Ep. 4 — Jenny Bratburd transcript

[JINGLE: What, who, why, when, where? This is PhinDing Answers.

Music: Eggy Toast - Lose your head]

PETER: Buenos días, answer seekers!

OLAYA: Buenas tardes, answer seekers!

PETER: Yes. Welcome to episode four. We’ve made it this far. We got a few more to go. [OLAYA: woot woot] And honestly, this one is, in my opinion, quite a fun one because this person took a different sort of postdoctoral position and then decided: time to move on and grow a little bit more. So Olaya, who is it that we are talking with today?

OLAYA: So today we’re talking to Jenny Bratburd, who’s a friend of Peter.

PETER: Yes.

OLAYA: And is an out of this world guest, and not only because she works at NASA <laugh>. And she’s our former postdoc with a job outside of academia. So let’s have her introduce herself.

JENNY: Hi, my name is Jenny Bratburd. I am currently the outreach coordinator for NASA’s Health and Air Quality Applied Sciences Team. Previously, I did a fellowship with the Missouri Science and Technology Policy Initiative. And before that I was, I got my PhD in Microbiology at the University of Wisconsin - Madison.

PETER: Yes, Jenny is someone that I have met through my various explorations in career development and her story was not one that I expected, but I’m so glad that she tells it to us and we get to highlight it on this podcast. So thank you, Jenny, for joining us for this conversation. Now, a quick note to all of you, please remember that this conversation was recorded in 2021. And so dates sometimes don’t line up, or we might sound very naive to various events that are currently happening. It’s because you’re listening to a past conversation. Anyways, Jenny is truly a star and we are so happy. We get to speak with her. So enjoy.

OLAYA: Okay. We can get started.

PETER: All right. So today we have a Jenny Bratburd on our podcast and you just heard a quick intro from her about who she is. Now, Jenny, could you tell us a little bit more about what you think a postdoc is?

JENNY: Sure. You know, I looked this up beforehand and it was like a temporary position to do research. And I think that’s a pretty good definition. Although postdocs, I think can go for as long as five years, which feels less temporary. But I think, you know, it’s a time for also training. I think that distinguishes it from just being staff or a scientist.

PETER: Yeah. I really like that aspect. Or I actually think that aspect of training is very important because it means that you’re trying to develop and you’re trying to grow. And that in theory, that’s what helps make a postdoc, a, that temporary position that you, you talked about.

JENNY: Yeah.

OLAYA: Did you know this going in?

JENNY: Oh yeah. Well, from my fellowship, like, it was definitely temporary. So my position was, it’s not like a regular academic postdoc where you just go to the lab and do research, I guess, or at least that’s how, that’s what I thought of postdocs before I did it. And my fellowship was structured as a postdoc, although not all policy fellowships like this are necessarily structured that way. And for ours, you know, it was a one year with one year of extension. So it was like, you’re not getting five years here. So make it count.

OLAYA: Yeah, definitely pretty different from some of our other guests’ experiences.

PETER: Yes, absolutely. And I’m curious, like when you were applying for this postdoc, obviously you knew that there was that time limit and you knew that you could do an extension but, regardless, was this the kind of postdoc that you thought you were gonna do when you were in graduate school?

JENNY: <laugh> No. I mean, maybe. Like when I was in graduate school, I thought, I guess if I thought I was doing a postdoc, it would be a traditional academic postdoc, and I would go somewhere for a bit longer and do a, you know, different kind of research. And then I started to learn about these, science policy fellowships, and there’s several of them in different states as well as at the federal level. And I started to learn more about that. And I was like, that sounds interesting too. So that became kind of my goal of a thing to apply for. And at that point, like, I wasn’t even sure, like how does that intersect with a postdoc? Like, can it be a postdoc or not, or like, what does that even mean? So, yeah, I learned.

PETER: Nice. And so when in your graduate career did you start to conceive of a policy fellowship versus the more traditional postdoc route? And did you have to have conversations with your PI about that?

JENNY: Yeah, that’s a great question. So for me, it was actually, we had this life sciences career day that they did every couple of years for the PhD students to tell us about all the different kind of careers that we could explore. And one session was on this, you know, science policy track, and it was just really different from anything I knew before. And it just sounded really engaging and like, you know, getting science to be used for the public in an important way. And so that’s where I started to get more interested. And one of the advice they gave us, if it’s like, if you’re interested in this, you know, go to places where decisions are being made, learn about that.

PETER: <laugh>

JENNY: So that’s what I started to do. And I got involved with our local, our local chapter that does science policy and then, you know, other things, and it was really enriching experience cuz it was kind of something I kind of did on my own, like away from the research and like not affiliated with my lab and yeah, I guess I did talk to my PI about it and he was kind of like, okay, whatever. So… <laugh>

PETER: Oh no.

JENNY: I mean he was, he didn’t stop me from it, like, but I think he was like, yeah, I don’t know as much about that kind of path.

OLAYA: Did you ever consider at any point doing like a quote unquote traditional research postdoc?

JENNY: Yeah. And I don’t know. I feel like for some reason that was around a lot of people who were like very anti postdoc [OLAYA: <laugh>] and so I was like, yeah, maybe, but there’s always like, people were always telling me like if you can get away and not have to do a postdoc or like minimize it, that might be better. And I was okay. So, yeah, I dunno. I guess a postdoc has never presented to me as something to like look forward to. If I do it, that’s fine. If I don’t, it’s fine. And yeah…

PETER: To me, that’s a very unique graduate school experience. And I’m curious when you were in graduate school, were you planning on staying in academia or were you leaning towards the industry side or something else?

