How is your schedule?
If you are like the rest of the people I know, you either:
Feeling pushed to the max is the number one response I get nowadays when I ask someone about where they are with their writing and work.
From my longtime academic coaching and editing practice guiding doctoral candidates through the peaks and gullies of completing their dissertations, I have seen how women in doctoral programs can easily become diverted by compassion for others in trouble. Well-meaning decisions and actions may result in calamitous consequences to their goal of a completed dissertation.
Although my experience has been primarily with women, if you are a man reading this, you may recognize some of these scenarios. In these stories (names and identifying details changed for their protection), you will see that tender-hearted consideration at the wrong times dangerously waylaid dissertation progress. If you’re a doctoral candidate writing (or not writing) your dissertation, perhaps these tales will confirm decisions to let no major interruptions complete your dreamed-of doctorate.
This is the third article in this series on finding hidden and unexpected pockets of time to write within your tried-and-true teaching practices. By paying more attention to what we do when we teach, we can spend less time teaching and more time writing without sacrificing quality feedback. Last edition, I wrote about how to streamline student feedback; in this article I will focus on streamlining how you grade student work. In the next and final article of this series, I will explore several ways to enlist student help in meeting your own writing goals while providing a role model as a scholar.
As we enter the back half of November, the end of semesters and the holiday season looms in the quickly approaching future. How will this affect your writing routine? Do you have a routine that keeps you moving in the direction of your goals? What will make that routine stronger?
In this week’s collection of articles from around the web, we explore ideas of requesting extensions in academia, redrafting strategies, research methods, and why an index is important. We also look at larger publishing topics of technology, research data sharing, and preventing bias. Finally, our list wouldn’t be complete without the best Black Friday deals for writers with that annual shopping event officially a week away!
Mike Murdock says, “The secret of your future is hidden in your daily routine.” Hopefully the ideas and resources in the articles below give you resources to make that daily routine stronger and more capable of meeting your writing goals. Happy writing!
Let me ask you a question – do you have publishing goals or do you have a plan for writing? Perhaps a trick question, as you may very well think to yourself, don’t I need both?!? However, what I want to clarify in this post is that goals are different than plans and one should hold greater weight than the other in your daily writing efforts.
So let’s start with identifying the difference between goal setting and plan making.
Why? The simplest and, at the same time, most complex question we can ask of ourselves in any situation. Simon Sinek said, “People don’t buy what you do. They buy why you do it.”
Our collection of articles this week includes a number of applications of the “why” in our work. From designing and publishing research to prioritizing and progressing on projects, in determining career paths after the PhD or looking at the future of publishing models, and finally, in how we conference and collaborate with others in our academic circles.
As you examine your writing projects this week, ask yourself why they’re important to you. The answer is what will drive them forward to completion. Happy writing!
