Today Morgan discusses really really boring scientific talk titles. Giving a great science talk begins with having a great title, that captivates the audience and motivates them to come to your talk. Don’t be afraid of giving your talk an interesting title! You will stand out, because everyone else will continue to use boring dry talk titles. Standing out is good. It gets you noticed. Morgan shares her favorite title for a talk, “Modeling biology with equations is like strapping a …. ” (you’ll have to watch the video to find out).

In today’s episode Morgan Giddings discusses the Oscars, pop culture, and a new idea for a science gameshow.  Science is fun, so why isn’t it ever portrayed that way on TV?  A science gameshow would help cure the boring science blues.

Over at Bio Careers there’s a rather long winded article titled “Do we need more scientists?”

Since it is late and it has been a long day, I must admit that I only skimmed it.

But it seems to make the argument that a bunch of chicken littles have been crying about the sky falling, because we’re going to have a shortage of scientists and engineers.

It says that these people have been up to this for many years… and that they are statistically wrong.

Ok, well, yeah.  In some sense we have no shortage – if viewed statistically.

On the surface, viewed by the broad brush of statistics, all is well in science-ville.  We have loads of happy graduate students and post docs just clamoring to get in.  Right?!?

Right-o.  However, statistics can never get you down to the underlying mechanisms of things.  It doesn’t matter whether those things are human behaviors – or molecular behaviors.

And here’s a behavior I’ve observed: I have encountered an ever-increasing array of scientists who have thrown or want to throw in the towel (i.e. quit science).

Maybe they don’t have any other job options.  Maybe they are just temporarily frustrated, and will soon get over it like a kid with a skinned knee.  Maybe, like me, they’ve found a great alternative career path such as  opening a bike shop.

Regardless of who, what, or how, there’s a why: science is increasingly hard to do for increasingly scarce rewards (unless you’re one of the elite “in crowd” – I suppose I should count myself amongst those with ~$1M of various funding to my lab this year – but I’ve never counted myself as being in the “in crowd”).

In the US, science does have a real problem.  It is not a problem of “how many,” but of “who”.

There are still plenty of eager foreign folks willing to come here to do science.  For many of those folks, it is the opportunity of a lifetime to get science training and do science in the US.

The problem is not that these folks (many of whom I count as good friends) come here.  I welcome them. The problem is that the dwindling interest of native-born US Citizens  in science is covered up in the broad-brush-stroke of statistics.  The foreign folks fill in the “numbers gap” – making the arguments on the aforementioned page sound sound. So, yeah – we have too many scientists. On paper.

But what happens if (or when) a place like China gets to the point that their science infrastructure rivals ours – and they are recruiting heavily for scientists?  I’m willing to wager that a lot of the foreign born folks who came here can be readily lured away.

Where will that leave the US?

Ask any Russian about the “brain drain” that occurred in multiple stages due first to the pressure of Stalinistic authoritarianism, and then later due to economic crunches.  Many of the best and brightest ended up here.

However, if things continue not-going-so-well for science here in the US (paylines on grant proposals of 10-12% at the NIH indicate not-going-so-well), that brain drain could readily reverse.

Statistics tell us nothing about that.  They tell us nothing about the underlying reasons for why there appear to be plenty of scientists still in the US – and if/when/why that may change.

Hence,  I cringe when people try to use statistics like that article does to make some kind of point about whether there is a shortage or not.  I’ll take my (wo)man-in-the-street anecdotal evidence any-day over those statistics to figure out where things are headed.  And the anecdotal evidence indicates there is a deep and festering problem.

The economic woes have just added salt to that wound.

At least the writer and I agree on one thing (agreement in bold):

Instead of raising the false flag of shortages, those concerned about the future of science and engineering in the United States should encourage objective appraisals of current career paths, as well as innovations in higher and continuing education designed for more agile adjustments to inevitable changes in these dynamic fields. The overarching goal should be to find ways to make these careers attractive relative to the alternatives, for this is the only sustainable way to ensure a supply commensurate with the United States’ science and engineering needs.

Yes, we need to encourage scientists and engineers – by helping them all along the career path!

Numbers be damned.  It is the people that count.