JENNY: I think when I started, I was interested in staying in academia and then I learned more about other careers and I was like, oh, this also sounds cool. And like, even now, like, I still like academia and I could go back to it maybe, but it’s just not necessarily the main driver of my interest.

OLAYA: So going into your fellowship and then like kind of like moving through it, like, did you do the two years?

JENNY: I did eight months, I think. It was really short.

OLAYA: Oh, wow. So between the moment where started and when you decided to end it, did your general perception of that period change?

JENNY: So I started it and like I knew it was temporary and it was also like a new, like a new initiative that they had started. And so like, I didn’t, it wasn’t like bad or anything. It’s just like I got out of it what I wanted to get out of it. And I also wanted to, move back to Madison. So when it came up for the renewals, like, okay, you can either renew it or not, but we need to know so that we can advertise for a new position or not. And so I was just like, okay, I guess I’ll start looking. And then I found something. So it just, it worked out really well.

PETER: That’s awesome that it worked out so well that you were able to find a place and it presumably at least near or in Madison.

JENNY: Yes. Yeah.

PETER: Awesome. Nice, good job. [JENNY: <laugh>] So during those 10 months, what did you do?

JENNY: Great question. So I said it’s not a very, it’s not like a traditional postdoc, but we were technically postdocs at the University of Missouri - Columbia, but we were also working more within the structure of this nonprofit called the Missouri Science and Technology Policy Initiative. And so what we did there, there was our main product, was these legislative science notes. These like short, you know, one to two page summaries of different scientific topics for the Missouri legislature and learning how to do that was a whole challenge cuz it’s very different from any of the writing I did in grad school. As you can imagine, like writing short is really hard and I also had to learn, really take a step outside of my training. My training was in microbiology and I also had to, so I had to learn about energy and environment and transportation and public safety and like take on these much broader range of issues.

OLAYA: Wow.

JENNY: So that was, that was very interesting and you know, explained a lot to me about how policy gets made. And then during that time, I also worked with the executive branch in Missouri with the Department of nNatural Resources, Division of Energy on kind of a little like mini-project on the weatherization program, which is a program that they have that helps with low income households and helps weatherproof their houses. And so I did this whole survey and wrote up this whole report. So I got to, you know, do some longer writing and a little more analysis, which was fun too.

OLAYA: How did you approach that change? Like both learning about potentially different topics from your background and then also writing these documents that I’m assuming have a very specific format, but that it’s very different from research papers.

JENNY: Yeah. So one thing that was nice is that like, it was me and then the four other fellows who came at the same time. So we kind of had that peer support. And we helped like edit each other’s work. And that actually taught me a lot about writing of just like doing it often and like getting that immediate feedback and learning how to do it quickly cuz we had to. So that was like really just like the hands on training and then for like learning about all those surf different topics, it’s definitely, I think a policy skill is sort of getting to know people and networks that you can rely on to find that kind of information, cuz there’s no way that any one person could possibly like be an expert in all those different fields. [PETER: Right.] So you have to know like where are the communities that do know about this, if I have these specific questions or you know, what kind of conversations that are happening in the public that I should be paying attention to? Like where’s the media sources that cover these specific issues and like trying to identify those kind of networks.

PETER: Nice. [OLAYA: Cool. Cool, cool, cool.] I love that idea that you brought up about community. I’m curious, when you moved to Columbia, did you find a strong community given that this was a relatively new fellowship?

JENNY: Yeah. that’s an interesting question. So it was a little weird for me cuz I had grown up in Missouri and around St. Louis. And so I had some notions about what Columbia was like. And the other thing that was weird of course is right in the middle of COVID. [OLAYA: Oh] and we didn’t have any vaccines and it was just like, do I go outside or do I just stay home? Or I think that was probably the hardest part, which you know, would’ve happened anywhere I guess, but definitely made it weird to think about how do you go out into your community. So that was a challenge. And so that kind of got me thinking about like, you know, how do you connect with people more online? Which, yeah, I don’t know if I answered your question.

OLAYA: You’ve said that, so you were sort of like diffusely associated with the university.

JENNY: Yeah.

OLAYA: Was there any support from them for like, I don’t know, like structured groups, like a postdoc association or activities for like career development and that type of stuff that you had a access to?

JENNY: Yeah, we did have access to that. They do have the Mizzou postdoc association, but I felt like most of their programming wasn’t exactly relevant to me of, you know, a lot of it would be like, you’re still on this academic track and you want this professor job, which I was like, okay, I’m not doing that. And then a lot of the other programming was also so like geared towards international students, which I was like, okay, that or postdocs, I guess. So I was like, that makes a lot of sense, but that’s not necessarily like what I need for this. So…

OLAYA: Yeah. Which, by the way, I just learned yesterday that are 55% of postdocs in the US.

JENNY: Wow, yeah.

PETER: Sure are. So given that you were a new community, did you do anything with your free time, even though you’re in a pandemic, were you able to like find some kind of work-life balance?

JENNY: Yeah. You know, I strongly believe in a work-life balance. I mean, I [OLAYA: woot woot], there we go. I did a lot hiking cuz there’s some really beautiful parks around there. So that was nice and I was able to hang out like with the other, the other fellows there, cuz we were all kind of in the same boat of like, we just moved to this place, but we can’t go out exactly. So we would go outside and hang out sometimes. And I met like a few of the researchers there and so it’s like, is it still possible? Even in the middle of a pandemic.

