I just can't be fucking arsed any more.

[SmashedPumpkings]

It's a rainy Monday at the beginning of assessment and marking season, and I'm at a point in my life where flouncing off forever for an early retired filled with an absence of academic bullshit feels within reach.
No longer being fucking arsed with academic life seems like a perfectly natural reaction to this context.
But, still I need to be a little bit fucking arsed because I do actually need to do my job, if only with minimal effort and if only for a decade-ish.

My lack of arsed-ness is manifesting in several ways including, but not limited to:
> Not pursuing any new research avenues unless they are genuinely innovative, fascinating and/or disruptive. I have no fucks left to give for research which is safe and intending only incremental shifts.
> Not attending conferences or workshops unless there is a clear and direct benefit to me. I have no fucks left to give for hearing about other people's safe research which inevitably results in hardly-discernible incremental shifts.
> Only writing academic articles that excite me even if they are completely left-field from my core research area and not guaranteed 3/4*. I I have no fucks left to give for spending weeks agonising over writing articles that are dull but strategic.
> Putting only minimal effort into teaching such that I ensure the basics and foundations are sound while giving no attention to the singing and dancing add-ons because, shock horror, academia is not one long Tik Tok video. I have no fucks left to give for pedagogical practice which ignores the fundamentals of sound scholarship and assessment and, instead, focuses on shiny things in the name of some bullshit strategy.
> No longer answering stupid student questions. I have no fucks left to give for students who email with questions that have been answered both in person, in lecture materials and on Ultra sites.
> Completing my citizenship role to the absolute minimal standards and at a time which is convenient for me (barring meetings of course). I have no fucks left to give for roles which have minimal kudos attached, from which I get zero satisfaction and which I believe would be more effectively, and cheaply, done by a colleague on an administrator contract.

In short, I'm working to contract whereby I'm doing my job to an adequate quality but no more than that.
Though I'm still a decade away from leaving academia, I'm already beginning the process of winding down. In six or seven years I'll dispense completely with anything which is absolutely non-essential.

Thank you for giving me the time to vent this. For obvious reasons, I've name changed.

I wonder whether anyone else just can't be fucking arsed any more? And if so, how does your not arsed-ness manifest?

Time to do something else perhaps? Personally I've got 3 years left before I jump on the next voluntary severance train and head off into retirement.

Sillitonic raises an important question about postdocs/ECRs. To be honest I get the impression from the above discussion that most of us on this board are decades post that stage and much nearer retirement, so the advice here is not universally applicable. Some of it is what I've always done, but it's based on having got a permanent job when the job market was already difficult but not insane like it is now, and expectations of what you were supposed to do once in post were, while challenging in some ways, significantly lower than they are now. So, what to do? In all honesty, if you're already burnt out as a postdoc, I would advise leaving academia while you still can (most of us here are well past that possibility), and find a different career with reasonable working hours where you are not so taken for granted. No-one should be working 3 times more than they are contracted to - your health and wellbeing are much too important for that.

I was thinking the same @Whyisthemoonmadeofgreencheese reading the ECR post last night tbh. I didn't comment as I never did that - I'm what used to be called a teaching fellow and moved into academia from the financial services without doing a PhD so I'm in a privileged position.

There's a whole world out there @sillitonic, an early academic career is hard. DH went that route and he's doing fine now but he's a complete overachiever even within that world and we still made huge sacrifices to get him to where he is now, including living apart for two years during his fellowship.

@sillitonic Get out sooner rather than later, and carve out time to make it happen. My field is littered with people who should have moved on after a first post doc but hung on, not unlike an abusive relationship, because it’s difficult to let go of the academic dream. They hang around doing post doc after post doc and get bitter.

Some of ours become lab managers, programme managers or move to core facilities, but that works only in technical specialties where there are grants or core funds to pay for those roles.

OP, are you me? Did I write this and forget?

I think we may be at the same institution. If it's an institution with a four-letter acronym which should be three, and has a slogan with a pointless full-stop at the end.

Why don’t you consider a career change? If you’re in social sciences there a plenty of jobs in socio-economic research in private sector consulting- fairly well paid. Lots of demand for qual and quant research skills. Very interesting and impactful government research work

I like you very very much.

