In a recent conversation with my PI and our collaborator we
talked about a potentially very interesting experiment that would involve a
pretty lengthy behavioral experiment followed by slice electrophysiology. It
would mean that a certain person would have to come in every single day (so
both days on the weekend) for months. Collaborator:”Yeah that’s what it’s like
to be a post-doc”. I said that that certain person was not going to be me, and
that I wasn’t going to do those experiments unless I was promised help.
This is not the first time that I refuse to do an experiment
because it means that I will be in the lab for an endless number of days, and
the last time this happened I didn’t even have BlueEyes yet. I don’t think this
sets me back; I just only do those ridiculous experiments when I feel that it
is really worth it.
Bottom line is that we are going to put those experiments in
the grant that we’re writing, and when push comes to shove we’ll see who is
going to be running them… I just already made sure that that won’t be me entirely.
I often have to push back like this. Sometimes PIs forget that ideas are cheap, but data comes slowly and with difficulty. Without postdocs to veto the worst ideas and those with poor potential returns with respect to risk/effort, it's insane what we'd be doing here.
ReplyDeleteGood for you!
ReplyDeleteGood job setting boundaries!
ReplyDelete-katiesci
Good for you, and harder, I imagine as a postdoc or grad student, since it's such a part of the culture, right?
ReplyDeleteStand your ground!! And good luck on the grant.