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Collaborative Online Career Panel: Women Faculty in Organization for Human Brain Mapping Special Interests Group & Student and Postdoc Special Interests Group

Written by Naomi Gaggi, chair of Student-Postdoc SIG & Jean Chen, chair of Women Faculty in OHBM SIG

In early June 2024, The Women Faculty in the Organization for Human Brain Mapping (OHBM) Special Interests Group (SIG) and the Student and Postdoc SIG jointly hosted an online career panel featuring women faculty globally. The webinar aimed to address the following learning objectives: (1) Understand training and career trajectories of representative women faculty globally (2) Become familiar with challenges, barriers, and factors that impact the success of the careers amongst women scientists and (3) Discuss strategies and solutions to promote women’s career development in academia. The online webinar provided an opportunity for those not able to attend the in-person career panel at the OHBM conference, held on Wednesday June 26th at 6 PM.

The panel was co-hosted by Dr. Naomi Gaggi, chair of the Student and Postdoc SIG, and Dr. Jean Chen, chair of the Women Faculty SIG. They asked questions ranging from family planning in academia to imposter syndrome, the ever-present problem in academic spaces. Many attendees brought up questions that the panelists, including Dr. Donna Rose Addis, Dr. Leticia Rittner and Dr. Julie Golomb, addressed with different perspectives across the world and even across academia and industry settings. Highlights of the discussion are mentioned below:

The Career Trajectory of a Women Faculty-Member

Everyone’s career trajectory is different, and this is certainly true of our panelists. All panelists shared their unique motivation for wanting to be a research scientist. For example, Dr. Addis emphasized that it is not necessary for scientists to come from academic families, and her takeaway message is that everyone is equal before science, what matters is an inquisitive mind. Dr. Rittner, on the other hand, trasitioned from industry to academic at a relatively late stage in life, but her courage and determination saw her through her training, in which she had to care for her young children as well as work on her thesis. Her take-away message was that it is never too late to follow your heart.

Navigating Family Life- “Work-life Balance”

Bringing up family planning and your home situation is up to you! When and how you bring this up can depend on your career stage. For example, Dr. Golomb suggested that as a postdoc, it may be beneficial to bring up your family plans early to your (potential) advisor so that you can determine if that lab is the right fit for you and your needs. If family planning is a priority at this stage, transparency would help the supervisor and supervisee to come up with the best training plan and support system. At multiple career stages, planning to have a family and moving through your fertility journey can be supported by your current career position by seeking support through colleagues and looking for support in a healthy work environment.

Balancing your work and life, whether you are planning to or already have children, can be difficult! Some strategies brought up by the panelists include creating a “finished tasks” list along with a to-do list to help make you realize your accomplishments and enforce your confidence that you are not constantly falling behind. Another strategy is keeping a record of reasons to say “yes” or “no” to all the requests that you receive from your institution, colleagues, and lab team. Learning to say no is an art, and having such a list can help you to identify the high-priority requests. By filtering through your priorities and feeling comfortable saying no, you will have more space to be more productive.

What if you feel you do not have enough time for your high-priority items? The panelists also suggested that a true “work-life” balance does not exist. Rather, when one is productive at work, one may be neglecting their family or self-care. This is alright, as long as there is a plan to re-balance things in a sequential manner.

Imposter Syndrome and Speaking Up

Imposter syndrome can happen to anyone! Our panelists highlighted some differences in which men and women may deal with it, and also stated, based on their own experiences, that the more you put yourself out into the world and get feedback from others, the more confidence you can gain which will dampen the imposter syndrome. For example, approaching a keynote speaker and crossing barriers that are inside of your head can help you manage your imposter syndrome and expand your horizon.

Dealing with Harassment

Harassment can happen at any level, whether it be from your advisor or from someone with whom you advise. Gender can also impact the form and extent of it. The main takeaway is that it is always important to have a support system at each level of your career to navigate through any situation, especially from the leadership. More information about this can be found in this blog article by the Women Faculty in OHBM SIG.

Make sure to follow up!

The webinar format was part of our effort to be more equitable and inclusive. The 1 hour webinar was obviously too short cover all the questions that were submitted, and we urge our members to look out for the next installment of the online career panel.