Lessons learned from 365 days, 35k interactions, and 2.4 million views on LinkedIn (or perhaps we need more conversations about academic life).
About a year ago, I set out to write a twice-weekly post on academic life. At mid-career & stuck at home, it seemed like a pretty good idea. It would double as a discipline writing exercise (3000 characters is tough) & as a reflection on lessons learned.
I honestly thought twice a week would be a stretch. I also didn't think I would make it a year.
To motivate myself, I set two extra goals. First, I wanted to reach a million impressions. It seemed like a crazy number. Second, I wanted to double my followers - 5,000 seemed like a lofty goal.
Somehow, I hit all three goals and then some. I'm surprised and grateful to the many people that looked, liked, or commented on my 300 or so posts. 2.4 million impressions is crazy. 8,000 followers is amazing.
So what did I learn the past 52 weeks?
Three important lessons.
First, that people are decent. Even when people disagree, they tend to do so politely. There aren't a lot of sharp elbows on LinkedIn or offline - at least about my posts.
Second, that faculty need to do a better job sharing knowledge. Many senior faculty comment that my posts deal with obvious content. Yet, early career faculty and PhD students often comment that they wish they had known ... sooner.
Third, most faculty agree that academe is broken and needs to be fixed. We need to build a more positive, honest, upbeat culture - if we are going to leave a better academy to our children and our students.
So many thanks for the reads, the support, the follows and the lessons learned.
Have a great week!
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