PETER: Right. Nice.

OLAYA: Nice, nice, nice. I did not get tired of advocating for enjoying your free time and taking all your vacation.

JENNY: That is great.

PETER: A hundred percent. Yes.

OLAYA: Okay. So we’re going to switch gears a little bit. And with this series, we’re stating, seeing who the current and recent postdocs are. So who are you?

JENNY: Who am I? I’m Jenny? I’m US-born. I’m a woman. I’m a white person, I guess I’m queer <laugh> but I don’t talk about that much. I’m a science policy enthusiast. I’m a baker. I’m a biker <laugh>

OLAYA: Oh, I’ve another one. Hi.

PETER: There are multiple things that we need to talk about right there.

JENNY: <laugh>

OLAYA: Did you also start your own sourdough during the lock-down?

JENNY: No, I didn’t but my girlfriend did and it was really good. So I could not compete.

OLAYA: Same here. We still have it. [JENNY: Oh good.] His name is Yates [JENNY and PETER: <laugh>]

PETER: What’s one of your favorite things to bake?

JENNY: Wow. What’s one of my, I like baking all kinds of new things. My last bake was a cake. I started doing cakes. I’m trying to get good at decorating cakes, but it’s really hard for me. So still working on that.

PETER: So fun. Wait, but you were microbio, is that correct? [JENNY: Yeah.] I feel in some ways pipetting cells might be similar to like cake pipetting or pipping, I guess.

JENNY: Yeah. You would think. Maybe I should get like a set of pipettes and try and do my icing that way.

PETER: And just add different kind of nibs at the ends of the pipette.

JENNY: That might work. I don’t know. <laugh>

OLAYA: Transferrable skills.

PETER: There we go.

OLAYA: <laugh>

PETER: So given that beautiful and wonderful list of identities that you just offered, how do you think those may have impacted your experience as a postdoc?

JENNY: I think I have a lot of privilege to be honest. And I think, you know, that makes it easy to like blend in, in the university environment for example. But obviously it’s not great if you’re part of the minority cuz then you stand out. That’s probably not a very elegant way of saying that, but just wanna acknowledge that.

PETER: Mm-hmm <affirmative>

JENNY: I think I’ve kind of thought about this a lot, especially during grad school about like mentorship and like how do we make a better experience for students as well as postdocs, you know, people who don’t have the power and how they interact with power and it’s a hard thing and definitely shapes our experience a lot. So I don’t know.

PETER: Yeah, I agree. Can I, I’m gonna take us off, off course here and ask, do you have any thoughts around how graduate and postdoctoral mentorship mentorship maybe could evolve or change to make it better and more supportive?

JENNY: I got lots of thoughts that, you know, we wrote a thing together.

OLAYA: Do you have five hours? <laugh>

JENNY: Yeah, how could it be better? There’s you know, I feel like there’s a lot of people actually like working on that exact question and honestly I wish that more leadership at universities would take it up and be like, okay, let’s follow through. Because like being at Mizzou was kind of a weird experience and I bring up the privilege thing, but like I also saw this through the lens of working with the Missouri legislature. And there was, there was, it was a weird back and forth to see, because they were talking on one hand, the university would say like, we wanna support all of our, you know, trainees. And then not that long after they’d be like, actually we’re gonna cut, you know, all of these departments and support that like helped the trainees. And it was like, then they got the backlash from that. But then like I could also see on the legislature side because they’re, you know, there are certain things happening in the legislature that are not great. You know, if you’ve seen any of the debates about like critical race theory and just, there’s a lot of like, there’s a lot of negativity towards higher education at times. And so you could also see this from that lens of like there’s pressure coming down because they will and, you know, have cut the funding to Mizzou and this is also happening in many other states, you know, if they say, we think you’re being too political or, you know, we just don’t like the idea of this. And even though the students are asking for it so strongly. So I think like it was the first time I’ve seen like firsthand from the like more political side of it, cuz I had always experienced as a student being like, why are you cutting the funds to this? Like why are you doing this? And so it was unpleasant still to see that happen, I guess. But yeah, I mean, I feel like you, there needs to be an, there has to be some kind of investment of support for trainees. Like, you know, because many people are coming, especially like for low-income people like to, to make sure that they have the funds and opportunities that are not being asked to like, you know, use your credit card to register for the conference and we’ll pay you back, you know, many months later, you know, just making sure that these things are like easy enough.

OLAYA: For then to the conference to go virtual.

JENNY: Yeah. Oh yeah. <laugh> not even not even getting on that. And then also just like the other thing I think about a lot is, you know, how do you make systems accountable and like what actually happens when something goes wrong and like, how do you have those conversations? Because I think many of our institutions aren’t set up to do that, but I saw this in grad school, a lot of like, you know, you’d see a conflict arise and it was basically just this huge power imbalance and there wasn’t any way to have like a person to person like just a regular human being conversation because it came with so much baggage and it was like, you don’t wanna talk bad to the person who basically has control of so much of what you’re doing. And [PETER: mm-hmm, <affirmative>], that’s kinda like one of the things that like, you know, Peter and I worked on with that article. And also like when I was in grad school, worked with a team on this of like thinking about like, what would it look like? Like what kind of like systems of accountability would look like? And I think there’s a lot of different options and we should be more willing to have these, these hard conversations around mentorship and about support, you know, cuz they might feel hard, but it’s definitely preferable to the alternative of things go horribly wrong, you know, and you could have avoided the bad outcomes.

