A new world of work for scientists

Last week, I went to visit two companies where the concept of "a new world of work" (het nieuwe werken in Dutch) has been implemented. Although I am always eager to try out new ways of working and new productivity tools, and even though the whole process is probably supervised by experts on organization psychology and management, I did have a few ideas on the side.

1. Going paperless requires another way of teaching 

Going paperless would be a nightmare for me. Just like that. All my research starts with a pencil and a piece of paper. I sketch general ideas, and draw little diagrams with forces on it. Lots of arrows, and some abstract symbols.
I cannot imagine doing this on a computer, for the simple reason that my mind would end up being preoccupied with how to use the computer program as opposed to the creative process itself.

In fact, I clearly remember one of my professors in Brussels stating that the goal of our studies was to have the right understanding of structures, such that we would be able to design a bridge in the jungle by sketching it on paper and calculating by hand.
This explains how I as an engineer have been raised, and how I develop my ideas. I didn't grow up sketching force flows on a computer. If we want researchers and engineers to go paperless, we probably will have to teach them during their studies how to work out their ideas on a computer, instead of with pencil and paper.

2. Seriously, cubicles?

From sticking around the blogosphere and the marvelous newsworld of Twitter, I thought it was a common truth that cubicles aren't the way to go. Here's a quote that I wanted to dig up again for this quote from Brain Rules:

"What do these studies show, viewed as a whole? Mostly this:

If you wanted to create an education environment that was directly opposed to what the brain was good at doing, you probably would design something like a classroom. If you wanted to create a business environment that was directly opposed to what the brain was good at doing, you probably would design something like a cubicle. And if you wanted to change things, you might have to tear down both and start over."

However, I've seen cubicles in one of these ultramodern new work spaces and I was more than surprised, and I would love to hear what might be the reason for that.

3. Rules

I thought working in new ways would mean more freedom, but it seems in a way also to mean more rules. Apparently, more law and order is necessary to make sure data remain structured and the open offices remain nice and shining. Just like in secondary school, eating behind your desk is not allowed anymore. With my ideal work/study place looking like the picture below, I feel rather uncomfortable in a sterile white environment without books and plants.

courtesy of thefabweb.com

4. How do researchers work?

Just a random last question to end with: don't we need to understand how researchers work first before we determine which environment is better for them? I'm sure, again, that there must be experts out there who can pinpoint out all the typical behavior of a researcher, but I just didn't hear yet how to precisely implement that into a new office concept.
My five cents on this:
- The office should be suitable for irregular work hours: you don't want to start feeling uncomfortable in a giant office when you're the last one left who is working late at night.
- Having a microwave is a life- and research-saver, and equally important as free coffee.
- 15% to 20% of all people are highly sensitive - and we too would like to feel comfortable in our work space (otherwise I think I'd just stay working from home to avoid the fuss).
- Tools are key: for example, having enough strong computers to run simulations is totally necessary.

 Overall, I'm still very curious to see how this will be implemented, and I think trying to change the way we work will actually make us think more about how we work, and what we can optimize along the way. And even though the changes are planned for 2014 (when I'm supposed to have graduated already), I'm trying to do my part by reading, thinking and taking in information.

Doing a PhD: is it work or school?

I'm often confronted with the question what a PhD actually is: is it going to school or is it having a research job? Explaining people that it is somewhere in between both seems to be a rather unsatisfying answer, while that is my best and most honest answer to it.
While this topic has been covered previously in "10 easy ways to fail a PhD" and "Is the 9-5 PhD a myth?". From the first, especially this passage makes me both smile and want to pull out my hair at the same time:

"Ph.D. school is a monastic experience. And, a jealous hobby.
Solving problems and writing up papers well enough to pass peer review demands contemplative labor on days, nights and weekends.
Reading through all of the related work takes biblical levels of devotion.
Ph.D. school even comes with built-in vows of poverty and obedience.
The end brings an ecclesiastical robe and a clerical hood."

Here's my take on this:

Reasons why it is work 

- It requires continuous effort, you can't pull an all-nighter before your thesis defense like you can do for an exam and call it a day.
- You receive a salary (or: something that keeps you alive), and if you're lucky like PhD students in the Netherlands, these years count as professional years towards your retirement and money is saved somewhere for when you retire.
- Depending on where you do your PhD, you also pay taxes, like any other person with a job.
- Your university considers you as a temporary employee.
- Teaching duties are work, and should be taken seriously and dealt with professionally.
- You're not somewhere alone in the universe, but you'll have to defend your decisions in front of your funding body.
- You have deadlines from your funding body which are similar to deadlines in any regular job.

Reasons why it is not work 

- No one checks how you spend your day and how many hours you work. There might be something like a timesheet, but typically you'll just book 40 hours a week on your project, regardless of what you actually do.
- Even though supervisors have a certain level of authority over you, you still are fully in charge of your PhD.
- I think working 9 to 5 is a myth when you do a PhD. I typically am in my office from 8 to 6, and then I do additional work from home in the evening after dinner and during the weekend (on Sunday, I like to keep my Saturday for myself).
- You are still working towards a degree, and a PhD is the third cycle of higher education.

