It was only when I heard a senior professor talking to an early career audience that I understood the power of named, planned, and protected writing days…

It’s a little like the additional richness of life you get from a video versus a still photograph. The dimension of time tells you a lot in its own right…

Feedback can be driven more constructively by curiosity, care, and presence than it can by judgement, superiority, or derision.

There is a very important difference between plans and strategies. Gannt charts are art…but they are not the art of war.

Once you realize how your time is controlled, you can take back control of your time…

For times doing research where the creeping feeling of futility arises, where you feel like giving up, awareness of two interconnect concepts can help to no end…

It’s always worth considering where and when you can get your deepest work done.

If you have a question for Marc, you can now upload a recording on the podcast web pages. When your question is featured on a future Q&A episode, you’ll be the first to know!

As these people in your care move to new opportunities and build their own leadership skills in whatever career(s) they wish to explore, they will have this additional asset at which to direct potential employers, collaborators, partners, and cofounders…

Whatever you are creating, you have to first do it for yourself. Doing something purely for the likes is a slippery slope...

I made some progress, sure, but I was just completely preoccupied all day.

Consider those times when you need to allow yourself the time to grieve…

One of the main struggles over this time has been to not see every day as being in urgent need of massive progress. I’ve slowly realized the power in creative sprints as opposed to prescribed feats of bravado endurance that bears little fruit…

As I’ve aged, I’ve come to value the terms of talent, cleverness, and genius less so than terms like consistency, responsibility, and perseverance…

I end the evening with a single amber dram of whisky, to ‘wet the new baby’s head’, to reflect on a miraculous day, to seek comfort in making the most of the rare time at home now, to bringing the fullness of myself to my fellowship when I return to the lab. This one is for all the parents…

My specialty is being a Jack of All Trades, rather than a Master of One. It’s time to take advantage of that rather than worrying about whether or not I should be any other way to people who might be watching.

In academia, it’s easy to trap yourself in the mindset of being a selfish overachiever who puts all of their time into the pursuit of one thing, even if all of that time is not particularly well spent…

I’ve tried to remind myself that the little victories, the baby steps, and every other minuscule analogy of progress really matters. Of all the things this mindset can help with, staving of hopeless comparisons is one of them…

We are serial taskers, not multitaskers. Today, I held myself accountable to creating the best version of my focused scientific self for the fellowship that now lies ahead. More importantly, I stayed accountable to the students and staff I’ve had the joy of working with over the past several years…

It’s taken a lot of failure, rejections, and battles with self-doubt to get here. In a way, I still can’t quite believe it. It’s worlds a way from a year ago when I was wondering what I was going to do after my last fellowship ended…

Through the lens of my daily dealings leading an academic research fellowship, I’ll share with you my bite-sized thoughts on team management, motivation, public speaking, family balance, writing, mentoring, serial tasking, (not) multitasking, entrepreneurship, imposter phenomenon, and more…