Author: Helen Kara

Things Are Really Happening!

Posted by

0

juggling.pngDuring this academic year I’ve been involved in various enterprises on top of my commissioned research work, teaching, and writing commitments: solo self-publishing, collaborative self-publishing, and course development. And they’re all starting to come to fruition!

The course I’ve been involved in developing with Dr Janet Salmons is Path To Publishing, aimed at people who have a completed doctoral thesis or dissertation and want to publish from it to support their career goals, whether academic or otherwise. We opened for registration a few days ago and, even though the course doesn’t begin until October, people are already signing up! Universities are recognising that the course we are offering is excellent value for money and will benefit their early career researchers, and individuals are welcoming the opportunity to receive expert help with a complex process. The course is limited to just 20 participants, to ensure that we can give everyone good quality personalised feedback.

The collaborative self-publishing is a short e-book, co-written with Dr Nathan Ryder, called Self-Publishing For Academics. And it’s available for pre-order! The link is for Kindle books but it is also available via iBooks, Kobo and Nook, with Oyster and Scribd to come. Nathan and I have combined our experience of self-publishing various texts in a range of formats, and written the e-book we wish we’d had when we started out. The formal launch is next Wednesday 18 May, so prepare for whooping and hollering.

The solo self-publishing is my series of short e-books for doctoral students. The first, Starting Your PhD: What You Need To Know, is now permanently free to download. The fifth, Research Ethics for your PhD: An Introduction, is with my editor and should be out next month. I just have the sixth and last one to write, on Finishing Your PhD: What You Need To Know, and I’ll be done!

It’s an exciting time towards the end of a really busy year. I’m still kidding myself next year will be easier, but actually I think it’ll just be different. I’ll be working on my next full-length book, on research ethics (I’m in the middle of preparing for that right now), running Path To Publishing with Janet, and managing my commissioned research work and teaching too. It’s just as well I like my work!

 

 

Research Ethics – Can You Help?

Posted by

0

telephoneDear Internet

I wonder whether you can help me. I need people, from outside the UK, to talk to about research ethics. They can be academics or practitioners, from any discipline or field, and they need to have some interest in research ethics. If they fit that specification, and they’re based outside the UK, I’d like to talk to them.

This is for my next book which will be on research ethics. I’ve done a bunch of interviews with people from the UK, but I want to take a more global look at the topic. I’ve asked everyone in my networks but I’m getting nowhere, so I’m throwing this out to you in the hope that you may know one or more people who might be willing to talk.

Interviews are taking about an hour and can be done by phone or Skype. The interviews will be kept confidential, and I’m happy to email over my questions for someone to look at before they decide whether or not they want to take part. I won’t use anyone’s name in connection with the book. I am compiling a list of the roles and countries of origin of the people I’ve spoken to, to give my readers some idea of the breadth of contributions, with interviewees choosing their own designation e.g. ‘senior lecturer in social work, British university’ or ‘independent researcher, UK’, but if someone doesn’t even want to go that far, that’s OK with me. Some of the people I’ve spoken to have held several roles in connection with research ethics but have chosen to speak to me from just one of their roles, which is fine. Some have chosen not to answer all my questions, or to answer several in one; that’s fine too.

I would be particularly interested in talking to people doing, or who have done, research in countries with authoritarian rather than democratic governments – though I’d also love to talk to Australians, Americans, Canadians, New Zealanders and so on. In fact I’d like to talk to people from pretty much anywhere outside the UK, though I only speak English.There’s no big rush; I’m hoping to get the interviews done some time in the next 3-4 months.

Obviously I wouldn’t expect you to give me someone’s contact details, but if you know people you think might be willing and able to help, perhaps you could draw their attention to this post and then, if they want to get in touch, they could email me through the contact form.

Here’s hoping…

A New Venture: Path To Publishing

Posted by

3

pathlogo-purplegreen.jpgTaran-taran-taraaaaa! Drum roll! I have an announcement to make!

