Week in review: 8-14 March

Overall I think this past week went extremely well.  I made progress on a number of fronts and pushed myself without burning out.  In hind sight, I suppose my major criticism would be prioritisation.  This week I did get through a lot of reading, I added to my thesis and I ran some experiments, but I still took jobs as they came.  I think it will be important to be flexible when trying to finish my thesis, but I need to make sure that my time spent is spent on my thesis.  One thing that I've hear numerous times from workshops and colleagues, is that it's ok to say no.  I find this pretty difficult, because I enjoy working as part of and contributing to a team (and a team can be defined pretty broadly); and for the most part, the things folks ask for help with is really fun.  I suppose at times, it can be beneficial to take a break from your work and put your mind on completely different tasks, but you can find yourself walking a thin line.  To navigate this space I think it's important to know what jobs have priority.  And I think setting goals helps to set priorities.  A check list or to do list is one thing, these lists are usually filled was small manageable chunks.  Personally, I make my to do lists very specific action items which are different in my mind from goals.  As a practical example, a goal could be to finish a thesis chapter, draft a paper or run a suite of experiments.  These goals could take you all week and depending on other goals you may have to revisit them numerous times before completing them.  Perhaps these are just middle distance tasks.  However, regardless of what you call them, you should have a clear sense of which take priority so that when a job is finished or you need to take a break from a task, you know where your attention should be focused.  Then instead of looking for more work you continue making progress towards the deadlines already ahead of you.