The other day, after reading a book on copyrighting by Joe Sugarman, I decided to use one technique that he suggests for coming up with a title for an upcoming talk.

The technique is simple: brainstorm. Don’t just write one title. Write 25 or more. Then pick the best one.

So I started brainstorming. I wrote some titles. I wrote some more. I started feeling silly, but I forced myself to write some more.

Towards the end, I got a little loopy. You can see the whole list below.

I then went back and rated them all, 1 (best), 2 (ok) or 3 (bad). I sorted them all in a spreadsheet, and removed the 2’s and 3’s.

I had about 5 left.

One kept beckoning to me. I just could not bring myself to delete it, or pick one of the others above it.

Guess which one?

“Modeling biology with equations is like strapping a V8-engine to a horse drawn buggy”

If I had written this title in my standard way, the most likely outcome would have been:
“Multi scale systems biology modeling with computer agents”

Which one sounds more interesting? I find the former far more compelling, due to the strong visual.

And, it conveys an important subtext that the second, more “safe” title doesn’t – that our tools aren’t necessarily right for the job.

Who knows how the folks at the receiving institution will like it, but it gave people around here a good laugh. They liked the title. I wrote the abstract in a more serious tone – but it did address the point made by the title.

This is an example of “Marketing Your Science” in action. A boring title is less likely to catch someone’s attention. If it doesn’t catch their attention, then they’re unlikely to come to the talk. If they don’t come to the talk, then what is the point of giving it?

Here is the list of possibilities I brainstormed (I’d like to see your vote in the comments for which one you prefer):

Agents are everything

Agents and fractals

Agents and fractals: modeling self similar protein behavior

Modeling self similar protein behavior

Multi scale systems biology modeling with computer agents

Protein behavior as a fractal mirror to nature

How complexity arises from simplicity in biology

Cells are simple, but our models that are complex

Proteins are simple, but our models are complex

Of birds and proteins: how modeling reveals fractal self-similarity

Birds are made of proteins and birds are like proteins

The Birds, the bees, and the proteins: how nature mirrors itself at multiple scales

Taking cues from the birds and the bees to construct realistic cellular models

Can cancer be solved by specialists? Or does it require a generalist.

It’s not the size of your CPU, it’s how you use it

It’s not the size of your equation, it’s how you use it

From equations to agents – boiling the complex down to the simple

Models as tools – it’s all how you use them

Modeling biology with equations is like strapping a V8-engine to a horse drawn buggy
“You have lots of power but won’t get very far”.

Representations of proteins: equations or agents?

From the simple arises the complex: can we mirror this in a computer?

Biological complexity arises from simplicity – can we model it the other way around?

Modeling how biological complexity arises from simple rules

The complexity we see in biology derives from many simple interactions

Forward modeling or reverse modeling: from the top down or from the bottom up?

On the top or on the bottom? Modeling approaches reveal how you like it.

ps – should science really be so boring all the time?  Most talk titles I see convey that sense.  But given that we need to get more people interested in science, not less, how about we make it a little bit interesting from time to time?

pss – I invited well known antibiotic resistance researcher Bruce Levin (from Emory) to give an upcoming seminar in my department.  He obviously “gets” this concept.  His talk title?

“Sex and drugs: the population and evolutionary dynamics of recombination and antibiotic treatment in bacteria”

The global warming debate stirs up passions from both supporters and deniers.

One thing that is clearly lost in most of the “popular” debate is the underlying science.

There was an article that studied this: “Balance as bias: global warming and the US Presige Press“.

They make an interesting case about why the popular press coverage of the issue, under the guise of “balanced reporting,” actually skews away from the science.

Here’s a simple thought experiment to illustrate how “balanced” reporting is biased

Say we have the “Purples” and the “Yellows” – two groups of people who have a strongly held belief in their favorite color.

There are 95 Purples and 5 Yellows.

We also have two other groups:  ”Reporters” and “Undecideds”.

Undecideds listen to Reporters.  Reporters have the job of “balanced” reporting of the Purple vs Yellow debate.

So, every time the debate crops up, they report “Purple said XXX” and then balance it with “Yellow responds YYYY.”