PETER: Absolutely. And just a real quick plug, that article that Jenny is, is referencing, was called “Building a diverse and equitable biomedical research ecosystem” will provide a link, it was in PLoS somewhere on the blog, I think. Anyway, shameless plug

JENNY: <laugh>.

PETER: But I think that you’re hitting on some really important points. And I think one thing that might be important to our listeners is what are some of the things that graduate students or trainees should try to understand around policy and around some of the decisions that in general are consider to be made behind closed doors and it’s a black box and all you know is that it’s impacting you.

JENNY: Hmm. That is a great question. I’ll say sometimes they are being made behind closed doors and there are some reasons for that, but a lot of times actually these and these decision and these conversations are happening very publicly. So for example, your state legislature like that, stuff’s generally being recorded it’s you can usually access it online or on TV and you can find out about exactly what they’re saying. You can even watch them saying these things. I think a lot of people don’t because it takes up a lot of time if you wanna actually like tune in for every day of session. But that being said, I think that, you know, many people in office, like they do wanna hear from their constituents and they do wanna hear from people that are gonna be affected. They’re not working on this issue because they don’t care. Like then they just wouldn’t work on the issue. Though I think a lot of people might feel powerless. Like it’s kind of easy to see a bunch of things happening and be like, what do I even do? But like know that you do have power and your voice is valuable and there are opportunities to speak up about this. I think one thing that can help people, especially when you’re like, I don’t have enough time to like listen to CSPA all day or whatever is, you know, finding an organization you can ally with that has the resources or the ability to like keep you connected with the updates that are gonna be most important to you. And if they is not, you should make it [JENNY and OLAYA: <laugh>]. But usually there are like-minded people and you can work with these people and find when these opportunities are hitting, that are really important. And that’s the thing, because policy is all about relationships. So you just gotta find, like I was saying earlier with, finding the right networks to know what’s going on, it’s the same thing. It like finding the networks that care about this and making sure that you know the people that are making the decisions and that you can be heard and that your feedback is gonna be taken into account. And I think actually for students too, I think a lot of students leave the power on the table. I don’t know if that’s an expression [PETER: <laugh>] but like…

PETER: I like it.

JENNY: Good <laugh> but it’s like you, there’s opportunities that I think students really fail to use sometimes, like just like voting for example, I know a lot of like the lowest voting rates are with the STEM students. Actually you might have like a university student counselor something and they usually actually do lot of control over like the student, you know, funds and budget there that can be used in the ways that you wanna see it. But like if you’re not getting involved, then nothing really happens.

OLAYA: Yeah, no, I was gonna say we had a postdoc union in my institution and it was actually hard to get people to sign up. A lot of people were like, eh, I got my raise anyway, so why should I pay dues?

JENNY: Yeah.

OLAYA: So yeah, getting people to like take the power that is available to them is a big deal. And I also like the, like the idea you threw out about getting for of, with all sorts of organizations that already exist. I think that’s a good option for international people who most of the time are not eligible for the type of fellowships like the one you did, but are still interested in like policy and being involved with decisions regarding science.

JENNY: I wanna say that international students are eligible for the policy fellowship I did.

OLAYA: Woo!

JENNY: Yeah.

PETER: That’s amazing.

OLAYA: That’s great. Cause like I know the, I’m not super familiar with all the available fellowships. I just know the one from like AAAS.

JENNY: Yeah. It’s extremely confusing. So… <laugh>

OLAYA: Do you happen to have any like resources or like lists of these type of fellowship?

JENNY: I do! The National Science Policy Network. That’s like a group of early career people interested in science policy. They maintain a list of different fellowship opportunities and they also have a part where they specify like who’s eligible, if it’s international or not. Highly recommend that cuz yeah, I’ve <laugh> every time that I’ve like talked about this in like a public setting, I feel like that question comes up, but being like, so are international students eligible? So it’s definitely a very common question.

PETER: And I will say the National Science Policy Network has a fantastic, very active Slack channel that sometimes is overwhelming.

JENNY: <laugh> That is true.

OLAYA: Aren’t they all?

PETER: But I believe that’s how Jenny and I met. [So]JENNY: Yeah]. All right. So I guess trying to get us back on track so that this episode isn’t seven hours long, even though I would love it to be. Olaya, do you wanna move us to why do postdoc?

OLAYA: Yes. So you, Jenny, you talked about discovering the path of science policy sort of later during your grad school. Was there any particular motivation that pushed you in that direction? What sounded exciting about it versus the quote unquote traditional postdoc or the idea that like the option that you also gave, which was not doing a postoc at all?

JENNY: Yeah. Well, I guess I feel like one of the best reasons I can think of for doing any kind of postdoc or fellowship is, you know, you wanna get more experience, especially experience that’s a little bit outside of your training that you already have. [PETER: mm-hmm <affirmative>] And so that was what motivated me. And I feel like that’s what I’ve seen people be the most successful in any of these types of positions is like, you’re not just doing more of the same thing, but you’re really stepping out of your comfort zone and learning new skills because then you get a lot more opportunities open up.

OLAYA: Did you get the things that you were expecting out of it?

JENNY: Yeah, I got that and more. I mean, I definitely learned a lot about policy. I learned a lot about like different policy areas. I learned to improve my writing. I learned, I actually learned about different research methodologies, like qualitative research. That seems to be more common in a lot of policy areas. Yeah. It was very eye opening to me because like, I like I’d been exposed to a lot during grad school, but it’s like, no, it’s extremely narrow what you get exposed to during grad school. That’s the whole point.