I have been plotting with my co-conspirator Dr Janet Salmons of Boulder, Colorado (who I met, like many of my collaborators, on Twitter). We have designed a new online course, Path To Publishing, for people who have been awarded their PhD or equivalent (EdD, DBA etc) and who want to publish from their thesis or dissertation. And not just publish whatever they can, but publish effectively, in a way that will support their career aspirations. (NB: edit as a result of a query from Oxford Dphile in the comments below: if you’ve completed your thesis or dissertation, but haven’t yet had it examined, that’s fine too.)

Path to Publishing will run for six weeks in the first semester of the next academic year, from October 10 to November 18. It is limited to 20 participants to ensure that we can give everyone good quality individual feedback. We are offering a discounted rate for the first course in recognition of the possibility of teething troubles (though we are working hard to try to ensure there won’t be any). The fees will be US$400/£280 payable through PayPal – after this first course, the fees will rise to approx US$500/£375 (exact amounts may change slightly due to currency fluctuations). We will be asking for detailed feedback in exchange for the discount, to help us perfect the course for future participants. Another reason we’re offering a discount to the first cohort is that, along with the course, we will be setting up an online support group for course members and alumni – but the first time around there won’t be any alumni to give advice and support to new members. Nevertheless, there is value in peer support, and we expect the online support group to be well used.

The course will include two live webinars at times as convenient as possible for the class, bearing in mind everyone’s different time zones (and these webinars will be recorded for those who, for whatever reason, can’t attend). Janet and I will provide good quality course materials, weekly lessons, and exercises in planning and writing for publication, plus individual feedback on each exercise. We plan to show you how to assess the publication potential of your thesis or dissertation in the light of your career goals. We will cover all kinds of publishing, including traditional academic publishing (journal articles, book chapters, books), self-publishing, social and mainstream media. By the end of the course, you will have a personal publication strategy for the next 1-2 years which aligns with your own career goals. All you need is a completed thesis or dissertation and a good standard of written English.

Janet and I have extensive experience of academic writing, publishing, and teaching. We have both written full-length books, book chapters, and academic journal articles, and have taught on several continents. Janet has co-edited books, and I have self-published books. Both of us are experienced users of social media and also have some experience of mainstream media. We have enjoyed the process of combining our expertise to create Path To Publishing.

We’ll be starting to publicise the course in earnest soon, but I wanted my blog readers to hear about it at an early stage. As the number of students is limited, if you are interested, put your name on the preliminary class list here for first access to registration. Janet and I are excited about this course and we very much look forward to working with our students.

When A Contract Ends

Posted by

0

finish lineI’m putting the finishing touches to the report of a research project that’s been running for the last 18 months. And then it’ll be over. Which is a bit sad, for a number of reasons.

First, the work is for a national organisation, but unusually that organisation is based close to where I live in the Midlands of England. So, unlike most, this job hasn’t involved a lot of travelling: much of the work has been done within half an hour’s drive of my office.

Second, I’ve been working with another researcher, a colleague I met for the first time on the day we went to be interviewed for this job. I liked him then and my respect and appreciation for him has grown throughout the project. He’s responsive, thoughtful, caring, creative, and generally a terrific collaborator. I will miss working with him.

Third, it’s been an interesting, complex project, evaluating a community-based advocacy service for older people with cancer. The work is multi-faceted and that makes it a real challenge to investigate it fully and come up with suitable recommendations for taking the work forward.

Fourth, it’s paid some of the bills. These kinds of longer-term contracts, that provide a basic level of income for a period of time, don’t come along so often but are invaluable for indie researchers.

Letting go of a project can be hard for anyone, but there are some specific areas of difficulty for indie researchers. Commissioners don’t think to get back in touch to tell us how our work is being used, and seem surprised if we email or phone to ask. We have very little say in how our work is disseminated, and sometimes it’s not disseminated at all, which can be really frustrating. And unlike our academic colleagues, we don’t have the requirement to publish that can keep the relationships formed during a project alive for months and years after completion.

