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Barriers to New Beginnings: Lakshmi Ramachandran

Barriers to New Beginnings: Lakshmi Ramachandran

Dr. Lakshmi Ramachandran’s vision is to help sustain and retain scientific talent, a workforce crucial for the betterment and sustenance of life on our planet through innovation. Science is crucial for achieving the SDGs. However, people in science continue to suffer from the publish or perish culture, lack of funding, and lack of guidance in their career and personal development.

Dr. Ramachandran aim to address this through a two-pronged approach:

  • Empower science professionals to advance in their careers and life with greater visibility, confidence and leadership through coaching and training.
  • Enable scientific organisations to be more inclusive and supportive of their talent to ultimately improve performance and remove burnout and attrition.

 

Lakshmi Ramachandran

 


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Career Story

An Unconventional Science Career Journey from a PhD in Cell and Molecular Biology to Science Leadership Coaching

Why do I do what I do? This is a question I often ponder upon, a lot more recently, as I hear this curious question “What made you move from science to personal development?”I have had four career transitions. First, academia to industry, then to science communication, next to research program management, and finally a total transition into the personal development space.Though the last one may seem like a major transition, as I connect the dots, it is more of a natural progression from working in science to working for people in science.

From PhD to PD (Doctor of Philosophy to Personal Development)

My career journey started with an exploration of the workings of our body at a cellular and molecular level. In 2002, I joined the doctorate programme at Roswell Park Cancer Institute, SUNY, Buffalo, USA with a full scholarship. As I narrowed down my research to studying just ‘one’ molecule out of some 42 million molecules within a single cell, I had a humbling realization of how much we do not know.This realization is what drives scientists to keep going on a never-ending path of discovery, to unravel one mystery after another only to tread into a more complex world of mysteries waiting to unfold. The path I am on today is no different except that it is a discovery at a different level, more at self, human behaviour and meta-level.My career transitions are a result of challenges and choices I made at each phase of my life. After obtaining my PhD with a Dean’s award, I made my first career transition into the Industry. I joined Astrazeneca, India, as a drug discovery researcher. At a time when my career was flourishing, I faced a personal challenge of infertility. After a period of emotional turmoil, I made a tough decision to step aside from my career to find personal fulfilment as a mother. During this career break, I co-wrote and published an award-winning memoir-recipe book Roomies/Foodies with a friend from graduate school. After our first son was born, we moved to Singapore in 2012. I struggled to get back to scientific research due to my career break and relocation.  After two years of going from pillar to post with my CV, I got a job in science communications. Although I was disappointed about not being able to get back to research, I was happy to get back in science.However, a new problem awaited me. Imposter syndrome! The career break and a new field instilled self-doubt and a feeling of not being good enough. Fortunately, I became part of the women in science community at my institute and realised that I am not alone in the journey. I learned about the ‘leaky pipe in STEM’ where women drop out of STEM careers especially post PhD and postdoc, resulting in a drop of women researchers globally to 29%.  I became an advocate for women in science and co-led the global Gender Summit in Singapore in 2019, attended by both global and local policymakers and stakeholders in science. Here is a speech I gave on the topic of ‘Why the world needs more women in science’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPcnkDXAPYI
Meanwhile, I moved into another career as a programme manager of a 22-million-dollar consortium.During all of these, I faced multiple challenges, which led me to embark on a journey of self-discovery. I recognised the immense potential of humans which gets blocked due to lack of clarity, fears and doubts. I invested in my self-development and became a professionally trained speaker (member of Keynote Women Speakers Directory), coach (certified by the international coaching federation, ICF) and a professional development expert. Today, as someone who has faced imposter syndrome, I am motivated to help people, especially high potential individuals from science, overcome self-doubt and imposter syndrome. I have co-created the Enoughness Coaching Programme to this end. I am also co-developing an emotional intelligence programme for researchers to better manage workplace relationships. My overall mission is to help people, especially students and early career professionals from science advance in life with greater visibility, confidence and leadership and ultimately live a fulfilled, productive life.

A big realisation I had was that it was my training as a scientist that helped me navigate my career transitions. This is through what I consider a key strength of researchers- the ‘exploratory mindset’, characterised by curiosity, creativity, adaptability and resilience.

Life happens and sometimes throws you off your track. It’s like a boat out in the oceans hit by a storm. In such situations, keeping afloat through resilience itself is a big achievement, let alone finding your direction. It’s when things calm down that the quest for direction and destination begins once again in the journey.

Key components of an exploratory mindset

Here, I will share from a science/research perspective on the exploratory mindset which is key to steering oneself in the direction that will be most fulfilling and aligned with who you really are and what you really want to be. To remember this easily, think of the acronym CARCuriosity, Adaptability and Resilience.

  • Curiosity: Curiosity is the seed that nurtures an exploratory mindset. It replaces fear, doubt and hopelessness. Curiosity is foundational for any research to ask the right questions and steer towards the best direction to find the answers. Curiosity is also essential when things don’t go well. Instead of wallowing in self-pity and asking ‘why is this happening to me?’, ask what I need to learn from this experience, and what else can I do to move forward?
  • Adaptability: Change is undoubtedly constant but also uncomfortable most times. In science, one has to be very agile to quickly adapt to new discoveries, inventions, newer methods and technologies. Those with an exploratory mindset are able to embrace change sooner and explore how they can use the change to their benefit rather than feeling thrown off track.

Resilience: Failure is an evitable part of good science. Thomas Edison once said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found ten thousand ways that won’t work.” Scientists embrace failures and rejections many more times than success and approvals. That calls for a high level of resilience to thrive and move forward. It is human to feel disappointed or frustrated with failures, but never give up or lose hope. (Here’s an article I had written on ‘Hope’: https://www.drlakshmispeaks.com/post/a-message-of-hope).

Hope this inspires you to tap in on your exploratory mindset to explore why you do what you do and what you really want to do.If you wish to learn more, subscribe to

  1. https://www.linkedin.com/newsletters/leadership-in-science-6921471003797704704
  2. www.drlakshmispeaks.com

Edited by: Virender Singh

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