OLAYA: So it’s kind of the definition of grad school.

JENNY: Yeah.

PETER: It really, it is <laugh>. Whenever I go to trivia nights, people are like, oh, you have a PhD, you must be super smart, therefore you’re gonna help us win. I was like, no, my PhD was in one tiny sliver of research. That does not mean it generalizes to understanding sports, cuz it doesn’t.

OLAYA: <laugh>.

PETER: So would you ever do a postdoc again? It sounds like you had a fantastic experience

JENNY: It was pretty good. I mean I’m not like team pro postdoc. It was fine. [PETER: <laugh>] I feel like, I feel like I got all the best parts out of it while avoiding some of the worst parts and it kinda…

OLAYA: I would call that as success.

JENNY: Yeah. I feel like it is kinda like a sabbatical almost. So I don’t know. I would do that again if it were, you know, good like that. So…

PETER: Any highlights that you want to feature or comment on?

JENNY: I don’t know. I guess the highlight for me was just like meeting many different people and getting to meet people in like very different fields, these different conversations and learn all these new things. Like that’s just, it’s so much fun. So that was definitely a big highlight is like just really getting the opportunity to learn new things. Which I think before I did it, I was kind of like dreading a little bit cuz I was like, oh, I’m gonna be a beginner again. But it’s actually like, I don’t know. It’s really fun to be a beginner. So…

PETER: It is because I think you’re a beginner in on sense [OLAYA: with experience], but you have so much other experience that you’re just like beginning at a new level.

JENNY: Yeah.

OLAYA: Yeah. Cuz I think like the PhD does give you a lot of general tools and then you can apply those tools to whatever you do after, be it research or not. But we did talk about impostor syndrome in other episodes and I think everyone feels it, that they’re not good enough. So what would you say? The people who are like, oh, I just like want to do a postoc in something that’s sort of just like a little incremental step from what I was doing, but like I would like be comfortable with what I’m doing cuz then I will like get a paper in a year or something.

JENNY: <laugh> Well, I think there’s two things there. One is if anybody ever promises you, oh it’ll just, it’ll be really easy and you’ll get a paper in a year. <laugh> Double check that because it often doesn’t end up being that easy. You know, be careful there just because you know about the topic doesn’t necessarily guarantee that things are gonna go well, it’s just kind of luck sometimes. But the other thing I would say is like, I wouldn’t tell anyone what to do or not to. I feel like because only you are gonna know the reasons, like the things that are gonna be important to you and like what your goals are. And so if you’re looking at a postdoc, you’re like, it’s very similar to what I did before, but here’s all the reasons I wanna do it, you know? Or like I wanna stay in this area. I wanna live near my family and this postdoc makes sense. You know, like if that’s the thing that’s important to you, then you should go for that. Just make sure that you’re like fully considering it and not just like making a decision out of fear or that you don’t have enough of the information that you need to make a decision.

OLAYA: Totally. [PETER: Absolutely.] So yeah, I would echo would you just said and encourage people to reflect. Both people who are considering starting a postdoc and even like postdocs now. I learned a lot during like my second, third year as a postdoc and it like, my outlook changed and it’s never too late. So I would encourage everyone to follow Jenny’s advice and just like think real hard about what you wanna accomplish.

PETER: Right. And I would add to that, that a postdoc, no, any career move that you make has so many other implications to your life and that it is absolutely okay and, or maybe required to ask how this is going to impact your life and whether or not this career choice is the best choice for you as a holistic existence rather than you as someone on a career track.

JENNY: Yes.

OLAYA: And I would say that in general, any career move is a move forward. [PETER: Mm-hmm <affirmative>] like, you just don’t know what the end of the path will be if there is everyone. Cuz I feel like a lot of people are scared of like the curvy road and like I’m deviating from my ideal job that I had when I was 18. I think if at the moment feels like the right thing. It is the right thing.

PETER: And on that note, let’s awkwardly transition to when should one do a postdoc. So it sounds like Jenny, you did your postdoc directly after your graduate program. [JENNY: Yeah.] And I’m curious, so for a fellowship that you had, you kind of have this built-in start date, like you’re, you’re in a cohort model you’re starting at this time. Did that impact your graduation at all? Or your defending of your dissertation?

JENNY: Uh… <laugh> yeah <laugh> it did. That’s definitely a thing to pay attention to, cuz you need to get an agreement with your PI about how that’s gonna work out. I actually thought I was gonna defend earlier and then COVID happened. And then there was also this weird underlying lab drama thing that blew up in my face that contributed to me just saying, okay, I’m gonna push it down the line, but I have seen it kind of, it’s hard for people sometimes like for some fellowships where they require that you have your PhD already and to apply for example and like mine didn’t. So it was, I could run my PhD right up until the end where I needed to start the position. And so if you have something like that, like it takes a bit of careful planning and it might require like that you graduate earlier than you expected or you know, you have a slight gap in the middle, so…

PETER: Yeah.

OLAYA: How, how far in advance did you apply and when did you find out that you got it versus your graduation graduation date?

JENNY: I don’t remember when the first like application part actually was, but I do remember like in March or April having a bunch of interviews for this position and other similar positions, cuz it was weird cuz they were all like virtual and no one had ever done Zoom before or something [PETER: <laugh> oh no] Back in those days, yeah, I had a terrible or actually had a fine interview, but it was bad cuz it was for some fellowship that had like tech in the name and I couldn’t get my camera to work and I was like, uhoh <laugh> this isn’t a good sign. But everything worked out.

