00:10
Do you find being a postdoc very different from being a grad student?
I mean, I know it's only been a month or so, but like do you find it?
It's completely different, I feel like.
So do I, but I want to hear some specific examples from you.
Exactly, like what sort of mindset changes or just like the way you conduct your day-to-day life,
maybe that's different from grad school?
I think the big difference, maybe it might be particularly to my lab because my lab
is not a little bit more biotech oriented, but like leading a team is like, yeah, my team is like
consists of like experts in the field, like 20, 30 years of experience.
And then at least 10, like, yeah, those a lot of people are there.
I'm the one that like, yeah, I'm the youngest, but I'm supposed to lead,
form a team and lead a project. Yeah, that's a different and I need, yeah, I would need to kind
of ask them, okay, can you do this for me? That's completely different from being a grad student.
Yeah, you're usually the bottom of the food chain in grad school, you're being asked to do
things for somebody, but now you're asking other people to do something for you.
Yeah.
Oh, wow. That's big.
Yeah, that's completely different.
What's the size of the team you have to manage?
Right now, I'm still debating, like, I mean, the process, but I start with, I'll start with five.
But I hope, yeah.
That's still a lot. That's the size of my old PhD lab.
Not really.
Yeah, so, yeah, that I want to have, yeah, there's like a one area that I'm working on more like
nanomedicine, okay, actually more chemistry type, but chemistry type, I want to have
another member. So probably for that, and I need to talk with my PI if I want to write a grant and
hire people for that. So that's a, yeah, but that would be a different process than, you know,
yeah, being a grad student.
I mean, I feel like that's something. Yeah,
yeah, I feel like your postdoc is different from regular academic postdoc as well, I don't think.
Yeah.
Normal university postdoc have that much autonomy in managing other people, you know,
03:05
you might mentor a grad student or two, but that's different from,
like, leading a team of scientists to do research. You're basically a mini PI.
Yeah, that's different. So I'll see how it goes. Like,
I just started. So yeah, I'm going to have a meeting next week and then see how it goes.
But I have a, what is it like, mentor, like senior manager. So yeah, so that's also really good
support system.
Yeah. And I think it's great that you get an experience of managing people, managing scientists,
at a relatively early stage of your researcher life, because I feel like that's not something,
if you are going to traditional academic track, it's not something you get trained on explicitly.
And like one day you become a PI and then you're like, oh shit, now I need to
hire people and manage people. And like, you know, by then you're probably like,
you know, mid thirties or something like early thirties, mid thirties, and you like,
never had to hire people. So like, you know, how do you hire people? Right. I don't know.
Yeah, we'll see. We'll see how it goes. So yeah, it's just a part of training.
Although, I mean, like, I don't have immediate plans to like, you know,
become the head of the scientific team or anything right now. I mean, I'm,
um, I still feel like, you know, being a postdoc.
But it's been interesting to observe the difference in leadership style, I think.
Like my old lab, I loved being there and it worked really well for my personality.
Um, and I would say my boss is like a tough love type person. He, he has very high expectations
for you. Uh, and sometimes that's really good. You know, sometimes like that makes you work hard,
but also sometimes like that makes you work too hard and you don't realize that,
especially when you're starting out, you don't realize what a difficult task he's been asking
you to do. And you get disappointed when you cannot do it immediately. And you feel like
you're worthless. You feel stupid. You feel incompetent, even though it's not because
you're incompetent. It just is that the thing you've been asked to do is hard as fuck. And
06:02
it took me, it took me like a year or two to realize that when he says, quote unquote,
quick check, quick test, it means like a three month project for me. You know, it's not, it's
not, it's not like, Oh, let me go quickly pop into my lab and check this thing. Like, no,
it's going to be a full on investigation. And like, maybe it's a quick check for him, but for me,
it took me, you know, multiple weeks. And, and that's what I like had to realize that,
okay, like, it's not because I don't know it. It's, it's because this is my first time doing it.
And, you know, he has 25 years of experience doing this. So, but like, he wouldn't say that
he wouldn't say that these things are hard, right? Only like, he would just mention it casually.
And only when I go back to him after like, exhausting all of my options of troubleshooting.
And then I go back to him. He's like, I tried this, this and that. It didn't work. I still
don't know. I still have the same question I had two weeks ago. And he'd be like, I know,
it's hard. And I'm like, what? I know this wasn't an easy thing that I asked. I'm like,
why? Why didn't you tell me that first? Like, you know, I lost so many nights of sleep,
like wondering if I am cut for a PhD. If had you had he told me from the beginning that,
hey, this is gonna take you some time. And it's gonna be not easy, non trivial, but like,
I'm gonna let you try, right? So these are things that he just did. He just,
you know, had high expectations. And just wanted to see how you go about doing it.
Thankfully, that worked with my personality. It didn't work for everybody. And so it was that kind
of environment. And then like, my current boss is he's American. So my former boss is German,
right? And my current boss is American. And not to generalize or stereotype cultures at all.