@WannabeHealthier I've looked on LinkedIn and not seen anything. How do you find this work?

unpopular opinion, but whatever: doing some extra stuff to get the next role is not unique to eCRs/academia. A big part of the issue seems to come from the belief that the extra stuff is not part of the job. It is. It is not "extra" - A postdoc is not a PhD+, a lectureship is not a postdoc with tenure.

i am old enough for my experience a while ago to be a bit dated - there was very little CPD, transferable skills training, internships when i did my phd or postdoc - and any time off project was massively frowned upon. I think people of my generation "accepted" a lot of shit and were a bit of a mug, and not many of my peers are still in academia (10% max).

job insecurity is shit. But the parts of the job that make me not want to be arsed have nothing to do with the research bits that should make the bulk of ECRs lives (not including teaching fellows here) - these bits are: endless committees, management, HR, finance, contracts and due diligence, more committees, court of appeal, ethics board, pastoral esp. suicide watch and high stake MH lookout, interviews, convening, complaints management, surveys inc NSS etc, deputising for senior management, ref bollocks, mediation, marking chatgpt, exam boards.

I am also in a part of the country where the competition is not "insane" - in fact, we often struggle to recruit...

ohhh and if as a postdoc/ECR your university is making you do the crap above, they are abusing you (and possibly the terms of the research funding)

@Marasme the parts of the job that make me not want to be arsed have nothing to do with the research bits that should make the bulk of ECRs lives (not including teaching fellows here) - these bits are: endless committees, management, HR, finance, contracts and due diligence, more committees, court of appeal, ethics board, pastoral esp. suicide watch and high stake MH lookout, interviews, convening, complaints management, surveys inc NSS etc, deputising for senior management, ref bollocks, mediation, marking chatgpt, exam boards.

All these things, which are timesucks.

Not to mention the poor collegiality, weak management, general unfairness.

There's another thread going where someone feels guilty for not setting assessments where students get the AI to do the essay - and then critique it. This seems to be coming into every module - and probably looks like it fits Faculty advice 'in a fast-moving space', but I can't think of a more boring assessment.

There is subtle pressure to ignore cheating unless it's very obvious, and to be very gentle even then.

There's a line of argument that if everything worked as it should, and we maintained a positive mindset, it would be a great job. All we have to do is prioritise - and bear with the current crisis. But it's not a good job. Over the last year I've begun to prioritise ruthlessly. Even at my most efficient, it's boring.

I wait til being commanded on high for altering assessments. If the university was genuinely very concerned about cheating, they could go back to in-person exams and oral exams, but that would be time-consuming and upset the students so they are not, I don't then feel obliged to change all my assessments because they aren't AI proof. The uni loves solutions that have you running around like a headless chicken, I just don't do it anymore.

I honestly think if you are that fed up as a postdoc you should try another career. No shame in it, it probably isn’t the career for you.

I agree with PP that working long hours as a junior establishing yourself is normal in professional jobs. Academia, law, medicine, all of them. There is unlikely to be a professional career-track job where you don’t work more than your contracted hours, as you need to learn skills and demonstrate them

to the OP, what level are you at? Assoc prof ?

@Marasme
The profiles we need to have to get permanent work are totally different to the ones people needed to have even 10 years ago. I got rejected from an entry level ECR job at an ex poly which required 'track record in funding', as well as extensive pubs etc....most of the permanent staff at this ex-poly don't even have PhDs!! This is why me and my ECR colleagues are spending non-working hours writing grants.

So it really frustrates me when you guys say 'oh we all went through this its normal'...

I'm sorry but this simply wasn't the case before, at least not in my field. I don't resent senior staff for their luck, but I also find it patronising if they are talking down to ECRs who actually have more funding/ books/ publications than they do.

Where in the country are you? Because, I'm literally applying everywhere.

@PinkMildred

There is a junior doctors dispute with the NHS at the moment, because junior doctors are attempting to challenge these kinds of attitudes. You should not need to work overtime to 'learn new skills and demonstrate them'. Would you tell this to a postdoc working on a project of yours?

Saying we should expect to work more than our contracted hours is also disproportionately pushing women out from these roles due to childcare responsibilities.

@gyrt - i m in the North

everyone i know (now and in my ECR days) write grants in evenings and WE. During the day, we do the crap admin i wrote about above. During the evening/WE, we remember that our staff need new contracts to keep their jobs, so we write. And we wish the system was not so brutal, so we accept more committees to try to change things, little by little, for ECRs who are, i find more and more, mostly ungrateful of all our efforts. Apparently we are "complicit" or "toxic" - so yes, it really motivates me to go advocate, help, support, mentor, counsel, write letters, more grants, etc.

It might not be "right" but it s the state of play, and i don't think it will change anytime soon, especially with the state of HEI at the moment.

