Managing workloads with busy home life

[purplepandas]

Hi all,

Do others really struggle with this? I am massively struggling atm with kids and a FT SL position. I have had more teaching in the past (but have bigger admin roles currently) so not sure what it is that is tipping me over the edge now compared to other crisis points. I am not sleeping well at all (waking v early) and really down and anxious, def not managing. It's frustrating as others seem to manage and I have done in the past.

Not sure why I am posting this as I know there are no magic answers. Going to HoD is totally pointless and there is ever that stigma about not letting others know you are not coping (albeit one of my colleagues is aware and feeling similar).

Thanks
PP

That sucks and I think lots of people feel the strain. I know many are doing ASOS and working to contract at the moment so I don’t know if that helps you where you are.
My tip sounds a bit bad but basically it is to do the minimum to stay afloat and that includes teaching prep and marking. Work out how much time you get for those activities and stick to that. Yes, it does impact on the students but why should the university get my free labour to keep the students happy? Obviously for some modules you can’t do that and you have to do more but I know so many people who say they spend days on lecture slides and up to an hour on a 2000 word essay and I confess that I just don’t do that. I have done in the past and I got no recognition for it so I stopped. Same with admin tasks. I would hesitate to volunteer for stuff and would do the minimum for it to be competent but would not go above and beyond.
Not sure that helps but good luck.

Personally I find the admin roles occupy more headspace and cause more stress than the teaching. I did major admin roles for years and have recently ditched them in favour of more teaching. I definitely feel less stressed. I agree with not volunteering for stuff, and learning to say no. Like Pota2, I now do what is needed to stay afloat - academia and its impacts on my health have killed off a lot of the good will I used to have.

Failing that, if you are anxious, depressed, not coping, etc. - go to see your GP. We're not heart surgeons. No one will die if you are signed off sick. Your HoD will have to deal with it.

I also stick to workload times for marking- if the university wanted an hour of marking they should pay for it, they pay for 15 min odd per essay/exam paper so that's what I do- read it in 10min, write a few hundred words in five, all done.

Thanks @Pota2, @GCAcademic and @Nearlyalmost50, I really appreciate the replies. I need to find a better way of managing PhD student and other meetings so that I have fewer and take on less of the responsibility (sometimes I think I am too nice). That's not an attempt to sound good as I think it's actually not helping anyway and I need to be more direct and flexible.

Last week was a disaster through no fault of my own but I still had to sort out a number of crap and potentially serious issues. The knock on effect on research (and my mood) is significant. I was already spiralling and have been for months anyway so I think it was the last straw.

Agree re marking, I also adopt your approach now as there is no other option with time frames. I need to rethink my priorities in Jan. I am also trying to be better at saying no, this is something that does get me into trouble. Plus, I need to be harsher at home in terms of not trying to do everything for the children, I need to find some time for me somehow.

Thanks for letting me sound off.

It’s crap, isn’t it. My PhD student kindly sent me his chapter at 5pm today. For a meeting at 9.00 tomorrow. I’m so pissed off. There is just no consideration that someone might not want or be able to spend their evening marking your rushed, sloppily presented work. Gah!

Ugh I feel your pain, both of you. That’s so inconsiderate. I think I would just say to him that no way do you have time to read it and maybe set an agreed timeframe so that he knows where he stands. My supervisor always told me that I needed to send stuff at least a week in advance. I would never have expected her to read anything last minute anyway but it was good to have those boundaries made clear.

purplepandas oh I totally know what you mean about being too nice. It’s something I am working on too. I get students who aren’t my personal tutees asking me for references and meetings because they don’t get on with their (usually male) own tutors. This isn’t something I want or anything that gives me kudos. It adds to my workload and universities don’t value soft skills anyway so it probably means they take me less seriously. I do find it hard to say no to students though.

Commiserations. I'm just completely drowning. I've been waking up in the middle of the night in a panic - not about anything in particular, just heart racing and full of anxiety. I've also been wondering if I should actually tell anybody? But I'm not even sure who or how.

GCA, I had a student like that. I just met him at the meeting the next morning and said we'd talk about it next week. Often I wouldn't have even seen it before the meeting - I don't check email outside of working hours. I remember when he once showed up 15 minutes early for his meeting - I was in the midst of 10-minute meetings for selecting modules with UGs. He said he'd come back in a few minutes when I was done, and I said, no, I had another student after this one and to come back on the hour like we'd arranged. He said "I had no idea you were scheduled so tightly". Yeah, well, I am. Grr.

