On December 7, 2022, an interdisciplinary group of 19 pre- and postdoctoral researchers from all the universities in Graz came together for a festive and enlightening night in the Botanical Gardens. They were guided by Sabine Bergner, a psychologist who specialises in leadership, and together worked out how to productively approach those Fiasco-like experiences which are a normal part of an academic career.
The workshop emcompassed:
- building a "rejection CV"
- creating a twilight exhibition in the room using perceived successes and perceived misfortunes
- approaching psychological and other determinants by which we experience something as a "fiasco"
Using their own examples, the participants worked out a number of ways of dealing with these experiences; learning from them, integrating them, letting them go, moving on. The night ended with an exercise in "letting go" and some drinks, snacks and laughter.
Read & listen on with these tips from the PostDoc Office:
- Glass, R.L. (2000): A letter from the frustrated author of a journal paper, In: Journal of Systems and Software, volume 54, issue 1, p.1.
- "Dealing With Rejection", Podcast von Karen L. Kelsky PhD (The Professor is In).
- Jaremka, Lisa M. et al. (2020): Common Academic Experiences No One Talks About: Repeated Rejection, Impostor Syndrome, and Burnout, In: Perspectives on Psychological Science Volume15, 3, 519-543.
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This Princeton Professor's CV of Failures Is Something We Should All Learn From : ScienceAlert