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Challenges and Small Wins Along Our Researcher Journey

In our initial blog we shared our insights as two early career researchers on why we are interested in research and what we are currently doing. We are both participating in a Mental Health Research Internship with the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) and NIHR Wessex Applied Research Collaboration. My name is Blue and I am a clinician researching interventions for schizophrenia, and my name is Harriet an Occupational Therapist exploring the impact of medical work restrictions for an Armed Forces population.


Here we want to tell you more about the successes we are having but also bumps in the road and how we have overcome them.


How is your researcher journey felt so far?

 

Harriet:

I remember at the beginning of this journey I didn’t view myself as a researcher. I was incredibly eager to introduce something I felt would make a huge amount of sense into clinical practice. I felt this was something I could achieve during my undergraduate training, to then take into being a practicing Occupational Therapist. I quickly found my initial simplistic view was much more complex than I thought and would take much longer than I had initially anticipated.

 

Blue:

 My journey is rather a relatively short one so far, with research related action only truly starting around 10 months ago. However, newly into this world I discovered the required approach was to continually apply yourself to a broad range of research related activities, which naturally opens you up to an array of responses. These can be positive, negative, or neutral, but the bottom line is that you simply must not stay down after receiving any undesirable outcomes!


I have been vaguely talking about being interested in research for years, just without any related goal directed efforts in this area. So, I guess the first challenge was properly getting started, which I imagine to be the primary hurdle for many people. What moved me up the gears from having idled in neutral for so long? The right combination of interaction, opportunity, support, and determination.


A colleague who works in another service in my NHS Trust told me about the NIHR Internships, so I looked these up and asked if I could gain further advice form them about applying, which they duly gave. I had the support of my manager to apply, so I then set about engaging my motivation and applied this to trying to get onto the internship. I sourced academic supervisors and reached out, and to my relief accepted. After putting in a decent chunk of time to the application, I was delighted to find out that I was offered one of the places.

 

 

What have been challenges and how have you overcome them?

 

Harriett:

My biggest challenge was recognising my naivety and receiving disinterest or rejection due to my overenthusiasm and inexperience. When you pour your passion and energy into something, it is hard to receive feedback that critiques, oversimplifies or misinterprets your work. The further you enter into research and apply for funding, support, or time out of work, the more you open yourself to this. I have found however, that this experience has increased my skill in conveying my research in a more effective way, and although it can be quite a ride when you are invested, experiencing rejection has increased my resilience and determination to continue pushing on doors until you find one that opens.


Although I am on this internship, I still picture myself on an emotional rollercoaster when I find myself peering over the edge of an impending deadline. Why is there always something due the week after Christmas? With work, personal challenges, and general exhaustion, I start to wonder if I should let an opportunity slide, but picturing the rollercoaster reminds me, the track will eventually start downhill again, whether successful or not the push has generally always been worth it for the exhilarating ride down towards the next landmark.


All the small wins I have found have been unexpected ones on the journey, conversations I have had on a random meeting at a conference or event and generally through interactions with people outside of my project like meeting Blue! Speak to people and see where it takes you. It’s almost like fishing, drop a few lines into the water and wait for someone to bite, just be prepared you may not have anything for ages and then they may all bite at once!

 

Blue:

The nuts and bolts of undertaking research brings along a host of challenges – technology, vast amounts of time spent on relatively small aspects of the project, results etc. Overcoming these requires diligence, determination, and support from others. Support needs sourcing, and often funding if this is on the form of training or supervision. Crucial to making the most of the funding and opportunities that you have won, is using the time to also seek collaborations, and pursue a range of outputs to gain further funding and build momentum.


Over the course of the past few months I have sourced and pursued various avenues of gaining experience, linking in with others and gaining publication outputs. Making links with peers, such as Harriet, has been utterly invaluable. I have plugged myself into other research groups and training and have led on research related ventures within my Trust. For outputs I have briefly presented at a national conference, had my research poster displayed at two, with a third accepted for the summer, I have written an article for a clinical magazine in my field, and of course co-created this blog. I have reached out for requests and links when I have felt unworthy, been wonderfully surprised by positive feedback from these, and quickly dusted myself off from any that were not fruitful, absorbed any productive learning, and moved onto the next on.

I have planned and adjusted the trajectory for incorporating research into my career, and through seeking and applying advice and expertise from others (colleagues, experts, supervisors, trainers), and doggedly chased all available opportunities to progress. A carful combination of various external factors (funding, support from service, support from professionals, training, supervision, peer support) as well as internal ones (determination, resilience, proactivity, self-awareness) has since enabled me to successfully gain two further small funding awards that will allow me to continue learning and conducting research for the next 12 months.


My advice – seek out your challenges, find and pursue all possible relevant opportunities, be dogged, do not stop until you have succeeded at them, be the architect of your own wins!


Blue Pike & Harriet Wilding

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