Welcome And K To R Path

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You're listening to significant impact podcasts for early career researchers ready to change the next award. I'm Sarah Don, I'm a great consultant and academic career coach. And on this show, I help you navigate the transition from mentored awards to your first time. If you're ready to move from I hope I'm ready to I know I'm ready to join the wait list for the next cohort of K R Essentials at Sarah Doppeln.co slash K2R. That's S-A-R-A-H D-O-B-S-O-N.co slash K number two R. Now let's get to the episode. I want to speak to a feeling, or maybe a pair of feelings that I have been observing over the last several months, if not year, and change. In conversations that I've been having with prospective applicants to the K to R Essentials program, with current clients, former clients, members of the academic community. And one of those feelings is nihilism, I think. Just feeling quite defeated and worn down and hopeless about the state of funding and the career prospects for yourself. And the other feeling, which strangely I think is almost the other side of the coin, is panic. So it's this very strange blend of nihilism, defeatism, exhaustion, which is very sort of low energy, you know, lying on the ground kind of feeling. And then on the flip side, you have this anxiety, panic, whirlwind kind of energy. And they seem to be coexisting. So if you are feeling one or the other or both of those feelings, I just want to assure you that you are not alone in that. There are plenty of people who are feeling that way. And what I want to talk about today is how to manage those feelings in light of the continued pressure that you are feeling to move things forward, to get your grants funded. Because when you are pushing up against that nihilism, that feeling of like, what's the point? Why am I even bothering? While also dealing with that panicked feeling of, I'm gonna run out of funding, what am I gonna do? That can be extremely confusing and disorienting to be grappling with both of those things simultaneously. So I first want to talk about and remind you, I think, because this is not the first time that we have talked about this on the show. I want to remind you of the consequences of making panic-driven decisions or hopelessness-driven decisions, let's say. And I also want to acknowledge how understandable it is under the circumstances that you would be making those kinds of decisions. And then I want to talk about, you know, where do you go from here? How do we, how do we navigate this? How do we move through this? So it's understandable, of course, that this impulse to make panic-driven decisions has gotten stronger given everything that's gone on in the past year plus when it comes to NIH funding, which of course, you don't need me to tell you is the bedrock of most biomedical research funding in the United States, right? All of these other funding agencies, uh, foundations, other funding sources are not equipped to deal with the volume of requests, the number of projects that the NIH previously was able to sustain, right? And that's the reason everybody relied on this massive federal funding agency, is because it was it was built for that purpose. And as it has been slowly dismantled, or rather quickly dismantled, I should say, that has put everybody, researchers and institutions alike into a tailspin. So the impulse to make panic-driven decisions about where to put your energy and efforts when it comes to funding, it's it's understandable that that impulse has gotten stronger, right? But I want to make sure that we understand the difference between panic-driven decisions and and grounded and rooted decisions, and which opportunities deserve your attention and which don't. So let's talk first about what panic-driven decisions cost you. Right. So the the first thing it costs you is the the cost of chasing opportunities outside of your area, right? When you are in this mode of I just need something to get funded, you are more inclined to stretch or expand what you consider within your research wheelhouse, right? And sometimes that can be beneficial and sometimes it can be detrimental. And the the way to know which is which is to be really clear on what your wheelhouse is and then use discernment to make those decisions. And we'll get to that in a second, but let's talk first about the cost of that. Every time you pivot to a topic that you don't have deep expertise in, you're losing something. You're losing the track record of publications, you're losing your preliminary data, you're losing your reputation as a person who works in a specific area with a specific subject matter expertise, right? You're essentially starting from scratch every time. Or maybe not even necessarily starting from scratch, but the work that you have to do to make the argument that you are the person to be doing this work, which is one of the core arguments you need to make in any grant application, that argument is more difficult when you are moving outside of your research wheelhouse, right? From a reviewer's perspective, an application from someone who's clearly working outside their wheelhouse is weaker because they can't demonstrate that depth of expertise, that track record that makes a compelling case for that