OLAYA: I mean, people can’t still use Zoom after over a year. So…

JENNY: That’s true. That’s true.

PETER: We still have issues.

JENNY: So for the ones I was applying for, they were starting in the beginning of fall and I was applying in the spring or so. So it wasn’t, it wasn’t necessarily too distant of a time ahead, but sometimes you might wanna start applying like a year out. So, it depends.

OLAYA: So you, you already sort of touched upon the fact that you ended it a little bit sooner than maybe it was planned to be, you said that was like a year potentially two. You ended it after 10 months. What happened to like prompt that if like as much as you want to share, but like why did you think that was the good time? And like, it seems like you had your next move ready to go.

JENNY: Yeah. I mean there wasn’t, there wasn’t anything bad about like I liked the people I worked with and like I would’ve stayed longer, but for me I was considering the second year, but there was one I didn’t wanna continue living in Columbia, wanted to come back to Madison and like I had been kind of like driving back and forth between the two and I was like, this is just. If I can settle in one place, I should just try. And so that was a big motivator, which got me looking for jobs more. And, the other thing was legislative session for Missouri ends in the beginning of May. And so by that point, like I had wrapped up like the main part of the fellowship where we kinda have to be on call, I guess, to like write these, you know, these policy briefs. So like, I think if I had left any sooner than that, it would’ve been harder for the organization and not ideal, but because it was afterwards and we were kind of like ready to take more of a break. It made more sense. And the other thing is like, I don’t think that’s very uncommon with these types of policy fellowships because they are so short and you do have to be looking for a job right away that, [OLAYA: yeah] I think it’s pretty common to maybe leave a little bit sooner than you had originally signed up for [OLAYA: mm-hmm <affirmative>] and that’s usually like that’s, I think usually a good thing, cuz then that means you have a position and they’re excited for you to start. And like it is annoying being on the job market and trying to get everything to line up perfectly date wise. So yeah…

PETER: Well done in getting that to work somehow. So I do, I think it’s often a question in a postdoc’s mind around how to make that career transition, how to move from postdoc to whatever the next step is, because the quote unquote traditional postdoc is often lab-based or research-based. And so you are constantly running experiments and analyses and you’re not done until basically you’re no longer in the lab. [OLAYA: Yes <laugh>] So I think it’s really fantastic that you kind of had these structural timelines within your fellowship. Do you have any advice for postdocs in either policy fellowship or the more traditional postdoc in terms of meeting your deadlines while also on the job market?

JENNY: Hmm. That is a really tough question. I think you have to set certain boundaries because like you’re saying there’s you’re, you could be always working. There could always be more work, especially when you’re doing research, because anything you do will generate more questions and you gotta do more research. So part of that is just being able to say no and being able to say, I don’t have time for this and being able to delegate what you have to someone else, if that’s possible. And I guess for my position, it was kind of easy cuz we had this structure that was imposed by the legislature, but you can also kind of impose your own structure onto it. Like you can set aside time, you know, for your job search. You just have to make sure that you’re committed to it and probably have to work with your boss <laugh> on that a bit. But I think like it’s, I think there’s a kind of an unrealistic idea for students and postdocs sometimes that it’s like, oh, well I just need to wrap up all this stuff. And it’s kind of like a way to procrastinate doing the job search sometimes, but you really gotta set aside that time and know that that is also part of your position because you know, both being a student and being a postdoc are like training positions. They are not meant to be permanent positions. You should be dedicating some of your time just like networking and learning about job opportunities and doing things that set you up so that you’ll be in a good position to apply for those opportunities and all of that stuff.

PETER: 100%

OLAYA: Hear, hear.

PETER: Yes.

OLAYA: Yeah. And I feel like we know this, but the people who have to like sort of agree to this, do not know this.

JENNY: <laugh>

PETER: Right.

OLAYA: They, they sign up for like the, oh yes, I’m gonna get a postdoc. I’m gonna get someone to do stuff for me. And then like your career and your interests are sort of like second to that. And I am sensing a shift, at least as I said, like with the up and coming generations, everyone is talking about this and like, my cohort of postdocs, everyone was very concerned about career development and all types of options for careers outside academia. But you hear stories from people’s PIs and then it’s not this story. So I guess you didn’t have like, well you had sort of an academic advice or you said, did you discuss this type of career moves with them?

JENNY: Yeah. So I think, you should communicate these things to whoever is your boss, because that is important for how they’re gonna plan for things. And communicating is usually always better than not communicating. So just a heads up. If you’re working for someone who is really against it or very against you developing your career for some reason, that might not be a good situation and you might wanna find a different mentor <laugh> yeah. That’s a hard, hard thing to deal with. But also I mean, I feel like in many cases, like it can be worked out and you just have to agree upon what are the expectations, you know, if you’re hired for a certain position, ideally you would meet a certain set of goals. That doesn’t mean meeting all of everything, you know, because like there’s always more work. There’s always more research, whatever it is, but making sure that like within the timeline, let’s say you’re hired on a grant or something that, you know, there’s certain key things that need to get done that you’re able to say, like these are done or they’re close enough to done, or they’re in a position that it will be easy for someone else to take over. And I think, if it helps at all thinking about it from what your boss’s perspective might be, if you wanna make your case stronger, it would be helpful, you know, consider like what do they want out of this? Like if I can prove to them that that’s done, they don’t need to hold on to me <laugh>. And also I kind of, along with that, like there’s research on like, I think for students at least, of like, you don’t necessarily get more done just because you’re spending more hours in the lab. Like the time that you spend taking a break, like that does help recharge you and makes the work that you’re doing when you’re doing it actually more effective. And like the time that I spent, like I know like doing professional development stuff, like that was very helpful and sometimes was very helpful to like research in ways that I wouldn’t have expected. And so I think that’s another part of it is making sure that like you and your boss both recognize those benefits.