So in many ways I’m sorry to see this contract end, but the pill is very thoroughly sugared by the new contract I landed earlier this month. Without that I think I’d be in deep mourning. But this time it really does feel as though, as one door is closing, another opens.

Back On The Indie Researcher Rollercoaster

Posted by

1

rollercoasterI’ve written before about the indie researcher rollercoaster. I’ve been riding it again recently. The last few months have been quite tough. I’ve had one contract rolling along, and some bits and bobs of teaching work. I’ve also had:

  • The promise of ten days’ sub-contracted work in the second half of 2015, which turned into two days’ work at the very end of December, for which I still haven’t been paid.
  • An associate role with a national organisation, since last summer, that seemed likely to yield a fair bit of work but hasn’t yielded any yet (though I do have one whole day booked in for them in May).
  • The promise of almost full-time contract work from January to March of this year, which didn’t materialise at all due to staff sickness.

So overall I’ve been keeping my head above water, but only just. I have consistently been able to pay myself £1,000 per month, and had calculated that I would be able to carry on doing so while continuing to break even up to and including June. However, the rolling-along contract is about to end. I have some more bits and bobs of teaching work booked in over the next three months, but after the end of June I was going to fall off the edge of the work cliff into the cold deep workless sea.

On top of this, there were a number of unavoidable expenses looming: from essential repairs to my elderly and infirm car, to all my underwear developing holes at once. I was resigning myself to digging into my savings for the first time in many years, reasoning that if I’d saved for a rainy day, it was now, metaphorically speaking at least, about to throw it down.

Then last week there was one of those reversals for which the indie lifestyle is famous. A colleague and I went for an interview at a Russell Group university that wanted to commission some research – and we got the gig! Sensible budget (not so sensible timescale, but you can’t have everything) and the people were lovely.

So now I don’t need to dig into my savings, instead I can pay myself a little extra to cover the unavoidable expenses. Plus I don’t have to start worrying about work again until the summer. This is a huge relief – I have, quite literally, been sleeping easier.

Plus I landed another teaching client, and the more of those I can reel in the better. I’m working to build up my teaching because, although the work lasts for days rather than months, it’s more regular than research. If I can reach the point where I have a few days of teaching work in each month of the academic year, I’ll be able to stop chasing commissioned research altogether. Though the Teaching Excellence Framework is looming here in the UK, and I don’t know whether my input will help universities to manipulate the metrics successfully enough to make it worthwhile for them to use me. So while I can take a break from the rollercoaster for the next little while, I’m sure I’ll be riding again soon.

Society For Indie Researchers?

Posted by

4

SRA logo 300dpi.jpgI was invited into an interesting conversation on Twitter the other day, between @DrNomyn, @deborahbrian, @lianamsilva, @readywriting, @darthur62 and @donnarosemary. At one point @deborahbrian said, ‘What we need, too, are professional organisations for independent scholars – do these exist?’ That was when @DrNomyn invited me in, asking, ‘How hard would it be to start one?’

I replied on Twitter but, as this is something to which I have given some thought, I had rather more to say than would fit into 140 characters (or 80, more like, what with all those names already in the tweet). I have long wanted a society for independent researchers. (Despite my scholarly credentials, I identify as an indie researcher rather than an indie scholar. I think this is because I’ve never been, or aspired to be, a salaried academic. Nevertheless, there is clearly significant overlap, and I think such a society might well have room for both.) And I have considered starting one, because, as @DrNomyn implied, it wouldn’t be that difficult.

The hard part would be keeping it going.

