As
you make the transition from scientist to manager, you may realize that the
technical and mathematical skills that got you where you are won’t help as much
as you advance. Although (when mixed with a bit of intuition and common sense)
they may be sufficient at lower levels, like department chair, group lead, or
principal investigator, these abilities alone will not be enough as you move to higher levels. Even though your undergrad and graduate curricula were
packed full of requirements, you may reach a point when you lament that you
never took a management course. Your success will depend less and less on the
skills that made you a successful scientist and more and more on your human competencies. In a community that is dominated by introverts,
this is a particularly troubling realization, and an individual with even mild
extroverted tendencies has a natural advantage. There is a joke I heard while I
was working in the Astronomy Division at NSF. Question: How do you tell if
someone is an extrovert? Answer: When they pass you in the hall, they look at your shoes. It is sort of funny only
because it is so true. I worked on the Math and Physical Sciences floor – the
directorate that includes Math, Physics, Chemistry, Materials, and Astronomy. I
can’t tell you the number of times I passed someone in the hall, and they
looked down. I found I had to really focus on keeping eye contact and saying
something simple like, “Good morning.” So imagine how an individual in this
community of introverts feels when they learn that their career advancement now
depends on the one thing they were never good at (and never had to be) - their
ability to develop effective working relationships with key individuals.