Let’s do the math, and compare that to what “Undecideds” will end up reading.

They will read 50% of the reporting on Purple’s side, and 50% on Yellow’s side (if it is truly “balanced”).

So, if there are 100 news reports, there will be a total of 200 statements.

100 for Purple, and 100 for Yellow.

Already it sounds to Neutrals like Yellow is “just as valid” as purple, because we’ve got “fair and balanced” reporting (despite that Purples are actually in the vast majority).

But it gets worse. Because the Yellow population is so small, the press ends up asking the same people over and over again (resampling from a limited pool).  Those five Yellow folks get a lot of practice, and refine their message over time.  Plus, they have extra incentive to promote Yellow, because they get $$$ from donors for it.  So they get really, really good at promoting Yellowness.

However, the Purple folks only get asked once in a while for quotes.  They don’t get much practice. And they don’t get any $$$ for being purple, so they have no real need to refine their message.  Plus they’re the kind of folk who don’t really like “marketing” themselves anyway.  They think “marketing” is a strategy only for, well, marketers.

So, then, you have the “balanced” reporting that gives the undecideds the impression of a 50/50 split, on top of a more refined message from the yellows.

Who’s going to win that debate?

I don’t care what topic you pick (global warming or colors of the rainbow), the minority group with the refined message wins the round.

That’s why Science Marketing is so absolutely vital!

A while ago I wrote about one of my own major “science marketing blunders” (and I have more stories to come).

But this global warming thing is a similar blunder writ large.

On that point, I just saw a tweet from Michael O’Loughlin that is relevant: “So tired of science not being vetted through academia, rather it is being spun by media all the time.”

There are two fallacies in this thinking:

1. That academia is particularly good at “vetting” (I say this having just received yet another crackpot paper review last night from a reviewer who must have been asleep – they missed the point by a mile – while the other reviewer clearly “got it”)

2. That this is the fault of “the media”.

NO.

It is our own fault as scientists, because we, collectively, are horrible at marketing our work to the general public.

I’m not trying to start a war here about whether global warming is real or not – or whether we should do something about it or not.

I’m simply saying that, if the majority of the scientific evidence on the topic says one thing, yet the majority of the populace believes the opposite thing, then we, as scientists, have done a horrible job of getting our message out.  We have failed at marketing.

Why do we do such a horrible job at getting the message out?

There are multiple reasons:

• Because we’re boring. Seriously boring.  I see talk and paper titles all the time that are fluffed up with haughty buzzwords.  It may make the speaker/author look smart, but what it doesn’t do is get a broad audience interested.
• And since we’re boring, our message gets drowned out by the sea of noise out there in the world – Pop stars, Olympics, Car Ads, Beer Ads, Internet Marketers, iPods, iPads, American Idol, Lost… you name it.  It all competes for attention, every day and all the time.  Boring is going to loose that competition, every time.
• Worse still, scientists haven’t caught up with modern internet communications.  Visit a typical scientist’s lab website.  My own is a case in point. (I’ll refer to my own site so as not to offend anyone else.  I’m sure this only applies to my site, and that yours is exciting and interesting).  It is full of tedious facts going on and on about how great we are.  It doesn’t get updated often.  It is not particularly interactive.  We don’t promote ourselves on Twitter or Facebook.  The list goes on. I might want to change it, excepting the following point:
• There is no direct “reward” for marketing or promoting our science to the outside world. This is a humdinger. As a practicing scientist, the best way I can be rewarded (if I care about that kind of thing) is to keep my head down, work hard, publish papers, and apply for grants (then apply for more grants).  Maybe I should mentor a few students and teach a few classes here and there.  That’s it.  If I decide to take it upon myself to do something outside of that – this blog for instance – there is no reward, and quite often, a negative reward.  It takes time away from the grant writing I should be doing.
• We don’t understand that different media require different messages.  Scientific papers may require more rigorous terminology – but communication with the general public requires inspiring, interesting, and exciting words.  They are two different beasts, and almost no scientists I know are trained in the art of communicating with the public (though some figure it out).
• How many times have I heard some scientist on NPR saying “the evidence is inconclusive” or somesuch.  Well, I’ve got news: the evidence for everything, always, is inconclusive! But ordinary people who aren’t scientists don’t understand that kind of waffling.  They get up, go to work, and get a paycheck.  If they don’t go to work, they get fired, and there’s no paycheck.  None of that stuff is “waffling” – it is reality.  There’s no “63.2%” probability there.  So it is hard for someone living in that kind of reality to understand people who sit there and waffle about “we don’t really know how much the temperature will rise”.  Come on, folks!  Some of you are pretending as if human belief has nothing to do with it, and that science is all just about “facts.”  By pretending this, you damage your scientific cause – whatever that may be.