It s also pretty much like that in the charity sector also.

My advice to all my postdocs and the ECR I mentor is:
1 - get out if you don't like the asks on time. It will not change. Find your purpose, the one where you don't mind the hours or the role.
2 - if wanting to stick, pick the low hanging fruits to get that funding experience- this includes the small network pump priming funds with >50% success rates. I manage two of these in my discipline and next to no ECR apply (or come to the info sessions)
3 - stop assuming the generations just before you got lucky, or got it easy. Most asst/assoc prof are fairly "young". Same goes for many full profs.
4 - your last point re childcare responsibilities - unless you are a single parent, it is a responsibility that can be split between 2 parents, not just mothers.

I totally agree.

i haven’t been to a school meeting or a programme lead meeting for a year. I have over 4000 unread emails in my inbox, I don’t respond to anything on Teams. My marking isn’t going to get done in the arbitrary time constraints this year. I don’t have time to do the timetables for next year and am ignoring the increasingly angry emails from the timetabling dept. I’ve done no research in 3 years and just ignore anyone who attempts to talk to me about it.

I am far less stressed now I’ve decided I just don’t give a shit.

😂

As someone working in academic research support, I hear you!

@gyrt I agree that the needs are different, in that to get a lectureship, much more is required than it was in the past. We aren't going back there, though, if anything there are job cuts coming, especially at the higher levels (as very expensive). I'd think if this is the career path you want. I still like it despite not having a permanent job til around aged 40, and many of my friends, especially women, have struggled with the early years or just stopped, but once and if you can get beyond that, it's still a good job (for me, anyway).

I also agree with @Marasme about picking the low-hanging fruit, many of my post-docs (or even during the PhD) don't do much of the things I tell them to do which are easy wins, in funding, in networks, in terms of writing and so on. I find it frustrating how disengaged many of them are with their research areas, I think home working and living away from your institution hasn't helped with this, plus the lack of travel in the Covid-19 era. It took me a long time to get going though as a researcher, so I'm kind of sympathetic.

@ItsallIeverwanted

Of course we are not going back there. But I'm making the point that, due to this state of play, many ECRs these days can be leaders in their fields before getting a permanent job - most where I am are on prestigious grants within a couple of years and do high profile impact stuff. There are also attendance expectations - I don't recognise your description of ECRs where I am at all.

I like my job because I have always had wonderful PIs, going back to my PhD. The 'extra' work I do has nothing to do with demands from them - I'm quite capable of doing my contracted work within contracted hours - but rather the insane profiles we are expected to have to get any stable work now. Of course its not going to change.

If I had a PI who routinely expected me to work more than my contracted hours, and said that childcare shouldn't stop me because I have a partner, I would just leave to be honest.

@gyrt

your words were "Saying we should expect to work more than our contracted hours is also disproportionately pushing women out from these roles due to childcare responsibilities"

my response had nothing implying "childcare shouldn't stop me because I have a partner"

going back to the point of the thread, though - you point out that your PIs do/did not ask you to work outside of the hours, but that perceived norms dictate this (I say perceived, because where i am, we appoint on a fairly narrow field of competition, with noone stellar with amazing profiles - these roles may not be cool enough to interest ECRs, after all, they are rank and file R&T contracts, nothing special, up north, albeit in an "old" uni)

the extra hours i do are because my head of school and senior management specifically make these demands, because for every NSS that we tank, every weak REF result, we get beasted and get threats of VR/CR. Because the new promised lectureship/replacement to retiring colleague we ve been fighting for gets pulled.

for people like me - why stay? it s a good question and probably has a lot to do with sunken cost fallacy, and being too old to retrain, move to another sector which will be similarly fucked up, and having enough rage from 25 yrs of taking a lot of shit from everyone more senior and more junior to dig our heels in and say fuck you to the system whilst still trying to make it make sense

for people like you - why look for a permanent position in academia if you know that you resent what you call the extra stuff, and what we all call "the good parts of the job".

sorry to come across a bit hard, but lets stop pretending that it s all roses once you get where you think the end of the tunnel is.

I love this. You sound awesome and I want to be your friend.

Thanks for everyone's response to this. It's really fascinating to read the replies and different perspectives.

I'm SL at an RG University in social sciences for PP who asked.

I worry that I've been a bit negative in my framing on my not being arsed-ness. I'm not at all. Like PP have suggested, I'm focusing on the good parts of the job and sacking off the bad parts. Some of the bad parts still creep in <eyes pile of 150 essays to mark> but they cab be handled.