OLAYA: Yeah.

PETER: Yes, absolutely. I’m going to now just write off every coffee break I take as just mental health recharge.

OLAYA: <laugh> Is it also tax deductible?

PETER: I really hope so, but I fully agree that like taking time to re-charge is essential, whether that is on a daily basis on a weekly, monthly, hopefully we don’t get to yearly basis, but taking that time to really check in with yourself and make sure that you are running at your optimal levels is very important.

OLAYA: Totally. And on the note of like mental health and wellbeing, a very important part of that is where you are doing your postdoc. So did you, when you were choosing the fellowship, did that location, like not the sort of graphical location, but like the type of entity that you would be, working with and the sort of community and culture of that particular place, did that influence your decision to make the type of fellowships you were applying to?

JENNY: Yeah, for sure. And in kind of weird ways, I mean, location too was also a big part of it. So if you picture at the time I’m making this decision, it’s around May, 2020 and we’re in the middle of a pandemic and a huge uprising in racial consciousness, I guess. there’s there’s riots happening at the Capitol there’s there’s wild stuff going on. So for me, like, first of all, location, I might have taken a different position. Like in Washington, DC had things been different, but things looked bad at DC at the time. Trump was still president.

OLAYA: And little did we know…

JENNY: There were some wild things going on there. and I was like, you know what, this is a crazy year. And also there’s a pandemic. And like, if I move there, like I don’t even know that I’ll be able to like do things. I don’t know. So I decided Missouri would probably be a better option. And that also gave me the option to drive to see my girlfriend in Madison, because it was, you know, it was like a six hour drive, but it was still doable. [PETER: mm-hmm <affirmative>] So that was one that was one factor of there’s this crazy stuff happening in the world and the location aspect. And then there’s also the institutional aspect. And for me, like, I wasn’t super thrilled about Mizzou and I’m still a little skeptical of them. I don’t know, I’m sorry.

PETER: That’s okay. You should be.

JENNY: Okay. Good. <laugh> There’s just, there’s some weird things happening there. And for me, like the other thing was the Missouri Science and Technology Policy Initiative was kind of this new thing. And so, you know, I was talking to the director about like, what were her goals? And like, where’s the funding coming from and how is this all gonna work? And so I really grilled her on that. And I think that was kind of funny because for some reason I felt more empowered because it was this new organization to like really drive home and really like, I wanna know the answers to all these types of questions. And I think like if it had been like a more prestigious location or, you know, a more well-known person that I was gonna work with, I might have felt intimidated and afraid to ask those questions and looking back, I’m like, you should always ask those questions regardless of, you know, the reputation of the place that you’re planning to go to.

OLAYA: Totally, totally. Value yourself and know that if you don’t ask the questions you might end up in not a great place.

JENNY: Yeah, I know I’s it’s hard.

OLAYA: Yeah.

PETER: Terrifying to ask some of those harder questions.

OLAYA: Again, impostor syndrome, yeah. Comes along with your PhD.

PETER: <laugh> I guess now that you are at NASA or at NASA Health, I don’t know if there’s a difference. Is there a difference?

JENNY: It’s…

PETER: Are they different branches of the same entity?

JENNY: No. I mean, NASA’s NASA and ours is like a grant team project out of the NASA Applied Sciences.

PETER: Ah, got it. Well, so now that you are no longer a postdoc, is there anything you wish you had known before being a postdoc that you would suggest other people to explore before making their decision?

JENNY: Hmm. Yeah, I guess, I mean, my position was kind of weird because it didn’t necessarily have to be a postdoc position. And that was something that was instilled in me by elder grad students I knew. You don’t have to do a postdoc. And I knew this happened to other people too. Actually one of my friends, he was going to work at a private company and they were like, oh, well we could structure this position as a postdoc. Don’t you want that? You, Right. And he was like, no, I wanna be a scientist. Like I want the scientist position. I want this permanent position. [PETER: Yes] Yeah. So like you can add..

OLAYA: And I want the scientist salary.

JENNY: Yeah. And that too, right? Like that’s a big part. So like, think about what it is that you really want to get out of it. That’s probably what I would tell someone to think about before making that kind of decision is like, what do you really want to get out? Is the postdoc the thing that you actually want or is it something that’s similar? And can you advocate for that?

PETER: I love that.

OLAYA: Yeah. And when people are trying to decide where to go, like say they have already committed to doing a postdoc, and they’re trying to decide where. You mentioned asking all the questions, what type of things did you ask? What do you think is important to consider? Like going back to what we were saying before about the like inner exploration and knowing yourself, how does that play into the questions that you’re asking?

JENNY: Yeah. that’s a great question or set of questions. I think actually Beronda Montgomery, she’s written a lot about this, of thinking about it in terms of don’t seek validation from your institution. You should be giving yourself the validation you need.

PETER: Yes.

JENNY: Yeah. She’s great. She has a book about out lessons from plants, but like, I think that is really important and that’s kind of something I didn’t learn until more recently. And it’s definitely something that’s been sticking in my mind. A lot of like, you know, it’s not like you should be aiming for a position. It’s like you have your own goals and your own mission and wherever you are in whatever position you take should help you with your own goals. Which I think is maybe not the way we always look at it.