Science is not just about “facts”.  If it were, then explain this phenomenon to me: science goes in fads and fashions.  Once it was a “fact” that stomach acid caused ulcers – until a new “fact” came along that H. pylori causes ulcers.  Those two “facts” contradict one another.

That’s because they are not facts, they are beliefs, supported by some body of evidence.  And those beliefs often change as scientific fads come and go, and as new evidence accumulates.

I’m not saying that global warming is a fad.

What I am saying is that I know many people on the “yes global warming is happening” side of the debate, who act as if the debate is about “facts”.  When you get into a debate and pretend it is about facts when it is actually about belief, you’re going to loose, every time.

That’s because you’re debating from a weak platform.  You’re not admitting to yourself that you actually believe something, and so you’re not allowing yourself to argue the point effectively.

Hence, you go up against someone who does unabashedly believe in their side of the argument, and they’re going to quite frequently come out on top – regardless of “facts”.

If scientists would learn “marketing” this wouldn’t be such a ridiculous debate

Here’s an interesting tidbit: good marketers are just as scientific as any scientist, perhaps more.

They test everything.  Every headline, every word, every ad gets tested – because it is the difference between money and no money in the pocket.

Hence, I find it rather ironic that no scientist I know of is out there testing the efficacy of their own scientific communications.  There is no “split testing” for the efficacy journal article headlines or lab websites.  Hence, most of them are not effective.

Simply put, marketing is a science: the science of swaying belief.

Hence, it is a second irony that the marketers of the anti-global-warming debate are using the science of belief so much more effectively than the scientists with the pro-global-warming point of view.

And that, dear reader, is why I need to get back to writing my book about “Marketing Your Science”. (3 chapters done, a few more partly done – it won’t be that long, if I can just find the time to work on it).

I know a lot of artists and scientists, and the story is the same for both: be “proud” or be “paid”.

This came up when I was talking to a friend who has a band that plays some music I happen to like, Graveyard Fields.

I recently ran across Mark Joyner’s “Online Music Promotion Course”, and I recommended it to my friend the musician.

Mark Joyner is an “internet mogul” who pioneered many aspects of early online marketing, and now runs a series of courses on managing time, money, and energy. I’ve gotten a lot out of Mark Joyner’s various efforts. For one, I’ve learned how to better promote my own scientific work.

I thought that my musician friend needed some marketing help, so I told him about the course.

A few days later, I asked him, “did you sign up?”

His response distilled down was “it was too much marketing for me.”

I was a bit flabbergasted – but not surprised.

I see this all the time. I used to hold this attitude. In fact, I used to resent some of the well-known scientists who are good at “marketing” themselves (almost all well known scientists are good at marketing themselves, unless they were the 1-2% that got really lucky by being “discovered”).

A month ago, I attended a book writing session at the Science Online conference near Raleigh/Durham NC. I saw the same dynamic play out.

There were three published authors running the session. Guess which one of those was the most successful (in terms of buzz, interest, interviews, and perhaps, money made)? It was the author who had been doing her own marketing for more than a year before the book was published, through Twitter, Facebook, and blogs.

After the authors spoke, questions were asked. There were questions on how to get “discovered”. It seemed clear that at least part of the audience were only interested in practicing “their art” – not in doing their own promotion.

But the odds of being “discovered” without sufficient self-promotion are about the same as the odds of winning a lottery.

Hey, I didn’t make the rules. Sometimes I am not proud to have to “market” my work. But the evidence is all around: if you don’t promote your artistic (or scientific) work, you are very unlikely to get any gravy from it.