investigator score, right? That that factor three, expertise and resources. It's harder to make the argument for expertise, right? So putting my grant consultant hat on for a moment, as someone who has read and internally reviewed dozens and dozens and dozens of R01s, I can tell when someone is writing about work they genuinely care about versus work they're doing because they think it's fundable or it seemed fundable. I can tell when the enthusiasm is coming through, when the depth of expertise is coming through, the depth of thinking is coming through. There's a coherence to the research program, to the track record. And when those things are missing, I notice. And if I, a non-subject matter expert, notices, you can bet that a subject matter expert reviewer is also going to notice. Right? So I just want to underline here and emphasize that it is costing you focus. It is costing you that track record where you move from strength to strength and build on the work that you've done previously. And again, there are exceptions to this, and there are ways to pivot where you're able to make that argument that the work that you are proposing is an offspring of the work that you've done before. But again, that requires discernment and it requires a clear perspective on where your expertise is truly rooted. And if you don't have that or if you're not clear on that, again, it's much more difficult to make that argument. And I keep thinking about one of the graduates of K to R Essentials, and you can go back and listen to her episode. It's the episode with Jillian, who talked about really feeling this pressure to diversify the type of research she was doing because that's what she was being told she needed to do. And I will remind all of you that this was pre-2025, right? This is before the pressure intensified around, you know, making sure that you can keep the lights on in your lab and find funding, right? This is before that. This is just the sort of regular run-of-the-mill pressure to um to have your research funded. And she described going through the North Star exercise and really getting clear on where she wanted to be, where her expertise was, the unique perspective and skill set and interest that she brought to a particular area. And identifying that and clarifying that helped her become really grounded in her expertise to the point where not long after she did that exercise, she came across a funding opportunity that was completely aligned with her area. And she wrote a grant proposal in 10 days. And of course, I do not recommend this. Uh, I do not recommend this to anyone as a way to write a grant. But what I want to underline about this is number one, when you are that aligned and you are that clear on your wheelhouse, on your area of expertise, it comes together very easily because you are already immersed in the literature. You're already aware of the major problems that you want to solve and the gaps in knowledge that you need to fill to get there. You just you're you're already immersed, you already care about what's going on in the literature. You already know what those conversations are. So you can synthesize them so much more quickly than you can when you're moving into a new area and you need to orient yourself to something new. You're already living there, you're already having those conversations. And so it does come together very, very quickly. Again, do not recommend writing a grant in 10 days. This is more of an illustrative example of what happens when you are that aligned. And the other thing I will say is that getting that clear on your area allows those opportunities to land in your lap, right? It's perhaps a little bit mystical or serendipitous, or maybe it's just your reticular activating system that is noticing these opportunities. Now that you have spoken it aloud, it allows those opportunities to become more visible, right? So whether you believe in woo-woo or whether it's your brain just recognizing what you are putting in front of it, these things tend to happen when you take the time to get crystal clear on who you are and why you're here and what you are good at and what you want to contribute. I also want to acknowledge that those panic-driven decisions, that scattered sort of, let me just find something that I can work on and put together and submit, it feels safer because you're doing something, right? You are moving forward, you are writing grants, you are showing that you're trying. It all makes sense. And it does feel safer because you're doing something. But activity, productivity, and progress are different things. Scattering your focus delays mastery, it dilutes your track record, and ultimately, in my view, it produces weaker applications. And I kind of think of it like, you know, how we talk about security theater at the airport, you know, taking off your shoes and putting all of your liquids into little plastic bags. It doesn't actually make you safer, but the the production and the theater of it is part of the security. I feel that oftentimes in academic spaces, we engage in productivity theater, right? We work on things just to show that we're working on them or to, you know, to show the powers that be that we're trying. And to me, that is just such a giant waste of time for all the reasons that we've just talked about, right? If