I think there are two main reasons that would be hard. First, there aren’t actually that many indie researchers/scholars who would be interested in such a society, and most of us are insanely busy, so getting people involved in anything beyond initial sign-up would be difficult. (I know this because I’m on the Board of the UK and Ireland Social Research Association (SRA), which makes considerable efforts to involve and support indie researchers, most of which are poorly attended/used despite what people say they want in the biennial members’ survey). Second, and partly as a result, such a society wouldn’t generate enough income to pay people to run it, so it would all be done by volunteers, and as I believe I may have mentioned on this blog once or twice, the last thing indie researchers need is more unpaid work.

A third, subsidiary problem, is that there is a high turnover of indie researchers and scholars. People like me, who are resolutely indie and have been for, in my case, 17 years now, are rare. Quite a high proportion of indie researchers or scholars are people who have been made redundant, or whose contract has finished, and who haven’t yet secured other work, so they set up as indie while also looking for jobs in the hope of earning some money to tide them over. Some of them may stick with indie work, either through choice or necessity, but many will go back into employment sooner or later. Others like the look of the indie lifestyle, so set up as indie with every intention of making a go of it, then find they can’t make enough money, or they don’t like working for themselves, or they hit some other problem. (I felt for @darthur62 who said he couldn’t maintain indie work because his networks fell apart; that’s what happened to me after the change of government here in 2010, and I’ve been very lucky to be able to rebuild my business). And some are successful indies who are seduced away from their indie work by an organisation with an offer that is (or appears) too good to refuse.

I make no criticism of anyone in these positions. Any of them could be, or could have been, me. Frankly, if any organisation offered to pay me a decent salary just to write stuff, I’d be there like a shot. But the churn in the indie population is another factor that I think would make it hard to maintain a society for independent researchers and/or scholars.

So my advice, as given on Twitter, is: find a society near you that caters for indie scholars or researchers, join it, and get involved. I’d recommend the SRA for anyone in or near the UK/Ireland. They offer events, training, support with research ethics, good deals on insurance, a magazine and newsletter, a directory of members’ services, and we’re currently trialling access to academic literature for members, with other benefits in the pipeline. There is an equivalent-ish organisation in Australia called the Market and Social Research Society, though some tweeps expressed disquiet at the thought of being lumped in with the market researchers. There will also be discipline-specific societies, as @deborahbrian pointed out, for e.g. educational researchers, sociologists, anthropologists, etc. Each society should be able to give you information about how many indies they have in their membership, and what they do to support independent scholars or researchers, before you join.

I was looking forward to meeting other independent Fellows of the Academy of Social Sciences. Turns out I’m the first. There are one or two who are indie now, after decades as professors, but that’s not the same. I would love it if there was a society for indie researchers and scholars, and am rather hoping someone will disagree with me enough to start one. I’d certainly join.

Bitty Writing Hell

Posted by

0

book finished photo.jpgUs writers do the whole ‘grass is greener’ thing just like everybody else. When I was writing my last book, I was longing to get to the journal articles and other projects that were piling up on my to-do list. Now I’m drowning in shorter projects and it’s driving me crazy. Look! Pictorial evidence! I can’t wait to be working on one big long book again, when I will undoubtedly become sane and well organised (cough).

Here’s my current shorter project to-do list:

  1. Research Ethics for your PhD – 1,000 words written, approx 9,000 to go
  2. Finishing Your PhD – not started
  3. Another short e-book, a co-authored Top Secret Project – out with beta readers
  4. Co-authored journal article #1, my co-author is currently responding to reviewers’ comments so with luck we’re nearly there
  5. Co-authored journal article #2, first draft done, at the bat-it-back-and-forth stage
  6. Journal article on third sector infrastructure and liminality – second draft done, with my former mentor from TSRC for feedback
  7. Book chapter on transformative research frameworks in practice for an edited collection for Sage – planned but not started
  8. Journal article on transformative research frameworks for a special issue of Qualitative Research – planned but not started

And I’m co-editing a special issue of the International Journal of Social Research Methodology, on research ethics, which is also involving quite a lot of bitty work.