I’m not exactly sure why the world has changed to the point where this is so necessary, but I have an idea.

I believe that it is the constant cacophany of other “marketing” messages that are out there, screaming for your attention.

I know plenty of people who hate this. I know one person who changed cell phone providers simply because of their marketing.

But recently I had an interaction that was revelatory to me.

I joined an online copywriting course, focused on marketing copy.

I sent a sample of one of my bits of work to the instructor. He sent it back completely rewritten, and I thought it sounded like a late night infomercial. When I told him that was my response, he wrote back saying: “the reason it sounds that way is because that works – those guys spend millions of dollars on those infomercials, so they tune and tweak them until they pay off”

It is so bizarre to me, sometimes, to write ad copy. But I’ve done some testing myself – and the “late night infomercial” approach is statistically superior to bland and understated in terms of response.

Science is a creative product – just like books and CDs. While one can’t go about writing “late night infomercial” style headlines for manuscripts or grant proposals (I’m sure that would backfire), it is essential to pay attention to how the work is being “marketed”. (aside: most science work is not marketed at all – that’s why most articles get buried in the trashbin of history so rapidly).

Here’s another way I can verify this. My mother was a successful watercolor artist. What do I mean by “successful?” I mean that she paid the bills by selling her art – without ever holding a “side job”.

How did she do that? A majority of her revenue came from marketing notecards and prints with her art on it. Only a fraction of the revenue came from selling the paintings themselves. She figured out early on that she had to “market” her work. She didn’t necessarily love that aspect of the work. But she did get to avoid working as a clerk at Wal Mart.

While I don’t have hard statistical evidence on this, I think the anecdotal evidence is so strong as to be almost irrefutable – if you don’t learn how to market your own creative works effectively, then getting paid reasonable money to do that work is unlikely.

The bottom line for my friend (and many others I know who hate to hear mention of “marketing”): “you can be too proud to market your work, or you can can get paid for your work – but not both”.

Speaking of that, do you want a preview of my upcoming book, code named “Marketing Your Science”? People who sign up for my newsletter list right now get a free copy of Chapter 1 – Why Marketing Your Science Is Important.

It’s that little box in the upper left hand corner that is beckoning to you.

You may be wondering – like many researchers – how in the world am I going to fit all that data into the 12 pages required by the new grant format?

One key is to tell a story.  That is more vital now than ever.  By telling a story of what you want to do, how you want to do it, and why you are the right person to do it, you don’t need a long list of facts about your work.

If you want to learn more about how to do that, sign up for a free teleseminar (telephone/web seminar) with Dr. Adrienne Cox, from the Dept. of Radiation Oncology at UNC Chapel Hill (she’s one smart lady).

Don’t wait too long … the seminar is tomorrow, Thursday Feb 25th, in the evening.

Are you struggling with formulating a great specific aims page?

The specific aims are one of your keys to success.  If a reviewer encounters your aims, and gets confused or lost, then it is likely game over for your grant.  Do not collect $200, do not pass go.

In both my advising and consulting work with my younger colleagues, I focus first and foremost on the specific aims.  I won’t look at the rest of a proposal until the aims are water tight, rock solid, and exciting as well.

It is amazing how much complexity can go into formulating just this single page.  Perhaps that’s why so many people don’t do it very well.

I often see half-cocked aims pages.  But a half-cocked aims page is the start to a half-cocked proposal.  Why bother, if you aren’t going to do it right?

Just say “no” to half cocked aims

I was recently helping a consulting client with an aims page, and there was an aim which was half-cocked.

By that I mean that it was a good thing to do, but the plan for doing it wasn’t well thought out.

I suggested to the client to either firm up the plan, or get rid of the aim.

His response was, “But then I’ll only have 3 aims”.

“So what?” I said.

In my ensuing explanation, I firmed up something that was vague before.

Your aims page is a main “public face” of your proposal.

Think about your first date with someone.  Don’t you usually make sure that you look nice, before you walk out the door?  Your aims should be that same way.  They should put your best foot forward.

Sure, you may have flaws (all of us do), like a little too much flab around the waist (or whatever), but in all likelihood, you’re going to wear clothes that minimize that flaw on the first date.

Your aims should be like the first date.

