What is SLAM?
Grad school is a great place to gain scientific expertise—but that’s hardly the only thing you’ll need in your future as a PhD. Are you ready to lead a group? Manage your coworkers? Mentor budding scientists? To address the many interpersonal issues that arise in a scientific workplace, grad students from Chemistry, Physics, and MCB founded SLAM: Science Leadership and Management.
This is a seminar/workshop series focused on understanding the many interpersonal interactions critical for success in a scientific lab, as well as some practical aspects of lab management. The target audience for this course is upper-level science graduate students with broad interests and backgrounds, and the skills discussed will be applicable to a variety of career paths. Postdocs are also welcome to attend.
SLAM is sponsored by QB3 and VSPA, with additional support from the Department of Chemistry and the LBNL Chemical Sciences Division.
For more information, please contact SLAM leadership at berkeley.slam@gmail.com. You can also find us on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
Spring 2021 SLAM Workshops
Monday, February 22, 10 a.m. – 11:30 p.m.
Teaching diverse populations of students requires instructors to construct learning environments that are inclusive and equitable. Research in psychology and other disciplines suggests that how students personally experience learning environments strongly influences engagement, motivation, sense of belonging, and conceptual learning. In this interactive workshop, participants will share a common experience as the basis for discussing how students may experience classroom environments differently from one another. Individual participants will then have the opportunity to self-assess their current awareness of 21 common equitable teaching strategies and identify those that could be immediately implemented in their classrooms.
Please email berkeley.slam@gmail.com to receive the Zoom link to this event.
Monday, March 8, 1:30 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.
In the course of any academic career, one has to start, develop, and sustain effective collaborations that benefit both the investigators and students alike. How does one go by fostering such collaborations, be it on the scale of individual labs across campus, cross-institutional collaborations, or large-scale groups and consortiums sustained by grants like NSF? In this workshop, you will learn about the challenges, benefits, and everything in-between from experienced leaders in the field.
Please email berkeley.slam@gmail.com to receive the Zoom link to this event.
Thursday, April 29, 12:30 p.m. – 2:00 p.m.
This workshop introduces effective methods of negotiating with potential employers. Topics include basic elements of the negotiation process, how to leverage your strengths, avoid common pitfalls, handle multiple offers, and successfully close the deal.
Please email berkeley.slam@gmail.com to receive the Zoom link to this event.
Fall 2020 SLAM Workshops
Monday, November 30
Dr. Malcolm Hill, Bates College
Many scientists working on their Ph.D. are familiar with research intensive institutions and may limit faculty searches to these types of universities. Liberal arts colleges offer attractive career paths that allow for serious scholarship, exciting teaching opportunities, and membership in a supportive community. Dr. Hill will present his experiences as a scholar and teacher at 3 liberal arts institutions, will discuss how he moved into administrative positions, and will share how search and tenure and promotion processes work at these institutions.
Please email berkeley.slam@gmail.com to receive the Zoom link to this event.
Monday, December 7
Martin Mulvihill PhD, Founder, Safer Made Venture Capital
Venture capital may not be a common career path for PhD chemistry students, but learning about how venture capital fits into the funding ecosystem is valuable to anyone interested in how innovations are commercialized. This talk will share some of my own journey from an academic career path to the creation of Safer Made, a mission driven venture capital fund focused on the elimination of hazardous chemicals from consumer products and supply chains. I will discuss entrepreneurship in chemistry, the demand for safer chemistry solutions from the marketplace, and the opportunity for early career scientists to make a positive impact on the future of chemistry.
Please email berkeley.slam@gmail.com to receive the Zoom link to this event.
Spring 2020 SLAM Workshops
Fall 2019 SLAM Seminars
Seminars are held in 106 Stanley Hall, from 5:30-6:30 pm. Join our mailing list to receive workshop details, reminders, and opportunities to sign up for dinner with the speakers.
Monday, September 9
Joe Charbonnet, Green Science Policy Institute
Monday, September 16
Arman Zand, Farmstead
Monday, September 23
Meg Fasulo, Bartlit Beck LLP
Monday, September 30
Phil Buhlmann, University of Minnesota
Monday, October 21
Allegra Liberman-Martin, Chapman University
Alanna Schepartz recently joined the faculty in the department of chemistry at UC Berkeley after 30 years on the faculty at Yale. Her lab works in several areas of chemical biology, and she is leading a complex, multi-PI effort to synthesize unusual and interesting new molecules using the ribosome: a wonderful combination of Science, Leadership, & Management!
Monday, November 4
Ajay Virkar, C3Nano
In this talk, C3Nano’s progression from a university spin-out into a fully operational advanced materials company with the industry’s leading technology, a global footprint, and a successful track record for commercialization of various products, will be discussed.
Monday, November 18
Hanadie Yousef, Juvena Therapeutics
Dr. Yousef will discuss the stages of creating and building a biotechnology startup, from generating an idea and business model, networking, laying the foundations, fundraising and recruiting a team. She will share tips and lessons learned from the last 3 years on this journey.
Monday, November 25
L.-C. Campeau, Merck
We are often taught that the best plan wins. We see it in movies and sports all the time. From high school, career counselors help us plan to get into the best college, then best graduate school and ultimately through to our professional lives. L.-C. Campeau’s experience is quite the opposite. This talk will meander through the peaks and valleys of his formal training and professional career. He will share some of his thoughts on personal development and key insights from his last 12 years in professional life.
Jen Heemstra, Emory University
This seminar will be a lively discussion about work approaches in graduate school, benefits of proper communication with your peers, and how to navigate the long academic journey. You can follow Jen on Twitter @jenheemstra for her experiences and leadership advice!
Feedback
- Sloan, W. (2007) Feedback That Works: How to Build and Deliver Your Message. Center for Creative Leadership.
- Kirkland, K. & Manoogian, S. (1998). Ongoing Feedback: How to Get It, How to Use It. Center for Creative Leadership.
- Cannon, M. & Witherspoon, R. (2005). Actionable feedback: Unlocking the power of learning and performance improvement. Academy of Management Executive, 19(2), 120-134.
- Cartwright, T. (2003). Managing Conflict with Peers. Center for Creative Leadership.
- Sharpe, D. & Johnson, E. (2007). Managing Conflict with Your Boss. Center for Creative Leadership.
- Gallagher, R. (2009). How to tell anyone anything: Breakthrough techniques for handling difficult conversations at work. New York: AMACON.
- Dealing with difficult people HBS Results-driven Manager Series
Grove, C. & Hollowell, W. (2002). The seven balancing acts of professional behavior in the United States.
Smith, D. (2008). Divide or conquer: How great teams turn conflict into strength. New York: Penguin Press.