I have quite a bit of writing to do in my day job right now, too, from proposals for new projects to reports for projects that are almost complete. And I’m making preparatory notes for my next full-length book. Plus, of course, there’s blogging. Hence the slight hiatus. I can’t even bring myself to tweet much at the moment, and I love Twitter.

In Belbin’s typology I am a strong ‘completer-finisher’ so this kind of workload drives me crazy. It’s one reason I can’t stand gardening: nothing is ever done. (I love gardens, though; I just prefer to believe they happen by natural magic.) My workload right now is very much like gardening. Plant a seed here, prune a branch there, trim a hedge, dig a hole… aarrgghh!!! My idea of a nightmare!

I know from experience that the only way out is through, and I just have to keep nibbling away at all the different jobs a bit at a time and they’ll eventually get done. But I have learned from experience that I am never, ever, again, going to take on so many short pieces of work at one time. I take comfort in the fact that the deadlines are all in the next five months, so by the autumn I will be free(er).

And the good news is, by then I should be ready to start writing the next full-length book. Though there is also talk of a second edition of my first research methods book, so I may still have more than one writing project on the go. In fact that’s almost inevitable. But if I just had two or three, rather than ten or a dozen, I think my life would feel a whole lot easier. In fact, I can’t wait.

New Book Launch: Writing Your PhD

Posted by

5

WYPhD_blue_keyboard_LC_RGB.jpgToday I’m launching the fourth in the PhD Knowledge series. For new readers, this is a series of short e-books designed to help doctoral students with different aspects of the process. Although they’re called ‘PhD Knowledge’, they’re written with all doctoral students in mind, whether they’re studying for a scholarly PhD or a professional doctorate. And they’re also very affordable at £2.49/US$3.99/equivalents in other currencies.

The fourth book is called Writing Your PhD: An Introduction. It is full of tips and advice to help doctoral students get going, and keep going, with their writing. Writing is such an integral part of the doctoral process that it is impossible to ignore or avoid – and trying to do either of those things can lead to stress at best, failure at worst. But the good news is thSYPhD_green_SQmarks_noblend_LC2_RGBat academic writing can be taught and can be learned. In fact, I’m asked to teach writing skills in universities far more than I’m asked to teach anything else. And I know my courses help students because they tell me so on their feedback forms and, later, on Twitter.

I hope you, or someone you know, will find this book useful. Though if you (or they) haven’t started on a PhD yet, you might be interested to know that the first book in the PhD Knowledge series, Starting Your PhD: What You Need To Know, is now FREE to download from all platforms. So what are you waiting for?

Ten Top Tips for Successful Book Authoring

Posted by

2

me at book launch croppedI feel qualified to write this post for a number of reasons. First, I am a successful author. Second, I have worked in publishing, as have several close relatives and friends. I’m assuming that you’re interested in writing for traditional publication; I intend to cover self-publishing in a different post. So here are my ten top tips for successful book authoring.