A half-cocked aim is like letting the flawed parts shine out right away, saying “look at me”.  Some reviewers might overlook that.  Others will not.  All it takes is one reviewer who doesn’t like your proposal to sink its chances.

Your goal is to show strength, confidence, and logical thinking about your research, with each aim well thought out and accomplishing a critical mission within the context of your proposal.

If you put an aim on your aims page, that says, “this is one of the central things that I will focus my time and attention on during this research.”

So, if you list something, then you proceed to have a not so great plan for how you will do that “critical thing”, reviewers will wonder – has this person really thought out this work?  You don’t want reviewers holding any doubts, whatsoever.  When paylines are 1 in 8 or 1 in 10 proposals funded – one doubt can burn your funding chances to the ground.

The bottom line is that for each aim in the proposal, have a well thought out plan.  If you are struggling with figuring that plan out, then it shouldn’t be an aim!  You may still propose to do that work as a part of another aim (within the text of the proposal) – but something that is not solidly formulated should never go on the aims page.

Free specific aims template and example

I provide a free specific aims template, and a specific aims example page to my email list subscribers.  You can subscribe using the “subscribe” box on the blog here, or going to this page.

Previously, I wrote about an upcoming meeting with the chancellor of UNC.

It was audacious of me to just call up and make an appointment with the head of a large, prestigious institution like mine.

But I like to live life on the edge.

My goal was to discuss entrepreneurialism within the university – and how the university bureaucracy squashes entrepreneurial spirt.

The layers of bureaucracy are thick here, layered like a truffle embedded inside a wedding cake….

The chancellor was surprisingly receptive to my visit.  He’s obviously a smart guy, and a scientist.  He wants to do right by the University and its faculty.

He clearly understood the problems of bureaucracy at UNC.  He said it is his number one mission to reduce it.

But every time he tamps down the bureaucracy in one division, it lasts for a little while until he turns his attention to something else.  Then it grows right back, like weeds in a place with plenty of water and sunlight.

Perhaps that is an apt analogy.  Cutting back the weeds never solves the problem.  They just grow back.

The only ways to kill weeds are to cut off their water or sunlight – or to poison them.  Since “poisoning” is not going to be an acceptable solution when it comes to bureaucracy, we have to implement one of the other solutions.

The sunlight and water of bureaucracy are money and rules.

Rules serve a purpose – at least in someone’s mind, at the time they are conceived.

Once they have served for a while, they grow stale, old, and smelly.  Bureaucracy thrives on them – while everyone else chokes.

And money helps support the beast.  One might try to choke off the money, but I guess that the people at the end of the food chain – the scientists – would starve before the bureaucracy does.

Every grant that a researcher brings in comes with “facilities and administration” (F&A) money.  That money is supposed to pay for things that support the research environment.

But it is all sucked up into the voracious beast before it gets to the place where it benefits the researcher.  Various people have pointed out to me various “worthwhile” things that it is used for.

Is 5 levels of bureaucracy to approve a hire, “worthwhile?”

It doesn’t matter whether it is “worthwhile,” even in the rare instance that it is.  It is not benefiting the research.  It is not benefiting the science that the grants are supposed to be supporting.

I work in a 30 year old building that is crawling with cockroaches.  I’m not sure who that benefits, except for the cockroaches.

The way to starve the beast is to bypass it.  The F&A money should go directly to the researcher’s most immediate unit (e.g. department).

The department then could apply it to do things like get the space that we need.

I can hear many people in humanities say, “but wait, that would starve our side of campus.”

I am very much in favor of supporting the humanities and many other non-science departments.  I have a personal fondness for philosophy.

But I am not in favor of supporting those departments with F&A money from grants that are given to me to do specific research.  That is misdirection at best.  The state and tuition should be supporting the teaching mission of the University.

—-

I was thinking about all the hiring problems we seem to have.  It can take (many) months to get a hire completed, because it has to go through so many levels.

Why is that?

My department seems to have an HR person (a “facilitator”) just to navigate the bureaucracy at higher levels of the system.

Instead, why not train her in the rules, and just let her do the work directly?  Then we wouldn’t need 5 levels above her (or however many it is).  It would be faster, cheaper, and would starve the beast.

