Downtime is Productive

by Robyn Byrd

As winter break approaches, folks will ask writers and researchers, "so you plan to get a lot done over vacation?" First of all, winter break is not a vacation. Second... NO.

As behind as one might be on writing a thesis or dissertation (or on any other big project), it is important to take your downtime where you can get it. Even if it means filling your schedule with other things, like a day job. Some of my colleagues spent the break doing nothing. If you can afford it, downtime doing nothing can be just what you need. But if you can't, or if you're restless, then setting aside knowledge work for a time and working on "regular people" stuff instead can be a much needed respite. In the 21st century, we now know that sometimes a break from work is the only thing that can really increase work productivity. 

It is important to affirm this to yourself, just as it important to renounce the lie that downtime is lazy. Americans, even those of us who have opted out of the rat race, are obsessed with being productive, with working ourselves every hour that's available. It doesn't actually help us get much done, and it wrecks our relationship with the intellectual work we love.

I spent my winter "break" doing seasonal work and teaching intensive ESL courses for international students. I worked seven days a week. I don't recommend it. But what didn't I do? I purposely didn't work on my dissertation. Sometimes this stressed me out, but other times it was freeing. I had license not to do schoolwork. It was winter break. Besides, I had not a single hour left in the day to do anything but "real" work. I paid off the bills, almost as if I wasn't a poverty-wages grad student. I gave my kids a middle-class Christmas. And somehow, as exhausted as I was by all this... I'm ready to start my dissertation work again.

It's okay to bench yourself.

Pushing through a winter break, or even too much of summer, by working on a thesis or dissertation is a bad idea. Think of any other craft that involves such specialized, Herculean effort. Athletes, for instance, don't train like crazy for their sport in year-round. Not until it's time. If they trained every day, they would wear themselves out, open themselves up to injury, and probably become bored. And if they're smart they don't train right up until the night before the big meet. They stop to eat, and take much needed downtime to heal. Knowledge workers, mental athletes, need to allow ourselves the room to heal, to prepare, and to let downtime make us yearn for our work.

This analogy applies to musicians as well. My partner's band goes on hiatus every winter after a December Christmas show. They play hard through the summer and into the holiday season, so they know they'll burn out if they play through the year's end. In spring, someone will get a gig again. They make a plan to have one by March. And then they rest. It is then that new ideas for songs come, tunes heard on the radio remind them of what they love about music, and soon enough they are back at it, ready to rock.

It's important to note that even though I worked my butt off at not writing this winter, I didn't do it without a plan to come back. The semester system gives an unstructured person like me just the calendar I need to plan my work. Next week the university starts up again. Winter break officially ends. I will officially quit my seasonal job, and I will set to work on my dissertation, yet once more. You see, while downtime is very important, you have to set a limit on it. A couple of months was just right for me. Just enough to get lost in this different life of being a working person. After my time away, physically and mentally, I'm ready to strain my brain instead of my back.

My Dissertation Boot Camp Experience

by Robyn Byrd

For the past eight years, Gail Jacky, Director of the University Writing Center at NIU, has had a summertime mission: getting dissertation writers to finish their dissertations! In June, July, and August, Gail runs what she calls Dissertation Boot Camps. Writers hole up in the Writing Center's isolated basement, and do nothing but write and snack. (And maybe talk a little.) The program's alumni are proof that this "retreat" method of retiring from the world for a few days is a proven winner for getting dissertation work done.

You may be wondering, "Why can't I just lock myself in my own basement for a week?" Well I'll tell you why, curious reader! I did the Boot Camp lite version last week (2-day camp versus 5-day camp) and here are the perqs of doing this with Gail in the UWC:

1) Healthy snacks, water, and coffee/tea are provided. No getting up to make food or brew a pot.

2) You work alongside other dissertation writers who are similarly focused and unfocused. You will all need to hole up, but you will all also need to take breaks. You can do so together if you like.

Jack London writing outside.
Idyllic! But not practical.

3) You work alongside a mildly busy office team. The UWC continues to meet with students (mostly graduate and adult students in the summer) during the Boot Camp, the phone continues to ring, and Gail continues to stay busy. No one is breathing down your neck, but they are present, creating an environment conducive to working productively.

4) Assistance is all around you. Gail and her team are ready and willing to read parts of your dissertation with you, during the camp. You will get the same attention they give their appointments, and quality tutoring and critiques for your writing. They can work with writers at any stage, from "Is this a bad idea to put this chapter here?" to "I'm almost done please check my citations!"

5) Most importantly, no matter what the UWC has or doesn't have to offer, it has this: IT'S NOT YOUR HOUSE. We all need to get out of our own spaces at times, or we get stuck in a rut. This is a chance to jump start your writing in a new place, a place where you don't have to answer the phone or worry about the dishes in the sink (there aren't any).

So don't lock yourself in your basement just yet! And don't go sit on a mountain top. There aren't any good snacks there.

As for me, I did not get a ton done in those two days, but my colleagues clacked away merrily all day. If I went again, I could make a better go of it, I think. I was delving back into my diss after a summer hiatus. What I did take away was a renewed understanding of what the heck I was writing, an organized to-do list for the rest of the summer, and about four new pages of material. That's not a lot of writing, but the executive function work I was able to do by being out of my house will lay the path for a lot more writing. I can see where I'm going now! I needed to temporarily remove my kids and my dirty floors from the view to be able to see the big picture.