  1. Remember that publishers need you more than you need them. You can write and publish, online and in hard copy, without ever going anywhere near a publishing company. Conversely, publishers can’t function without authors.
  1. Find a book that needs to be written: ideally one you’ve looked for because you want to read or recommend it, and definitely one that doesn’t exist yet.
  1. Learn how the publishing business works. The more you understand about the process, the better you’ll be able to work with your publisher. This will also help to reduce the likelihood of potentially stressful surprises.
  1. Research different publishing companies and choose one that you think will suit you and your book. Don’t hesitate to ring one or more commissioning editors for your subject area to discuss your idea; their phone numbers should be on the publishers’ websites. It’s worth asking whether they already have something similar in the pipeline. If they do, finding out at an early stage will save you work; if they don’t, you can have more confidence in your idea. Also, a phone chat gives you a chance to suss them out and get a feel for whether you will be able to work together well.
  1. Negotiate a contract with deadlines you will be able to meet. You can ask for changes before you sign the contract; once it’s signed, there is no going back.
  1. If you’re in the UK, as soon as you have a draft contract, join the Society of Authors and ask them to vet the contract for you before you sign. (You can’t join the Society before you have a draft contract, unless you have already published a book or equivalent.) If you’re not in the UK, find out whether there’s a comparable organisation in your country – or, if you can afford it, get your draft contract checked by a suitably qualified and experienced lawyer.
  1. Calculate the number of words you need to write each week to meet your deadlines while leaving some time in hand for contingencies. Write that number of words each week.
  1. Be kind and courteous to the publisher’s staff, even at times when you may not feel particularly well-disposed towards them. Respond to their emails and phone messages in a timely fashion, and deal gracefully with feedback. Remember, they’re busy professionals too; just because publishers need authors doesn’t give you license to behave like a prima donna.
  1. Meet those deadlines.
  1. Be prepared to help publicise your book. The publisher’s marketing department should help, particularly around the time of publication, but they have new books to work on every month so they won’t be able to keep the focus on your book. But you can. Promotion doesn’t need to take up a huge amount of your time and effort, but it’s crazy not to do some basic tasks. Such as: add a link to the book to your email signature; get flyers from the publisher that you can hand out at conferences and other events; put the cover image on any slides or handouts you create. If you can use social media, so much the better, but anything you can do will help.

Of course there’s a lot more to becoming an author than that – but if you follow these top tips, the rest should fall into place. Good luck!

I Don’t Know What I’m Doing

Posted by

2

head scratchingSome people call me an expert. I even call myself one on occasion, usually when I’m trying to win work or funding. But I don’t feel like an expert – or perhaps I don’t feel like I expected an expert to feel.

When I was younger, I thought of an expert as someone who knew pretty much everything about their subject. It’s true that I know a lot about research methods, probably more than most people on the planet, but I don’t know anywhere near everything. Research methods is such a huge and fast-moving field that nobody could know everything, but I don’t think I even know as close to everything as possible. In fact I think I’m a long way from there. Lots of people know things about research methods that I don’t know and, however much more I learn, that will always be the case.

But I do know how to be confident, even when I don’t feel confident. I don’t mean I’m falsely confident: if I don’t know the answer to a question, I’ll say so; if I don’t understand what someone is saying, I’ll ask for clarification. When I was younger, I thought doing that would make me look stupid. Now, quite literally, I know better.

I can even be confident about working on a project when I don’t know what I’m doing. That is a stretch for my confidence – sometimes it wobbles a bit – but I can do it. For example, I’m writing a book on research and ethics. The working title is Research Ethics in the Real World. I’ve been working on it since last summer. So far I have read half a dozen books and made notes from most of them, bought another 25 or so, interviewed eight people, and written 676 words. I’m at the exploratory stage and I really don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t have a structure for the book, or its voice, or a writing style. I don’t really know what I want to say, beyond something about how research ethics is linked with institutional, political, and global ethics; that it doesn’t exist in a bubble of its own.

But I have faith in the process. It’s what I tell doctoral students: keep on reading, thinking, and writing, and you’ll get there in the end. I’ve done this a few times now, though each time is different. And I do have a glimmer of a plan: when I finish making the notes from the books I’ve read, I’m going to plug those and my interview transcripts into NVivo, do some emergent coding, and see what falls out. I hope that will help, though of course it may confuse me further. But if I’m lucky, I’ll start to spot some connections, relationships, and patterns, which will help me find the way.

This is how creativity often works in practice. Bumbling around, doing what you enjoy, whether that’s picking out tunes on an instrument, messing around with paints, or stringing words together to make sentences. Lots of fiddling and noodling, also known as practice, while you work out the song you want to sing, the picture you want to paint, or the book you want to write. Not really knowing what you’re doing. Even when you’re an expert.