Don’t get me wrong.  I think that many of the people that work within the beast are very well meaning and trying to do their jobs.  But when one is trying to do their job in a dysfunctional organization, the job is, unfortunately, promoting more dysfunction.

Out of date rules need to be removed.  But there would be massive resistance to that.

Money needs to flow around the bureaucracy, not into it.  There would be massive resistance to that too, but perhaps not quite as much.

Ideally, both would happen.  That would really take care of the problem, once and for all.

I hope the Chancellor is listening

——

Note: I do plan to get back to topics of science careers and grant writing in the next installment.

You can also join my newsletter list if you want to hear more about the career stuff right away.

A while ago I had a meeting with a well-known scientist visiting our campus, and after talking science, I expressed some frustration about the impediments presented by university bureaucracy to doing my science.

He responded saying that he had just had dinner the night before with our Chancellor, Holden Thorp, and that Dr. Thorp had expressed an opinion that faculty should find ways around the bureaucracy.

I let that sit for a while… and it didn’t sit well.

Often times there are no viable ways around the bureaucracy.  For example, let’s say I need to give a key person in my lab a raise, and say for example that the bureaucracy says “no raises”.  I say for example “but the person took on much more work that she wasn’t doing before, so needs a raise”.  And the bureaucracy says “budget crunch.” And I say “but I pay for the person with grant money”.  And the bureaucracy comes up with some other reason.  Round and round it goes.  There is no way to get around such a situation, except for paying the raise out of my own pocket.  (The example situation above is very close to a real situation, where it took over 14 months to get a raise for someone who was strongly deserving of it).

So I called up the Chancellor’s office to ask for an appointment.  That appointment is today.

The conclusion I’ve come to is that this university (like many) want us and tells us to be entrepreneurial, yet in terms of actually supporting us in doing so, it falls very short.  This is going to be my main point for the Chancellor.

For example – this Fall my collaborator and I received an ARRA “Grand Opportunities” award from the NIH to accelerate our work on human genome annotation.  This came directly from an extraordinary grant writing marathon that I had undertaken last May, writing 3 proposals and parts of 2 others within a 5 week span.

Now, if this were a real entrepreneurial system (i.e. a business), if I had just made such an effort, and as a result brought in over $2M in revenue, I believe that they would have found some way to make that a rewarding experience, so that I would do the same thing more times in the future.

However, I had the opposite experience.  Getting that award was one of the single most challenging happenings of my entire career, because the university bureaucracy has been in the way at every step.  There have been problems with space, hiring, administrative support, and many others.  At one point, I found myself yelling at my chairman over space issues (which really weren’t his fault).  After apologizing for that, I had to do some serious reflection about what the problem was that would lead me to such a situation.

Who else thinks that bringing in $2.1M in funding (on top of the R01 I received earlier in the year) should be a cause for celebration, rather than a cause for major career angst?

The bottom line is that there’s a strong disincentive here for me to go out and ever try to do that (getting big grants) again!  (Instead, I’ve decided to use my grant-getting skills and energy to help other faculty be more successful at it).

That kind of negative feedback loop for doing something great is strongly discouraging of entrepreneurialism.

If I were in a business, and we’d just received a big contract or grant, we’d go out and lease more space (and have a big party as well!).  Problem solved.  Here it was a somber occasion.

I think this problem is not just localized to UNC.

Many universities now expect their faculty to go out and get (lots of) grants.  Yet many of those same universities aren’t prepared to support and encourage that grant-getting work (hey, if you’ve had a positive experience, please write about it in the comments, it would be great to see some uplifting stories once in a while!).

It is very different being an entrepreneur in the business world.  If you’re successful – you get paid a lot more money, and get access to a lot more resources.

I know, I know – science isn’t about the money (or, at least in theory, it shouldn’t be).  But the fact is that most universities have monetized the scientific endeavor.  So like it or not, as faculty, we can simply come to be seen as profit centers, rather than as scientists.

I think I have an idea here for another book… something like “Science is broken…and how to fix it”.  First I have to finish the other two books on my slate.

I’ll post about how the meeting with the Chancellor goes.