PETER: Well, I think that Jenny, you have provided us with some fantastic and phenomenal insight into both policy, policy fellowships, career transitions. And before we let you go, I have one final question.

JENNY: Okay.

PETER: Can you tell us a little bit more about your current position with NASA?

JENNY: Oh yeah, sure.

OLAYA: And are you going to space anytime soon? <laugh>

JENNY: You know, if Bezos can do it, why can’t I? <laugh>

PETER: There you go.

JENNY: There might be several reasons why. But currently I am an Outreach Coordinator and so this is pretty fun cuz I get to talk to stakeholders and people who are gonna use the science. I get to talk to scientists about what their research is and, you know, think about how to better explain that to the public. I get to help connect people and plan meetings and events. So it’s really fun. I feel like I get to learn just enough about the science, like the fun, and you’re just starting to get into it without having to get into too much of the less fun part where you’re like this data set isn’t working with this other thing. I don’t know why. So…

OLAYA: My code is buggy.

JENNY: Yeah. Right? <laugh> So that’s kind of what I’ve been doing now. And the, the overall mission for our team is to get the NASA data and products like into the hands of people who can use it. And specifically we look at a lot of like air quality issues and related health issues from that for the most part, because they’re, NASA’s got satellites, you know, orbiting the Earth that can tell like what’s going on in the air. And it turns out that can be very useful information as long as you can kind of translate that information and make it useful. So that’s kind of where I’m at.

OLAYA: Cool. [PETER: That’s amazing.] How do you think your postdoc helped you make that new change? Cuz it does sound slightly different to what you were doing before.

JENNY: Yeah, so it’s a little bit less political. The position I had really helped me, it helped me with learning about new topics. Definitely especially energy and environment, which is good because like, I feel like there’s a lot of policy in science that goes on in those topics. So that was really useful. And it also gave me kind of a greater appreciation for the whole like system of research as well as like the state and how, you know, evidence gets used in regulation and then how regulations get implemented and what that all kind of looks like, on a day to day level. So that was a really useful experience to understand that as well as with, learning how to communicate science to different audiences. I feel like in grad school we had a lot of opportunities to do outreach, especially with kids, which is, you know, a specific kind of audience and kids are a great place to start cuz they will just walk away if they’re bored, which is great. [PETER: They will.] But I feel like the audiences I often work with are like, you know, very smart people, but they don’t necessarily have this expertise in this specific area. And so it’s like, how do you distill the information while still keeping all the relevant stuff that they’re gonna wanna know? And so that was a skill that I, it started to pick up during the fellowship.

PETER: Yeah. Communicating your science to a broad audience is always a skill that I think all scientists need. But not one that they train you to have in the lab.

JENNY: Yeah <laugh>

OLAYA: It’s always something that good to practice [PETER: mm-hmm <affirmative>] and so find blogs or any sort of long-form science communication that you can…

JENNY: Podcast maybe…

OLAYA: <laugh>

PETER: Well, Jenny, thank you so much for taking some time to talk with us about your postdoctoral experience, your new position with NASA. It’s been lovely to catch up.

OLAYA: Yeah. Thank you. I’m so happy to have met you and it’s sort of like a different postdoc experience that I think it’s really important to also make visible and maybe we inspired someone to start a policy career.

PETER: I hope so.

JENNY: Wow. Well thank you. Thank you so much for having me and thinking of me. And it was great to get to talk with you. This was a really fun conversation, so thank you so much.

PETER: Yay. I’m so glad you had fun. [OLAYA: Yeah.] Thank you.

OLAYA: And good luck with the baking.

JENNY: <laugh> Thank you.

OLAYA: It was so refreshing hearing from, from Jenny. I hadn’t been exposed to many policy experiences. And it just sounds so interesting!

PETER: It really does.

OLAYA: And like things that are directly useful, cause like in the lab, like the application of your postdoc research can feel very far away and people are just focused on like getting the next paper out, but like curing whatever disease you’re working on might be like years and years away. But with policy you can get to make immediate, tangible change in society. So like isn’t that super cool? Also it was really encouraging to hear that there are opportunities for internationals in policy too, cuz sometimes you just hear about the big, shiny fellowships that are only available for Americans. So it was good to hear that there are options out there and you just have to look for them.

PETER: Yes. I absolutely agree with you on that. I think one of the reasons I decided to step away from research was because I was realizing that while my research was important to a bigger picture, the impact of my research might not be seen for years or decades down the road. So after having that realization, I was like, you know, maybe I’ll go have some more direct effects in administration. Anyways, I have to say also that I did not think that a PhD would get you to a position like Jenny’s, but I’m so happy to hear that it’s a thing and that she made it a thing. I love what she’s currently doing, doing outreach for NASA. And I look forward to seeing what she does with that and beyond in the future. Anyways, learning every day.

OLAYA: And we’re hoping to learn from you. So please send us your comments, takes, experiences, questions, bread tips and tricks to phindinganswers@gmail.com. Remember it’s P-H-I-N-D-I-N-G. We will include them in our final episode when we look back on all our awesome conversations. Also, please follow us on Twitter @phindinganswers, same spelling and we will keep the conversation going there too. You can get our episodes from our website phindinganswers.github.io. Please find the link on Twitter (so much easier) or wherever you listen to your podcasts. And we’ll be back next week with our final awesome guest.

PETER: Woot. Goodbye.

[MUSIC: Eggy Toast - Lose your head]