Building a new Academia: Values over outcomes

The global lockdown due to COVID-19 (which as of writing has been going on for almost 5 months) has forced us to discuss important issues about our culture: the “us and them” mentality of politicians, the role of work-life balance in the modern age and the continual mistreatment of minority communities (LGBTQ+, BlackLivesMatter). The same thing has happened in academia; being away from the lab has given scientists time to reminisce, reflect and rethink. This has led to discussion about if, and how, we can improve the structure of our academic institutions.
Those who have been part of the system for years, professors, senior fellows and career academics, are asking themselves (or being asked) if the current state of academia is fit for purpose. Likewise, as we return from the extended shutdown students, post-docs and other early career researchers are taking this disruption as an opportunity for change; to build a better working environment.
A blog post by Chris Denning the director of the new Biodiscovery Institute at the University of Nottingham, where I am based, recently discussed this topic. This was certainly not the first article I’ve seen discussing the need for change but it caught my attention more than others. In the post Chris highlighted that once we return to work if things are exactly as they were prior to lockdown he would see that as a step backwards; this is a chance to start building a better research culture. He notes that he wants to start initiatives to help create that better culture. Three of his suggestions for making this happen were to encourage:

  • Mastery

  • Autonomy

  • Purpose

In the post these were given as broad examples and they weren’t discussed in detail. I think these are some of the idea values we need to encourage if we want to build a better academia. When you’re building a house you don’t just start throwing bricks down and hope that it will stay standing for years to come. If you want to create something that lasts you need to lay a strong foundation. I think if we want to move forward and build something better then we need to build a new foundation for academia, and these three traits can be a starting point.

Mastery through mistakes
In my spare time I enjoy woodworking and I recently attempted to build several raised plant beds. Using scrap wood it took me four attempts to build the first one; my measuring and sawing skills were atrocious and the first three attempts had to be thrown out. The final product was good enough but the skills I practiced were more important; the next attempt was a lot easier and this time it only took me one attempt. The three failed attempts were frustrating but I was learning how not to do it. I have since made several more and would now classify myself as “not terrible” when it comes to woodworking. I am by no means a master of woodwork and will never get to that level but I have mastered some of the basic skills. This is the approach we need to develop in academia – don’t be afraid to make mistakes so that we can learn from them.
As scientists it is our responsibility to become experts in our field of work. To do this we need to develop the correct mind set – one of mastery over achievements. Focusing on goals is one of the greatest limitations of our current educational system; we teach students that achieving a desired grade is more valuable than learning the skills to be independent. The same is true in academia; we receive praise based outcomes (publishing a certain number of papers, doing exactly what your supervisor says, ticking the right number of arbitrary boxes) as opposed to developing our scientific skills.
We need to change this mind set and be ok with making a mistakes; the next time you won’t make that mistake, instead you’ll make a different one and each time you’ll learn something. We have to remind each other that just because an idea isn’t perfect doesn’t mean it doesn’t have potential. We need to learn that inconsistent results aren’t your fault and the only thing you can do is trouble shoot and find out why it happened.
If we want to build a new academia we need to encourage everyone to become masters of their own craft and we can only get there by making mistakes and learning from them.

Give people autonomy
A few years ago there was a lot of hype around Googles 20% rule – employees at Google were allowed to spend 20% of their time on passion projects. Some of the developers spent less time than this working on their side projects but the overall aim was to encourage innovation and let people work on something they truly felt passionate about. According to a Business Insider article the idea has fluctuated over the years but implementing this approach helped google develop GoogleNews and Gmail. In academia, like in business, we often use percentages to describe how we spend our time, usually dividing it across: lab time, paper writing, training, staying up to date on the literature and admin responsibilities. Because of this balancing act how many people actually have the freedom to pursue a passion project?
Giving people the freedom to explore and experiment is an opportunity for innovation. We can’t expect every experiment to generate ground breaking results, but if it leads to a new idea then it is worth setting time aside for these types of projects. Prior to lockdown my supervisor was trying something similar; he wanted to set aside several small pots of funding and each member of the group would come up with an idea and write a mini-grant. The most interesting ideas would get the funding and would be allowed to use it to pursue their own mini-project. Obviously there are selfish benefits to this approach; our ideas might lead to publications, they might create new areas of research or they might one day be used in a grant application. But the key word here is might – there is no guarantee. Scientists perform experiments to answer questions and not every question leads to a productive answer. As scientists we need to start encouraging guilt free exploration.
The goal of doing a PhD or post-doc is to create an “independent researcher” but how can we achieve that if we don’t encourage an independent approach to work. You can’t micromanage students and then be surprised when they struggle to manage their own projects. If someone has an idea don’t dismiss it without discussing it. Just because an experiment didn’t go according to plan doesn’t mean a student wasted their time; they, like all of us, are just learning.
We need to give people the freedom to make mistakes as well as explore and develop their own interests. This is true autonomy; being able to follow your own ideas. Without this freedom we risk making a research environment which stagnates and lacks innovation. We should want our academic institutions to be a place where independent researchers can not only survive but where they can thrive.  

Find a purpose
At the end of every scientific paper there is usually a few sentences dedicated to how the work could impact society. Likewise, when applying for funding you have to highlight the importance of your work in relation to a bigger picture; will it save lives, give us some fundamental insight about the universe, or are you going to develop some ground breaking new technology? This impact statement can sometimes be incredibly vague, but thinking something bigger than just your work, can help you find true purpose.
People studying equality and diversity might want to help change the world and make society fair and just. Maybe that person who just got the big grant isn’t driven by achievements, instead they lost a parent to cancer and want to find a cure so that others don’t lose valuable time with loved ones. Researchers who are working to building new sustainable technology want to build a better world for future generations. These are people who have found a greater purpose for their work.
Having a purpose is something that will get you out of bed on the days when you just want to hide under the covers. Compare these examples to “I want a million citations on the next paper that I publish.” Those are two very different attitudes; one is a purpose while the other is just a goal. In academia we are often focus on goals and forget to take a birds eye view, at the very least we don’t encourage it often enough. There is nothing wrong with setting goals, but goals are external and whether you achieve them or not is usually out of your control. Instead we need to focus on what we can control, and finding a purpose is something you control; because only you can choose your purpose.
Considering a wider purpose can be difficult, and will force us to have difficult conversations with others and, importantly, with ourselves. This approach may seem more philosophical than scientific but encouraging people to find a purpose is what will help us endure the hard times, and in academia there is no shortage of hard times.

What foundation do you want to build on?
For years a career in academia has been associated with poor work life balance, immense pressure to publish and the use of artificial measures of success (one day I will write a whole post about using paper citations as a measure of value). As we return to work we are having to design new systems to prevent the spread of COVID-19. As this happens we need to ask ourselves if we want to use this as an opportunity to change our academic system. If you are a senior academic try thinking about what kind of students you want to develop. If you are a student ask yourself what kind of student you want to be.
We need to move away from outcome based thinking and develop values that we aspire to, and now seems like a good time to start encouraging positive values. Personally my values are going to be to develop mastery, encourage autonomy and find purpose in my work. My values will no doubt be different to yours. But as we all return to work we need to ask ourselves: What kind of foundation do we want to build for academia and what values do we want to develop?

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