursue that direction and, and get that context and experience.

And I also think 10:11 - that that demonstrates that you’re, you’re passionate about something. So if you’re applying for, for a job, that maybe you didn’t have previous, you know, professional experience, and if you show that, you know, you’ve done it in your spare time, then I think that also will resonate a lot with with who you’re applying to. But I think it’s also important to also keep in mind that, you know, not everybody has the spare time to do that sort of stuff. So don’t put too much extra pressure on yourself. But um, I think just demonstrating your passion for for that thing that you want to switch into, I think is really vital and important. And kind of adding any kind of context.

So 10:51 - for me, even though I didn’t have previous experience with a community manager title, I came from the community that I would be community managing. So I had the context of the people that I was going to be working with. I shared their experiences. And then I had a lot of that kind of volunteer experience doing that community management. And that’s, that was very helpful, I think. Emmy Tsang: Thank you so much, Rachel. Yeah, I can totally agree with that. And, of course, over all the things that all of us speakers talked about.

Do we have time for one more question? 11:39 - Let me just quickly check the Malvika Sharan: I think they’ll have to move on Emmy. Emmy Tsang: Okay. Thank you so much for to all our panellists and for your questions. Yeah, I will hand it over to Malvika. Malvika Sharan: And I’ll hand it through you. We have a short reflection exercise that you lead. Yo Yehudi: Okay. Okay. So, folks, if you scroll almost to the bottom of the Google Doc, we have the reflection exercise, it says sustaining. And we have three question prompts.

And so 12:14 - this will just be let’s mute and for three or four minutes and have a think you can answer these privately if you don’t feel like you want to share these because these are personal with regards to careers related things. But if you are happy to share them, then please do. So the three questions are what brought you to work and to open leadership. So what feelings or motivation made you think about this? What would you need to maintain that feeling? Or the motivation for another five years? And what would you need to keep doing that for the rest of your career? And again, you can just write this privately if you’d rather not share this because we recognise that it could be personal, but it’s just a short reflection exercise. And then when we have two or three minutes left and federal to share anything that they’ve thought of in response to that, we’ll share that and then we’ll wrap up roughly on time.

I’m 13:04 - just gonna stick myself on mute while we type it. Okay. Okay, I’ve got thumbs up. Awesome. Okay, we keep typing, we have about three minutes left and I talk officially, I too have noticed we have multiple fundings coming into prompt two, which is a realistic and reasonable response to Yeah, I would love to keep doing what I’m doing, but someone’s got to pay me for it. Does anyone want to unmute to share any of the reflections that they’ve had? You know, I’m not afraid to leave awkward silences. Okey dokey, I keep keep this writing in, I’ve just wanted to just about plus one every single like I went through plus one, yes, I totally agree with this. And then I went to another one that’s like, wait, I’m just gonna spend the whole time going to every bullet point and plus whining, but I’m loving all of the motivation we have here talking about, like sharing and collaborating.

So 16:36 - there’s some really lovely and exciting energy, keep it streaming in. So I think we will wrap up the call. So we have next week at pub quiz. We haven’t set the time because we only just decided to do a pub quiz like a couple of days ago. But we thought it might be a nice way to just have a casual social call rather than something that’s really targeted and learning. And so we will send out the details for the pub quiz for everyone. If you’re a mentor, you may be familiar with some of the questions from last round, but we will update it a little bit. And we have set graduation dates.

So if you take 17:15 - a look at the bottom of the dark, we have links to three sets of notes with the time zones and a link to when it is in your time zone. And you can already hop onto those links and sign up to whichever slot is for you. Whichever thoughts suits you best. And if you find that all 10 of the slots are taken up, please let us know. And we can probably be flexible and figure out how to find more time for you. And as usual, also at the very end of the dark, we have a feedback.

So if you want 17:46 - to share anything that didn’t work or did work, then or anything that you change or anything that surprised you then feel free to leave that you can leave anonymously and we won’t know or you can leave your name Either is fine. And we do know that the author didn’t work. But if you share more about that if you wish, and mobic or Me Anything to add Malvika Sharan: I was just gonna say we’ll hang out for another 10 minutes. But it’s an official wrap up for people who need to be somewhere else. Thank you for joining and especially thanks to all the speakers It was very inspiring.

18:29 - Yo Yehudi: Yeah, so thank you so much to everyone who’s come along and like my biggest said thank you for speakers. Have a great evening day morning night as it works for you. It’s been lovely. Joyce, the the documents actually the links to our three documents are the ones that are vacanze just posted, you can actually just add your project and to one of the 10 slots in each of those documents. Okay, thank you. Joyce Kao: I’m a little slow right now. It’s like Yo Yehudi: we’re feeling you. Yes, yes. Please do put your name in the roll call. There should be slots for 10 different people. And you can put your name in there I’ll call Malvika Sharan: Yo, can you stop recording maybe I Yo Yehudi: suppose that I will do. Emmy Tsang: I’m trying to .