I was recently asked by a colleague to name a favorite ‘life hack’ for research or academic life. My first thoughts centered around productivity tips and tricks. However, the more I reflected, the more I came back to the concept that success isn’t really measured in getting more things done faster. Rather, success is getting the right things done – period.
Years ago, a trusted colleague and mentor advised me to ‘spend time with smart people … and good things will happen’. I honestly didn’t get it at the time, but eventually understood that taking time to listen and aggregate information gleaned from spending time with ‘smart people’ would help me define and focus my career goals on ‘important’ problems.