Like the others have said, first, sympathies and second, be ruthless with student demands. I set the rules at the start with my PhD students: 48 hours notice (not counting weekends) minimum for a short piece and a week for a longer one. I tell them this is good training in professionalism. Say no to stuff that’s too time consuming. Say to people that you’re over extended and you can’t give it the attention it needs. That way you demonstrate that your taking their needs seriously too. Be ruthless with your time. No out of hours email. Don’t reply fast, unless needed, as it only generates more email. Protect yourself. Oh and build in breaks into your schedule. Take care!

Say to people that you’re over extended and you can’t give it the attention it needs.

That's brilliant! Will borrow. :)

I've become much more ruthless over the years.

I set out expectations much more clearly and I rarely go out of my way for students unless it's a very special case. Things that work for me are:

Reply to student queries with an invitation to come and see me during my student advice hours. They usually don't come because this requires effort on their part. Also, ask them what they have done first re research, drafts etc before answering questions such as "what should I read...". Usually it goes no further because they haven't read anything or written a draft, they just want you to tell them what to say/read.

Any drafts (PhDs, Masters etc) have to be with me within a week before or the meeting does not take place.

Don't reply to emails quickly unless it's a perfunctory query. Don't reply to student emails after 6 or at weekends.

Arrange meetings before something else like a staff seminar, so there is a natural reason not to go over the time allocated.

When marking, I start a "comments bank" that I can cut and paste where required. Saves time writing out the same thing over and over again.

Use commuting time to deal with admin tasks like sending emails to professional services staff or the teaching team.

Don't volunteer to do anything at a meeting!!

Yes I also always schedule PhD student and research team meetings in hour long slots back to back so that they can't overrun. I think I am generous with feedback and support with PhD students but I have clear boundaries too and don't email or mark work at evenings or weekends. How old are your children? I find this time of year quite frazzling because the children are small and wound up plus v tired by the end of term. Once you are an experienced teacher I think big admin is much more stressful and depressing than teaching, though I do find that heavy teaching drains research/writing creativity more than heavy admin. When I had a big faculty admin job for a couple of years I wrote lots of footnotes in boring meetings because I was so desperate to be thinking about research instead!

Murmuration, this might be off topic, but I had a phase of waking up in the middle of the night having panic attacks and it was down the the mini pill I was on. I stopped taking it and felt so much better after only 3 days. Worth checking! Good luck everyone with your work loads. I'm a teaching fellow (so no research etc... to do) and I'm PT, I find it hard even with that, I've just given up trying to stick to contract hours and accept that I work longer, but can chill a bit in the summer.

Happy new year folks! I’m celebrating the fact that this is the only time of year I can i return from holiday and not find hundreds of emails to clear.

HAs anyone seen the AIBU on a lecturer not responding to a query about an assignment due Monday that they’ve had since start of December? I’m hoping said lecturer has been sensibly on holiday without email switched on. I cannot believe the 50/50 ratio on responses though.

imposter Happy New Year. I slightly disagree with you, fine to go on holiday, I usually take two weeks at Christmas, but crucially, I let my students know and my out of office reply also lets them know, so any questions about assignments or upcoming exams have to be asked before the end of term. I also usually allow a few days before an assignment or exam, so my students have early Jan exams, so I come back to work a few days before so they can email me if they need to. I think saying vaguely 'I'm around during the holidays' and then not being around for a week is quite bad. Nothing wrong with taking holidays as long as it's communicated so everyone knows what they have to do in relation to it.

Nearly, yes, I see your point. I think it all depends on what the lecturer said. I find it hard to believe they intended to be available during the Christmas closure period. It comes back to expectation management.

@GCAcademic gosh I'd be telling them no, this will not be read!
We have dept expectations about email times and I work part time (just gone down from 0.8 to 0.6, partly mental health, partly tricky DCs situation). I find students are understanding about my PT working. I have an UG project meeting half day (you come that time or wait till next week) and same for PG (I don't have any PhD students but I use the same slot for them and MSc students).

Thanks traynor, although I've been on the mini-pill for some 7 years but have only been having the panic-wakes for the last few months? Also definitely experienced some hints of depression this summer, surrounding an admin issue that got me massively stressed. I don't think I'm depressed, but I had been sliding into the not wanting to do things I enjoy type thinking (it all kicked off massively while I was on holiday, and I just wanted to lie down all day instead of actually doing my the holiday things). And they stopped when I took a few weeks off at Christmas and literally just started again now I've been back to work.