Running Research Projects Without the Meltdown

😩 Are you regularly stressed out, feel like you're in over your head, and wondering how you ended up working at 2 am on a Monday morning to meet a project deadline?

You're not alone: I, and much of academia and research, have regularly found ourselves in this position. It's usually not because of a lack of talent, capability or passion - but often because we don't practice good, effective and pragmatic project management.

The good news: there are lots of simple, straightforward things you can do about it (and some that take a bit more work). This is the topic of today's #HackingAcademia video:

🔥 𝐑𝐮𝐧𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐑𝐞𝐬𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐡 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐣𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐬 𝐖𝐢𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐌𝐞𝐥𝐭𝐝𝐨𝐰𝐧

I cover:

📌 Why effective project management is so critical in a career - especially when it becomes impractical (and undesirable) to just work yourself ragged to meet a deadline

🧮 How specifying sufficient resources (funding, salaries, equipment) and realistic stakeholder expectation management before the project gets going (or is even proposed) can save you so much stress later on

🗺️ That Plan Bs, Cs and Ds are important to consider - but not to excessively investigate them before you know they're even going to be in play

🎯 The "killing two birds with one stone" fallacy: don’t confound all the things you want to do and achieve with what *this specific project* requires. A constrained, stress-free project done well will help those other aims more than trying to cram everything into the project itself. 

🔧 Not realizing that the setbacks you've experienced on previous projects are NORMAL, not exceptions. Talent being leaving or becoming unavailable (for myriad reasons), equipment breaking, methods not working - this is normality, NOT the exception

🕒 Being realistic and accurate about timelines: initially you can cope by just being pessimistic - but you can't just pad everything out blindly: ultimately you want to be realistic: some things are quick, some things *always* blow out.

📈 A good project fulfills all its milestones: it does not (generally) overachieve in one area and completely fail to deliver in others

🧠 Identifying, recognizing and dealing with problems early is crucial. This is enabled by nurturing a team environment where:

🚨 potential issues are called out

🙅 no-one feels the need to get defensive

🤝 everyone moves to working together on a solution

👉 Easier said than done - but awesome when you get there.

Over 2 decades into my career, I’d say I’m reasonably competent at a number of things - but being an effective project manager is one where there is always so much to learn!

🎙 Podcast: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2191455/episodes/16998729

🖥️ YouTube: https://youtu.be/VrTPkMcJ8-M

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