But I'm just throwing that information out there. Yeah. He's American. And he is so encouraging.
He is verbally affirming. Every meeting I come up from him. I mean, he has lots of questions. He
asks our question. He is just as he expects just as high of a thing and items of things
he wants me to do. But he is very, yeah, like, he's very verbally encouraging. He says things
like, Asami, I think that's a fabulous idea. Like every third sentence. Like, you know,
09:03
he would be like, Oh, I think that's a terrific idea. Or I'm really impressed of what you've done.
Like, you know, even if it's just like the tiniest task that I've done. He is super like he I think
he just likes to like that's his style. He thinks that encouraging people with words is like what
motivates people. And I'm just having like a bit of an adjustment period where I'm like,
I think it was fabulous, but thanks. And sometimes like, you know, my, my skeptic science brain just
has to like, filter that level of compliments and just like tone it down a little bit and be like,
okay, I still do need to work on this other problems. So like, you know, I shouldn't just
like be happy of what I like what little things I've done is like, it's it's a opposite correction
I need to do like before I needed to correct for, like, no, this is difficult. And of course,
it's going to be difficult. But now I need to correct for Okay, you've done something that's
good. But like, let's now focus on this other thing. It's like a different vector of correction.
Interesting. Interesting. Yeah. But like, do you do you feel like you've like seen enough
different types of leaderships in grad school? Or now? Like, is it different? Is your boss very
different? Character wise? Yeah, they're different. It's it's similar to your case. Yeah, in a way.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. So yeah, I'm same. Like, I'm, I'm adjusting myself. And then they get when I talk
with my old landmate, who also like going through the same type, same type of adjustment. And she's
yeah, she's like, you scared? Am I doing okay? I'm like, yeah, I feel the same way.
I feel like I don't know if it's real or not.
It's just become like, wait a minute.
I mean, where do you think you sit as a leading figure? Like, like, where do you like on a
spectrum of super encouraging, like affirming boss to super stern boss? Where do you think you
sit? Oh, me? I'm a former. I'm a former. You're the super encouraging guy. I cannot picture you
12:02
as like a stern, like, you're not enough guy. That is so not for you. That's, that's interesting.
Yeah. So what about you? Why do you want to which type do you want to become one?
I think, I think naturally, for me, I try, I think I, I think I will try to adjust it
according to the person. I'll try. I'll try and judge. That's fair. I'll try and judge
if the person needs more encouragement, you know, more carrots or more whipping.
But I highly, I hope I don't need to be the whipping type of PI. Like, I hope whoever I need to
lead the team of people, I hope I only have to encourage them. But I think
naturally for my character, I'll probably sit on a more realistic side.
I would just be like, okay, so that was good. But there's a whole other thing you need to
worry about now. And like, let's get to that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But I also do think it's really
important to adjust it based on people too. Yeah. You cannot, you cannot do everything.
You cannot match exactly to the person to every single person you need to manage,
especially you have to manage a lot of people. You can't do that. But I think it's true. Like,
I see so many, especially in America, I don't know if you felt this, but
I felt like people who are a little bit shy or a little bit more reserved
had disproportionate amount of opportunities given to them. And that's not because they were
incompetent. They were just like a little bit more reserved. And I always kind of felt that
was unfair to them that just because they were not the loudest voice in a room.
Some PIs didn't recognize that there are people who are doing just as good of a work, but they are not
explicitly showy about it. Whereas some people just are good at showing, you know,
making themselves look good. And so like, I want to be sensitive to that. Like, I want to be,
like, if I were to lead, I want to be able to encourage, like, have an environment where
15:04
shyer people feel safe to talk and share their accomplishments, as opposed to only the loudest
people gets heard kind of environment. Yeah, yeah, that makes sense.
Yeah. It's funny, though, because now that I work in Asia, like my boss at like the big
department meeting and stuff, he needs to like constantly ask for feedback. Like everything
he proposes, he's like, does anyone have anything to say? Does anyone have any comments or thoughts?
Like he needs to constantly ask because otherwise, most people don't say anything about it,
like unless they feel really strongly about something, which some of them do, especially
when it comes to artworks. Conservators and scientists have very different approach to artworks.
So like some people do feel strongly about one way or the other. But just because we're
predominantly Asian, like our entire department, of course, because, you know, we're based in Hong
Kong. And he's American. I think what he wants is a very lively discussion. And that's not always
the case, depending on a topic. So yeah, it's really funny, because I feel like in my old lab,
it's like people don't shut up type people. So yeah, that's also a change, huh?
Yeah, that is also a change. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But it's interesting to see
sort of different subsets, different types of people who are involved in research and whatnot.
It's kind of interesting. Yeah. So makes me wonder. Yeah.
That's it for the show today. Thanks for listening. And find us at Eigo de Science
on Twitter. That is E-I-G-O-D-E, S-C-I-E-N-C-E. See you next time.
