Networking is always less intimidating when pre-arranged with a cuppa: an Early Career Researcher’s experience of the network’s monthly Collaborative Exchange meetings
Networking can sometimes feel like an intimidating word, never mind an intimidating thing to do. Conferences and society meetings are great for getting to know people and putting faces to names, but are often exhausting, expensive for an Early Career Researcher’s research budget, and can be especially intimidating when you see a person whose papers you’ve been reading for the last couple of months is right in front of you. While, as is often the case, individual academics are lovely once you start talking to them, starting the conversation can feel daunting. However, creating your own professional ‘network’ of people who know each other’s work creates a research community and increases access to resources, mentorship, support, knowledge, and skills. Career development and progression are often guided by sharing opportunities, experiences, and knowledge to thrive together.
One of the main goals of the Inner Music & Wellbeing Network is to stimulate discussion across disciplinary boundaries and to collaboratively generate new knowledge about imagining music. To help with this, we have a ‘Collaborative Exchange Scheme’, wherein you are assigned into pairs on a rotating basis for an informal chat via a virtual coffee break. The sessions consist of each person discussing their research interests, and then together beginning to discuss how your experiences and expertise could fit together to consider musical imagery and wellbeing in a new light. Wonderfully, this scheme makes it very easy to get to know other people researching musical imagery across a range of disciplines without all the usual steps of having to seek each person out, write an email asking to meet, wonder at why you might not have heard back yet (if at all), and then try it all again with another person. As an opt-in scheme, everyone you could be paired with actively signed up to talk.
When all is said and done, academia is the sharing of knowledge and ideas, and steadily chasing down the answer to ‘Ooh, but what if…?’. The Collaborative Exchange is a perfect setup to enable this. I’ve participated in five rounds of coffee breaks, and in each one I’ve heard about and discussed entirely different fascinating ideas. I’ve had the delight to discuss musical imagery in guided therapy, how intentional musical imagery use as a natural blocker for short term or working memory could be beneficial to individuals with ADHD, applying musical imagery research to more than just musicians, music and pain research, using musical imagery positively for self-regulation, and much more besides.
Moreover, hearing perspectives and ideas from researchers much more knowledgeable and far further into their careers than me has also been invaluable. I’ve been helpfully directed towards institutions I had no idea existed, discussed how other samples may overlap with some of the groups I’ve been researching in ways I never would have considered, and even had a job listing for social research passed onto me because we’d discussed my previous work and they thought it would be of interest. I’ve discussed my pair’s career progressions and been given helpful advice and considerations for my next steps. I’ve also had the delight of being able to return the favour and talk about my experiences of applying to Masters courses and undertaking my PhD with others just beginning to consider a formal career in academia.
Having something like the collaborative exchange setup to facilitate meeting people who are just as interested in better understanding musical imagery has been wonderful. The scheme has made a significant positive impact on my relationship and interactions with others researching in and around musical imagery, and I’m especially glad it exists. While providing an easy means of cross-disciplinary discussion, support, and growth, the informality of ‘just having a coffee’ combined with pre-set pairs makes it feel both effortless and incredibly enjoyable to be a part of.
Aliya Edwards