Summer One Reflection
Jamie Palmer
Trinity College Dublin
Introduction
The following report will consist of my reflections from summer one of the Laidlaw Leadership and Research Program. I will address my hopes, expectations and assumptions that I brought to the program. In the following two sections, I will address how these expectations and assumptions changed and moulded over the course of the program. The realities I faced were often very different to my assumptions throughout. I will firstly reflect on my time conducting research and move on to my development as a leader.
Research Project
The research portion of the program was an excellent experience overall. I learned a number of technical skills such as LabView, calibrations, rig construction and much more. I also improved a lot of soft skills such as time management, determination, self-motivation and facing adversity. However, little of my research project went precisely to plan! Some of the determining factors were my own mistakes, while many others were simply bad luck.
Due to unexpected constraints, my budget would not cover the equipment I needed for my project. To work around this constraint I re-purposed other older test rigs in the thermodynamics department, stripping them for parts and boilers to make my test rig. While I solved the problem and was now entirely comfortable with my budget management, I had run into a new problem. Due to the time taken to re-purpose the old equipment for my project, I was starting to fall behind. I was fast in updating my timeline and working hard to get back on track. I gathered a lot of momentum from this period of focus and high-intensity work. I have learned from this experience that "sprints" are a mode of work that seems to work well for me in periods that require high output. These "sprints" could only be sustained for short amounts of time before burnout was approached. If I were to use this mode of work again I would dedicate a definitive finish date and a clearer overarching quantifiable goal to the sprint.
Once I got stuck in, I was glad to be working on a difficult problem. I found for this project that routine was relatively easy as I was primarily working in the lab and not at home. I found that in-person was fair less challenging with regards to motivation than working from home. I found dealing with external factors, such as waiting on late deliveries, very difficult. I found these hard, as I had no control over the situations that were adversely affecting my progress. In future, I will allow more time for such external factors, and be more careful in my planning.
Leadership Development
The leadership portion of the program has been an interesting and rewarding challenge. Where output can be easily quantified in terms of research goals, it is harder to quantify in terms of leadership goals. It has required constant attention and reflection this past summer. The leader I have become this summer is a more decisive, more present and more consistent leader. I have also been working to improve my project management skills and resilience, as outlined in the research section of this report.
I previously struggled with consistency, with both my work rate and attendance at team events and meetings. I worked with Joel McKeever in my coaching session to goals that would help me rectify this issue. I found that with this new consistency, I had more presence in the team. This allowed me to make more informed decisions, learn more and grow closer to my teammates. Previously, at times I would feel distant and disassociated with my work or my team. I found a greater sense of fulfilment with the increased involvement. I never regretted attending a meeting.
I had many reasons for joining the Laidlaw program. Firstly I wanted to conduct novel research, that could hopefully be impactful on people's lives. I also wanted to grow as a leader in a number of ways. I felt that in a typical internship or placement I couldn't possibly get the hands-on learning that the leadership and research program provides. I also wanted to meet a diverse peer group from different disciplines; People to have interesting conversations and to work on hard problems with. Many of these motivations have not changed. One motivation that has now prioritised itself for me, is getting out of my comfort zone. On reflection, during the program, I haven't felt as much discomfort as I could have. I have found myself in the deep end maybe once or twice, but I would like to push myself much further.
Meeting with my ALS group and meeting with other scholars has been very constructive. As an engineering student, I find when explaining my ideas or research, I can get extremely narrow and off-track on certain topics when talking to non-specialists. By talking to students from drastically different STEM fields, arts and humanities, I have improved my communication style. I've come to realise that most of the time the nitty-gritty is not what is important to most. It is often the story and the bigger picture that captivates people. These conversations have helped me to become more clear and concise when explaining my ideas or work.
Over the course of the program, I greatly looked forward to the leadership sessions. Lead One and Lead Two were positive experiences. Lead Two was particularly helpful for me. I have disliked presenting in the past and it has been a large cause of stress for me. This made me very eager to learn in the session. Our instructor was great. He was clearly very experienced and provided excellent constructive feedback. Despite the session being very long, it was very engaging. I didn't find my attention dropping off. I learned new skills and presented to my peers. The day was a net positive.
Throughout the rest of the program, there are many leadership skills I would like to improve. However, I am going to focus on the following: communication and decisiveness. In order to improve my communication skills, I will actively pursue opportunities to present in public. I would also like to actively focus on decisiveness in the coming year. In the past, I have been too much of a perfectionist on tiny details. In the future, I will work to prioritise action and progress over perfectionism.
Summer one has been a massive catalyst in my personal development. Over this summer I managed to achieve many quantifiable things I was proud of - Building and testing a functional test rig, learning an array of new technical skills and producing a research poster. Through the experience, I also learned and developed knowledge and skills that are non-quantifiable - resilience, consistency and communication. I am looking forward to developing myself further in the future. I have greatly enjoyed my time as a Laidlaw scholar. I have had the opportunity to work with and befriend great people.
I want to extend my thanks to the Foundation for giving me this opportunity. I am grateful to my supervisor Dr Seamus O'Shaugnessy and Technical Officer of the Fluids and Heat transfer Lab - Gerry Byrne. I would like to thank everyone in Trinity Employability for the time they put into the organising of this program and for their unfailing support.