Reasons why it is school

- You are still working towards a degree, and a PhD is the third cycle of higher education.
- You are taking courses and studying topics which you do not fully master yet.
- You are physically in a school.
- You can go and ask questions to professors from other research groups and they'll be glad to help you like they would help a student and they won't charge you their expert fare as they would charge a professional in industry.
- You have a student card, and get a reduced fare at museums and the movies.

Reasons why it is not school

- Doing research is not like doing homework. There are a lot of differences between studying and researching.
- You need much larger levels of independence and determine your own course of studies.
- While it only takes a semester to finish a course, or a year (at least) to get a Master's degree, it will take at least four years to get a doctoral degree.

Inserting the chapter title to the header in Word 2010

For the report which holds all my experimental data, I've started to add the chapter title (that is, the specimen name in my case) to the header.
If you use header 1, 2,... for your titles, there is a quick and easy way to automatically add the chapter title to the header.
Here's a long and very clear description of how to do it.
To sum it up: all you need to do is go to "Quick Parts", select "Field", and then place the category to "Links and References" and select "Styleref". From there you can select what you need, for example "Heading 1".

Explaining your work to friends and family

Has it happened to you that at a large family gathering, your relatives ask what you are actually working on, and you end up mumbling some code language? Or that you tried to explain a friend what your research is about, and why it matters, but that you don't really know how to find the right words for it?

Here's a few little ways to make it easier:

1. Avoid jargon

Starting to mumble code language will make the attention of your friends and family vanish. They'll just nod at you and think you're doing something pretty complicated, which is for sure worth a PhD and which a normal soul can never understand. However, if you understand your topic very well, you should be able to explain it without the big words as well. Using simpler words doesn't mean the concept you are explaining becomes simpler. In fact, it challenges you to break out of the paper-language you normally use, and learn to really talk about your work.


2. Compare it to something from every day life

The National Geographic Channel typically compares sizes of building and spaces with Olympic swimming pools and soccer fields. When I showed the parents of students our experimental setup in the lab, I compared the forces in there to a number of heavy trucks concentrated on one wheel. To give them a general idea of the amount of experiments we did, I pointed out how many tons of concrete and steel had been going into the specimens already.

3. Point out the broader goals

Also related to the "So what" question. How will your research influence the world? Will it completely change the way we think about the world (rather unlikely) or will it be implemented in the machines of the future? Why should you really solve your research question? Will it have practical consequences? Don't start pulling out fancy mathematical formulas, but focus on the broader reasons for studying the problem and the possible implications of the results of your research.

4. Practice makes perfect

Practice it; doing so will make you look at your research from another perspective. Regularly talking to non-experts about my topic makes me realize time and time again what is the broader perspective of my work as well. It helps me to oversee original reasons why my research was initiated and the consequences it can have on society.

Tools for planning towards the defense

Previously, I've described which system I use to keep track of what needs to be done per week and per month.
Up to now, I haven't gone into detail of how I try to keep the ultimate goal (The Defense) in mind. In fact, only when I was 2 years into my PhD, I realized I should start planning towards the deadline for my manuscript, and ultimately the defense itself. In fact, I had to count back from when I would like to defend, to have an idea by when I should finish my manuscript. Then, I started counting back to see which chapter when should be written.

For planning over several months, making lists in Word or any other text document doesn't really work in my opinion.

Therefore, I looked for another tool.

One possibility is Klaar in Vier Jaar, which is tailored especially for PhD students. It's related to a book, which I must admit, I haven't read nor even ever looked at. What I like about this tool, is that it uses nice visuals.

However, I decided I needed another tool. I made a Google Calendar for myself which I titled "Roadmap to the PhD thesis defense". What I precisely like about this tool, is that it is integrated with all the other Google services that I use, and I can share it with people close to me, like my fiance and my mommy. I've used different color codes to plan for writing the chapters, holidays, conferences and slots of time for research. I didn't schedule in there the papers I still need to write; I hope I can squeeze that into my already busy daily schedule somewhere somehow.

Do you use a special tool to plan towards finishing up your thesis?

Another presentation style

Last Wednesday, I gave a presentation about my research. Usually, I follow the same consecutive steps in my presentation (overview - background/ literature review - experiments - results  - conclusions), just as I would build up a paper.
This time, however, I opted for a different style, and I think it also worked towards bringing a coherent story. I tried to follow the logic of a mathematical proof (theorem - proof - consequences) this time. Here's a brief overview of how I structured my talk:

1. Overview
I still start my presentations with an overview slide - maybe one day I'll also drop that and find a more natural way to start. I'd love to hear suggestions for that.


2. Recommendations
After the introduction, I immediately summed up the recommendations we've developed based on my research; and I treated this as the theorem to be proven.



3. Tools we used
As a background, I briefly introduced the experimental setup and the database from the literature I've compiled. These are the key elements to my proof, and in all further slides I heavily leaned on proof and data pulled from the experimental results and the database.


4. Proof for the recommendations
 This part was the largest chunk of the presentation. I took the audience by the hand (or at least, tried to do so) and walked them through the evidence for my recommendations.


5. Consequences
In one of the final stages, I showed the implications of the recommendations; and the results for 8 cases of solid slab bridges.

6. Outlook
Which questions are still open? What are we working on now? In a final slide, I pointed towards the future.