As said last week, I did not plan to write a new blog before next Friday. However, tonight, I came across three awesome contributions to naturejobs.com that I wanted to share with you without delay. There's nothing wrong with exceptions to the rule, I think.
All three articles were originally published in the journal Nature.
The first one addresses mentoring and professional development. It's underlying principle is that "principal investigators can show their postdocs how to make the most of their job search." (Nature 474, 667–669 (2011)).
Because last year's budget clarified the rules for tax credits, removing the 'student' loophole that gave some postdocs tax-free salaries no longer applies in Canada, the perception arose that the status of postdocs in Canada is generally 'undefined'. As the author of Oh, Canada... (Nature 474, 533 (2011)) says "Oh, Canada! Country of maple syrup, lumberjacks and mounties! You could have got it so right. But you didn't. ... Taxes are fine if they mean you get certain benefits ... . Unfortunately, Canadian postdocs now find themselves paying full staff taxes, but still ineligible for these benefits." Here, I just want to note that postdocs at Dalhousie University are now eligible for benefits, thanks to the efforts of our postdoctoral society, FGS and especially, to name just a few, Adrian West and Mike Lee.
The third article (Nature 475, 257 (2011)) argues that "a heavy administrative burden keeps top academic scientists from doing science." As a consequence, the author (a PhD candidate in synthetic chemistry at the University of Tasmania in Hobart, Australia) fears that he "will become an administrator of scientific tasks rather than an investigator of scientific truths." In my opinion, this assessment is dead on. That said, the job of administrator of new tasks will require a completely new skill set, which closes the loop to one of the top FGS priorities, professional development.
Lots of food for thought. On all three issues, we're at Dal are underway, but not quite there yet. There's still a tremendous amount of work that needs to be done.
Dieter