So I highly recommend the camps to anyone who can swing it, at any stage of writing the dissertation or even the prospectus. But there are a couple things I would change:

Actual photo of me
in the cold writing center

1) I would like to see more programming. We did have encouragement from Gail and the opportunity to sit with tutors, but I wanted to talk and interface a little more. Just enough to break up the writing for a few. The longer 5-day session might be better for really digging in and yet having these opportunities.

2) The UWC is COLD!!! If you are one who starts wearing flip-flops on March 21, you will be very happy. If you are like me, and wish you lived in balmy Palm Springs or the like, you will be very cold. For myself and the older woman I sat with, we got very sluggish in the afternoons as 12 floors of cooled air sank its way further down into the basement of Stevenson Tower B. The camp could use a better location... but the cave-like nature of where the UWC sits now is probably an asset too.

Next week I am leaving for a writing retreat in the Catskills Mountains. I hope it'll be warm!

The Graduate Degree: A Prelude to Knowledge Work

Investigating, analyzing, evaluating, creating, contextualizing, self-directing: skills like these are integral to the writing of a thesis or dissertation but also characteristic of the broad occupational domain called knowledge work.  To thesis and dissertation writers at any stage of their projects, below we offer thoughts on how you’re already developing—and can continue to develop—skills that are crucial for success in knowledge-oriented fields.

Tallies and Time Clocks?

Knowledge work is generally hard to quantify or measure.  Ironically, though, those who engage in such work across fields of academia tend to be fairly obsessed with counting and measuring.  Most carefully keep or monitor totals of papers presented, articles published, grants awarded, committees served on, and classes taught per year.  When you arrange your CV and the several accompanying documents needed for an academic job search, your field’s particular obsessions with such performance-related numbers boldly reassert themselves.  Other academic endeavors are sometimes summed up in terms of hours spent per week in classrooms, offices, labs, meetings, field investigations, grading sessions, or writing stints.

Yet the efforts that go into various kinds of academic production are not always easy to break down into regular time chunks.  Realistically, much academic work can keep the worker occupied from early morning to late at night, during parts of weekends, and during stretches of semester breaks.  (Let me briefly add that plenty in and outside academia do seem interested in figuring out the number of hours per week academics actually work—or in debating how many hours per week they should work.  A couple of recent reports (see here and here) suggest that such investigations and debates are complex and sometimes testy.  We avoid these issues in this post.)

Your Project: Training in Key Knowledge-Work Skills

A lot of what you do while completing your thesis or dissertation is obviously solid preparation for a future career in knowledge-centered domains.  As outlined and nicely detailed by the Careers & Employment Division at the University of Manchester, those aiming for a career in academia need to develop at least five skills for success.  Good news: as soon as you embark on your project, you’re immersed in an experience that can help you hone each of them.

Networking: As you develop relationships with members of your committee, each member can introduce you to others to help build your professional network.  In addition, while researching and writing, you can further extend your network by attending and/or presenting parts of your project at conferences.  Last year around this time, I traveled to a national conference to present a paper based on research for one of my dissertation chapters and attended multiple panels in areas central and peripheral to my academic interests.  The experience led to new contacts and eventually a request to submit a piece to a scholarly society’s publication.  Next month, I’ll travel to a regional conference to deliver a presentation with an NIU colleague and attend several discussion sessions.  You’re likely taking advantage of similar networking opportunities.  If not, seek them out.

Time Management: You’re already a knowledge worker and thus already weighing priorities and setting many deadlines of your own.  In previous posts on this blog, we’ve covered approaches to managing time during writing sessions, balancing your project with family matters, and maintaining your focus and enthusiasm by mixing work with recreational activities.  Consider such scheduling practices as sound preparation for the self-directed knowledge work of your post-degree career.

Resilience: While writing a thesis or dissertation, setbacks inevitably occur.  Data may need to be reanalyzed.  Ideas and approaches may need revamping.  Feedback on your progress from committee members—or from attendees at academic conferences—can be encouraging but also humbling.  As you get closer to the project’s completion, you’ll likely start looking for your postgraduate job.  Academic job hunting is especially fraught with pressures, rejections, and disappointments.  But lows like these that you experience throughout your project build your patience and resilience for similar wrinkles you’ll face down the road.

Presentation Skills: As a knowledge worker, you need to be able to present ideas clearly, in a variety of settings, among colleagues but also among people unfamiliar with intricacies of your work.  Each time you revise a section of your long document, you add useful material to your expanding pool of well-articulated expressions of your findings.  And you shouldn’t just aim to present them at your defense—another reason to plan to present at conferences while completing your project.  If you’re teaching, consider ways to integrate insights from your developing work in the classroom.

Project Management: At the NIU Thesis Office, we stress the value of being proactive in managing your thesis or dissertation project.  In a previous post, we featured a review of a useful book that describes the project-management approach to the dissertation.  Ultimately, you’re the manager of your project—under supervision of your director, of course.  The management experiences you gain now will certainly inform many aspects of your future knowledge-oriented employment.

Final Thoughts

Happy investigating, analyzing, evaluating, self-directing, and writing to all.  And good luck to those of you defending over the next few weeks!