AsianScientist (Mar. 28, 2016) – I know what you’re thinking.
You’re about to say, “But Alice! There’s no such thing as a typical day in the life of a scientist!”
I agree with this sentiment–the kind of day you have not only depends on what kind of scientist you are, but also on the stage of career. However, I also think that while there are no *typical* days for a scientist, you can expect certain things to occur at specific times of the day.
6-7 am: Wake up and go over all the tasks you need to do today. Complete your daily ablutions before taking breakfast, and your first coffee of the day before heading into work.
8-9 am: Arrive at work, grab a coffee and log into your computer. If you are a PhD student, log into your social media accounts, wish everyone happy birthday, see what weird stories happened overnight, then check your emails. If you are a postdoc, log into your emails, answer the emails from the boss, then fire some off to the PhD student to make sure that they pay attention to the appropriate ones.
If you are a boss, log into your emails and check to see that the postdoc replied. If they didn’t, fire off some more to make sure the PhD student and postdoc get the point, then head off to deliver that lecture you wrote last night.
10:30 am: Morning tea break time and everyone gets another coffee of the day and maybe a little snack. If you are a PhD student, take your break with the technicians and other students. Catch up on what weird stories happened overnight.
If you are a postdoc, you might join the students and the techs depending on whether that experiment you’ve been analyzing for the last few days makes sense or not, otherwise you’ll take it at your desk. If you are the boss, collect your coffee then keep an eye on the clock to make sure everyone makes it back to their desks and benches after an appropriate amount of time.
11 am: NOOOOOOOOOO, one of the machines has broken down! If you are the PhD student, sigh with relief that it wasn’t the machine on which you were running that overnight experiment.
If you are the boss and the postdoc, get angry that it’s the second time this month and fire off a number of angry phone calls and emails to the company demanding they send a technician as soon as possible!!!
12 pm: Oh thank god, it’s time for lunch. There’s a guest lecture that’s going to be catered–GOOD TIMES AND FREE FOOD FOR ALL!!!
1-2 pm: Oh man, it’s the second half of the day. Grab another coffee and then sit down at your desk. If you are a PhD student, start analyzing all that data you collected from the machine that didn’t break down (and breathe another sigh of relief that the machine that broke down wasn’t the one running your experiment).
If you are the postdoc, see if you can salvage any of the data from the machine (and maybe spend some time with your head in your hands).
If you are the boss, alternate between having phone conferences discussing projects with assorted collaborators and going over the lecture you’re delivering tomorrow (hmmm, maybe it can double for a lecture for that conference next month…).
3-4 pm: Whether you take an afternoon break or not will depend on how successful you were at doing whatever tasks you were doing for the previous hour. Otherwise, continue whatever you were doing … and maybe grab another coffee.
5:30 pm: *Sigh* Watch with a heavy heart as all the non-research staff leave for the day. PhDs and postdocs might spend some time having an existential crisis about graduation and/or career progression and security before returning to the task at hand.
Bosses may spend some time worrying about budgets and the necessity to secure grants to attract more students, pay the different staff members and maintain lab equipment, consumables and animal colonies.
6:30-7:30 pm: Time to take care of various personal and physical requirements. Head to the gym, spend some time with family and friends, eat a meal …
8-10 pm: Everyone has to work on whatever documents or presentations they didn’t finish during the day. Take your pick from thesis, paper, grant application, progress report.
11 pm-1 am: Keep on working on whatever it was you hadn’t completed before. Enter a state of heightened productivity fueled by the four or five coffees you had earlier in the day and the chocolate bar/bag of potato chips/jelly beans by your side.
1:30 am: Head off to sweet, sweet sleep. If you are the boss, fire off a few more emails to the PhDs and postdocs to keep them on their toes.
This article is from a monthly column called The Sometimes Serious Scientist. Click here to see the other articles in this series.
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Source: Asian Scientist Magazine; Photo: Shutterstock.
Disclaimer: This article does not necessarily reflect the views of AsianScientist or its staff.
