I would put your final point more bluntly: this is going to hurt. You are going to get rejected, a lot. It is almost impossible for a human not to take that personally. And yet you must try not to take that personally. Sometimes you will be out-competed by people who are better than you. Often you will be out-competed by people who are not, but the dice will roll their way, sometimes with a little puff of patronage blowing them along. Ultimately, you have to just keep throwing shit at the wall until some of it sticks.
Although I do agree that it's best if the shit is not, y'know, shit
In many cases, the only way to persevere through adversity is to believe in your own work. That's one reason why I never recommend "selling out." There will come a time when you face rejection for your project (even the sellout project), and it will be horribly alienating if you *also*, deep down, reject what you're doing.
Also, the fashions change fast. I can think of a few people who got plumb positions doing the sexy thing more than a decade ago. Well, it’s not the sexy thing anymore. So nobody really cares what they’re doing….
By contrast, good work is good work, and stands the test of time accordingly.
In something like the second week of my PhD at Cambridge, my supervisor, Istvan Hont, put a poor young visiting German postdoc to the sword at the notorious Monday Seminar. Five words "okay, why should I care?"
I often tell the story to undergraduates struggling to focus their dissertations. The point being, if you can't answer the Hont Question, why should anybody be reading/listening at all? It applies all the way up the scale. I live by the requirement that I can always answer it as regards my own work. People of the job market, take note! If you can't tell others why they should care, why should they hire you?!
I wholeheartedly agree, but let me add one caveat.
Sometimes, people start their talks by explicitly asking, “Why does this matter?” That can come off as defensive. It can also take focus away from the subject matter (which may be fascinating!) and put it on the academics debating said subject matter (who may not be as interesting!).
In other words, you want to know what makes the topic interesting, but sometimes “explain why it’s interesting” isn’t the best strategy for actually sparking people’s interest. Often the best strategy is to give an example, or to create some tension within the audience’s worldview that you’re going to resolve.
Yes, exactly. The best talk ensures that people never even think to ask the question “why should I care?”, and that includes not thinking to ask it because they haven’t been told by the speaker to ask it! It’s just answered as a side-effect of a good talk
I would put your final point more bluntly: this is going to hurt. You are going to get rejected, a lot. It is almost impossible for a human not to take that personally. And yet you must try not to take that personally. Sometimes you will be out-competed by people who are better than you. Often you will be out-competed by people who are not, but the dice will roll their way, sometimes with a little puff of patronage blowing them along. Ultimately, you have to just keep throwing shit at the wall until some of it sticks.
Although I do agree that it's best if the shit is not, y'know, shit
In many cases, the only way to persevere through adversity is to believe in your own work. That's one reason why I never recommend "selling out." There will come a time when you face rejection for your project (even the sellout project), and it will be horribly alienating if you *also*, deep down, reject what you're doing.
Also, the fashions change fast. I can think of a few people who got plumb positions doing the sexy thing more than a decade ago. Well, it’s not the sexy thing anymore. So nobody really cares what they’re doing….
By contrast, good work is good work, and stands the test of time accordingly.
In something like the second week of my PhD at Cambridge, my supervisor, Istvan Hont, put a poor young visiting German postdoc to the sword at the notorious Monday Seminar. Five words "okay, why should I care?"
I often tell the story to undergraduates struggling to focus their dissertations. The point being, if you can't answer the Hont Question, why should anybody be reading/listening at all? It applies all the way up the scale. I live by the requirement that I can always answer it as regards my own work. People of the job market, take note! If you can't tell others why they should care, why should they hire you?!
I wholeheartedly agree, but let me add one caveat.
Sometimes, people start their talks by explicitly asking, “Why does this matter?” That can come off as defensive. It can also take focus away from the subject matter (which may be fascinating!) and put it on the academics debating said subject matter (who may not be as interesting!).
In other words, you want to know what makes the topic interesting, but sometimes “explain why it’s interesting” isn’t the best strategy for actually sparking people’s interest. Often the best strategy is to give an example, or to create some tension within the audience’s worldview that you’re going to resolve.
Yes, exactly. The best talk ensures that people never even think to ask the question “why should I care?”, and that includes not thinking to ask it because they haven’t been told by the speaker to ask it! It’s just answered as a side-effect of a good talk
Literally LOLed at subtitle.
Thank you. It only took 76 subtitles, but I finally did it!