if you're writing a grant just for the sake of writing it, first of all, who writes a grant just for the sake of writing it unless they're being told that they have to? I personally think it is much wiser to spend your time figuring out where your deepest expertise lies, where your interests and skills and perspective come together and spend time writing grants that align with all of that. You are much more likely to be successful when you can speak with authority on those subjects where you already are immersed, right? Like we talked about, you're immersed in the literature, you know what those conversations are, you care about those conversations, you want to contribute to those conversations. And when you deviate from those conversations because you feel like you have to, you feel like they're not fundable for whatever reason, you are starting from scratch. And that just makes everything feel so much more difficult and so much heavier. So I also just want to acknowledge why this panic instinct is so strong right now. And of course, I don't need to remind you that the past year, almost 18 months, has been a real sea change in biomedical research. We have seen lots of researchers having grants terminated. We've seen hiring freezes, we've seen daily headlines that make the whole enterprise feel really precarious. So of course, your survival instinct is kicking in. Of course, there's a bit of panic underlying your day-to-day and a bit of nihilism, right? As we already talked about. It's completely understandable. And on top of that, I want to layer in the gender dimension, right? Women in academia are already socialized to say yes to everything. They're already socialized to be grateful for the opportunities that they have. They're already socialized to prove their worth by being productive. We we know this, we've talked about it before, right? The current climate that we're in takes that existing tendency and heightens it. It supercharges it. So the fear of looking unproductive, of not having enough grants in the pipeline, of falling behind, that was already present before 2025, right? Go back and listen to the episodes that I did in 2023, 2024. We were talking about this then as well, right? But now it's amplified, it's heightened, right? So that very thing that feels like a safety net, you know, applying to everything, diversifying your funding portfolio, staying busy, that is what creates that scattered element to your portfolio. And that's what makes it harder to produce the kind of focused, high-quality work that ultimately gets funded. So, of course, busyness feels like productivity, but if you're running in six different directions, you're not making progress in any of them, right? It's like that proverb she who chases two rabbits catches none. And I just want to remind you as well of something else that we've talked about previously, which is this concept that every yes costs you a no, right? So if you're saying yes to this, what are you saying no to? And if you're saying yes to a bunch of projects, a bunch of applications that aren't aligned with where you ultimately want to go, you are very likely saying no to the work that matters to you because you you don't believe it's possible or you are worried that it's not fundable. But all of those yeses in other areas necessarily mean that you're saying no to the very thing that is most meaningful and fulfilling to you and where your expertise truly lies. And it's really important to consider that trade-off, always consider that trade-off. So now that we have laid or revisited that familiar groundwork, let's talk about how to think about evaluating the opportunities that come your way and how to create, let's call them speed bumps in your decision-making process that will allow you to move away from panic mode or what the hell, why does it even matter mode, into decisions that allow you to move forward in a way that is meaningful to you. So here are some questions to ask yourself. Number one, does this advance my research direction or does it pull me in a new one? So if you have a clear sense of where your research is headed, this question becomes pretty straightforward, right? An opportunity that fits under your umbrella and deepens your expertise is strategic. An opportunity that takes you off on a tangent into a new area because it seems fundable is fear-driven or panic-driven, right? So if you don't have a clear sense of your research direction, that is very important information. If you look at an opportunity and you say, I don't know whether this aligns or doesn't align, that is very useful. That is a separate piece of work that you need to do, but that is useful information. That I don't know is extremely useful. Okay, question number two. Am I starting from strength or starting from scratch? So again, this should be pretty straightforward, right? If you have publications, if you have preliminary data, if you have a track record, a reputation, and if you have collaborators in the area, you are starting from strength. But if you would need to do a massive literature review just to get oriented, if you don't have any preliminary data, if you don't have any collaborators, and it would be a real stretch to argue for your expertise in a particular area, you are very likely starting from scratch. And