If these chairs could talk...[fill in the blank]
(as taken from my biostats lecture this morning)
Naturally, it took me exactly four times longer to complete than what the professor said it should take.
Now, relative to other decision-making units (i.e., students), I wonder how poor my efficiency score would be...perhaps by the end of my PhD, I'll figure out how to adopt the models developed by DiGiorgio and colleagues to answer this question...
Today I learned...
There are seemingly endless ways to measure blood pressure in a patient survey: if there are three measures, take the average of the first two or take the average of all three; round to the nearest integer or take the floor of averages; use both systolic and diastolic measures to classify patients into different categories (e.g., low, normal, borderline, high, severe) or just rely on systolic or more heavily weight systolic if systolic and diastolic measures do not neatly bin a patient into the aforementioned categories...and of course each of these decisions could have differential effects into how many patients are considered (1) hypertensive; and then (2) effectively controlled or uncontrolled with xyz interventions.
As someone relatively (aka very) new to the non-communicable disease (NCD) research arena, I started to go down a data/measurement rabbit hole this afternoon...
Today I'm grateful for...
Emmanuela Gakidou, my current PhD faculty advisor and career/life mentor for the last ~10 years, as she briskly pulled me out of said data/measurement rabbit hole and helped me see the forest for the trees in this particular analysis and project.
Emm's combination of thoughtful yet no-nonsense research oversight and insights, fierce support, and tough love works really well for me as a researcher and professional; the caveat, of course, is that it took me a few years to learn how to effectively receive and act on feedback, from Emm or anyone for that matter. Perhaps this skillset comes naturally for some people – if this resonates with you, well congratulations, awesome, mad props (or whatever the youths are saying these days). I was not such a person, and it's something I actively, deliberately work on to this day. Receive feedback, check. Process feedback, detaching emotional ties or similar mental weeds that can ruin otherwise very meaningful, important guidance. Ch....ch....ok, phew, check (and high-five for getting all up in your head!). Act on feedback, including clearly expressing appreciation for the person's willingness to give you thoughtful, candid feedback.
I can probably still pull up the email where, at the time, a faculty member called my writing "half-baked" and that it seemed like I didn't care about a particular project. I remember it so clearly, feeling as if I was literally sucker-punched, as these were things I always viewed as 'signature strengths,' as the positive psychologists call it: (1) being a good writer; and (2) being invested in whatever project I was working on. And who knows, it's totally possible that particular piece of feedback wasn't about me at all –nonetheless, that moment stands out to me because, while tough to hear, it also showed that this individual was invested in me.
Maybe this sounds a little odd, or perhaps a bit...masochistic? counterproductive? some negative-undertoned-adjective? I'm sure an endless debate could ensue. My two cents? While you should never be purposefully mean or nasty to someone (especially if you are in a position of authority), the opportunities for growth are often far and few between if you aren't open to receiving (and/or giving) candid, meaningful feedback. While I can't know the counterfactual, what I can say is that I am among the strongest scientific writers at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), and I happen to be very good at mentoring/supervising early career research professionals. #AppropriatelyConfident, per Dr. Jennifer Gunter
So thank you, to everyone who has invested me over the years, and for caring enough to give me the candid, thoughtful feedback I've usually, if not always, benefited from in one way or another.
No comments:
Post a Comment