to be clear, starting from scratch is sometimes necessary. It happens for early career researchers and even uh, you know, researchers who are further along who are making a pivot, right? But if you are continually pivoting or starting from scratch, If you're doing it repeatedly because you keep chasing new topics, that is a red flag. Because, of course, every pivot resets the clock on developing your expertise in any one area. All right, question number three. Would I still want to do this work if it gets funded? So if you have been around for a while, you have probably heard me talk about the hooray, holy shit phenomenon, right? So when you actually do get funded, there's this moment of celebration and validation that you feel. But immediately after you think, oh, holy shit, now I actually have to deliver on all of these things that I've promised. And that is a wonderful feeling. And I love to celebrate that with students, with clients. But that hooray, holy shit, can end up feeling quite sinister, let's say, if you've proposed something that you don't actually want to do, right? And I, you know, I talk about this all the time with prospective clients. And, you know, and we talk about it inside K to R Essentials, right? If your best case scenario is that the grant gets funded and you're now committed to three to five years of work and you don't actually care about that work, that is a problem. Sure, it's a relief that you have funding, but now you're committed to delivering on those promises. And if it's something you really don't care about, that is going to feel like a real drain. And of course, I want to acknowledge here that salary pressure is real. And sometimes you do need to take on work to keep the lights on. The question is whether you're doing it as a conscious strategic choice with an exit plan or whether you're drifting into it out of panic, right? And it becomes this habitual thing. Because we all know that your percent effort on a project is not a realistic reflection of how much work it actually takes, usually, right? And so if you are committed to a percent effort on a project you really don't care about, and of course it ends up expanding to much more than that, you're now spending a large proportion of your time doing work that doesn't matter to you and that doesn't advance your own area of interest and expertise. And the the further you drift down that path, the harder it is to extricate yourself. All right, question four. What is this yes costing me? So, like we talked about earlier, every yes has a cost. Every yes is expensive. If you say yes to this opportunity, what are you saying no to? So I want you to name the trade-off. I want you to make it concrete. In the moment, the yes feels free, right? You think you have the capacity, you have the time, you're just adding one more thing. But if there's one thing that I want you to take away from listening to this podcast, is that your time and energy are finite. Every hour spent on a fear-driven project is an hour not spent on the work that matters most to you. So always ask yourself what this yes is costing you, whether it's a grant application or any other opportunity or request that comes your way, what is this yes costing you? I want to wrap this up by saying in times of uncertainty, the instinct is to cast a wide net. It's understandable that that is your instinct. But what the most successful researchers do, and what I've seen over and over in my work, is they get more focused, more strategic, and more intentional about where they put their time and energy. That doesn't mean ignoring opportunities. It means having a way to evaluate them so that your decisions come from a sense of clarity, from a sense of direction of where you're headed, rather than from fear of what you might miss out on. The funding landscape is going to continue to shift. As of the time of this recording, March of 2026, there are still a lot of unknowns, particularly when it comes to what's going on with study sections and advisory councils. So we know that things are continuing to change. And because of that, you'll need to be adaptable. But adaptability built on a strong foundation of expertise and direction is very different from adaptability built on panic. The first is strategic, and the second is just exhausting. So the next time an opportunity lands in your inbox or comes across your desk, before you respond, think about those speed bumps that we talked about earlier, right? Run through those four questions and see what comes up. Stay in dialogue with yourself. Notice whether the pull you're feeling is coming from genuine strategic alignment or from fear. And just being aware of that is a hugely significant first step. All right, my friends, I'll see you next time. Thanks for listening to this episode of Significant Impact, from K Award to your first big R01. If you want to dig deeper into what we learned today and move a significant step closer to a smooth K-2R transition, visit Sarah Dobson.co slash pod and check out all the free stuff we have to help you do just that. Don't forget to subscribe to the show to make sure you hear new episodes as soon as they're released. And if today's episode made you think of a colleague or a friend, please tell them about it. Tune in next time and thanks again for listening.