To tell my prestigious job to do one

[Magnoliamarigold]

I recently returned from my mat leave, my job is as a postdoctoral researcher at an oxbridge university. Lots of Nobel prizes and OBEs at the department. When I got it it was my dream job.

I'm pouring from an empty cup. Baby is five months old and refusing to go to her dad, I am doing all the night feeds. The other day I slipped down the stairs and fell with the baby in my arms, and my back is in a bad way.

Because the role is so prestigious, my employer takes the . During my mat leave I was asked to use up all my KIT days voluntarily, so that publications could still go ahead. It was non negotiable. I was not paid during my mat leave despite being told I would be. I told them I was pregnant at the beginning of the year, but when I was in hospital being induced I was still having to answer emails about my mat leave as the HR woman hadn't yet got round to it. I have been asked to work on bank holidays, I have been asked to work 4/5 days a week even though I am contracted at 2.5 days. My boss is a professor who has not taken one sick day, or annual leave day in the entire time I have known her. She works bank holidays and a lot of weekends. She works when she's on holiday. Work is her life. Most recently I have been asked to take on a large amount of work that I probably would have been able to do previously, but I am so sleep deprived, my brain is so sluggish, and frankly I can't be bothered anymore.

I'm fed up, and tomorrow morning I am having an ad hoc review with this professor - she is unhappy with my work since coming back from mat leave and is clearly making a paper trail to give me some sort of kick up the and get me working at pace again.

I'm thinking of doing one of the following:

1. Make a record of all the unprofessional things I have had to put up with and use an HR mediator (albeit it might be the useless woman again, and will cause me a massive amount of stress)
2. Tell boss, shove it, I am taking the rest of my mat leave, take the financial hit and will come back when the baby is 1.
3. Work with her to improve my outputs in a way that everyone is happy

Has anyone been in this position? What should I do?

No one is underplaying OPs amazing academic achievements. We are talking about her role, in an academic setting, where she is being treated very badly. There is nothing prestigious about working under such conditions, in such a setting. No one needs to suffer for the sake prestige.

The only real, and ultimately legitimate reason to do a postdoc is if one is determined to become a PI one day. Having a PhD might be prestigious, but being a postdoc is really not. If you get stuck there it is dead end in your career and this can happen quite easy. Especially with women. I got stuck with 10+ of postdoctoral experience and basically that’s it.

That’s why I’ve given up on the academia/research circle jerk. The effort to get your name out there and half of it is utter crap that isn’t adding anything, and on and on, and it’s badly paid.
I either don’t feel like what I do actually serves a purpose BUT earn good money, or earn bad money but feel like there’s a purpose to it. No money no purpose, f* that.

To the previous poster who said the funding didn't cover mat pay, that is always the case, but most funders allow and extension of the bid. Regardless of that if the University employs the post doc on a fixed term substantive contract the contractual terms apply to the fixed term role if the funder doesn't pick up the tab, then the university has to and shoukd deal with it separately from the budget pertaining to the bid.

Even if a subsidiary company were used to employ some staff on different T&C UK emoyment law would still apply and the individual would still be eligible for statutory mat providing they met the statutory provision of 26 weeks' service by the 15th week prior to the expected date of confinement.

Also as part if their Athena Swan awards several academic units I know of have committed to providing extra financial and/or research support to women coming off ML. This is worth investigating.

Even if it doesn’t directly apply to you, OP, your supervisor’s behaviour within such an allegedly supportive space would be particularly egregious. Chances are higher that you would have a meaningful local advocate with some influence.

To the previous poster who said the funding didn't cover mat pay, that is always the case, but most funders allow and extension of the bid.
That was me, and the RCUK funder wouldn't give us any more money (either for more RA time or for enhanced maternity pay for the RA).
I got the impression the university didn't really know what to do with an RA funded by RCUK who was on maternity leave, and they were just grateful she only got SMP. We did ask the RC for more money to cover the lost training time (and the time lost due to my mat leave) but they wouldn't give us any. There was no specific mechanism for applying for any, you basically had to beg and they just said no.
Contrast with an RCUK funded PhD (OK, in the dark ages) which I did and when I had a nasty accident and was laid up for months, my supervisor just asked them for 9 months extra money and they said yes.

This perhaps isn't all that helpful, but it is meant in solidarity! I left academia in part because I found the experience of going back to my Oxbridge postdoc after having DS1 so horrible; I actually did move to another postdoc at a different institution and that was even worse, so the real nail in the coffin! I also just found that mat leave, and being out of that environment for a few months (though I also spent some of the six months I took editing a book and writing articles, which I deeply regret looking back) just changed my perspective - the scales just fell from my eyes. I realized that basically no one cared about the niche area or the 'big names' in it that had been my whole world and which had seemed so high stakes. I couldn't get myself back to a feeling that what I did mattered and I wasn't sure I wanted to.

Anyway, I left. I still work in a university and although my new career has quite a lot of stresses and issues - in part because I've been rapidly promoted and so now have a lot of responsibility, which is a nice contrast to my huge struggle to get my foot in the door with academia! - I don't regret the decision to leave academia, ever. The more time passes the gladder I am!

Your option list:- Forget 3, They will never understand your POV. If they get sympathetic and agree to changes. They will ignore as soon at the first crisis.

Bit of a side point, but what is your job of you work in a university but you describe it as not-academia? It is a managerial type role?

Yes - I was originally employed to coordinate a specific project between the university and an external body but I now manage one of the central professional services functions.

Adding to this message - your university absolutely should pay the maternity pay for postdocs out of central funds. i had this argument with my uni back 10 years ago and they agreed it was their legal responsibility. If it comes up again, don't ask for money, don't beg the department, just tell them that they are paying. And they will - they have to.

I imagine that the OP meant it was prestigious in the sense of working in a very high ranking lab. Such positions are really difficult to get and a lot of people are prepared to make personal sacrifices
for them, which is why they get away with treating people like crap.

Sounds like you are not ready to be back to work.

in my experience, prestigious, ‘good for CV’ places often tend to come at a price!

you need to decide what’s important to you!

Female post-docs are treated like shit. Academia is still totally misogynistic.

Former Russell Group STEM admission tutor here, OP. You have some excellent advice, particularly from @RampantIvy. We unequivocally prefer quality over quantity.

It is definitely not recommended to do Physics without Maths A level. The positive side of this is that the two reinforce each other to some extent, particularly if you elect the Mechanics modules in Maths.

If your DD really wants to do more. - and with those GCSE grades, which are good to very good, but not stellar, I would prefer to see her concentrate on doing her best in her A levels -
an EPQ she is enthusiastic about is much more doable. She can finish that up in Autumn term of Y13.

Sorry, wrong Board

I think that's just the nature of academia. Me and DH were both part of it and both eventually left. It's become so much more competitive than it was 30 years ago when you did a PhD got a job as a professor and worked 9-5. Now it involves loads of 2 year post-docs moving from place to place. A gruelling teaching schedule and a massive pressure to publish and win grants or there'll be no next job. I did love my field and enjoyed some elements of teaching but wouldn't go back. DH now works in finance and earns ten times his salary for fewer hours (he also gets to do interesting research - although definitely less esoteric). I work for a charity part time and am much more relaxed. It's easier to become obsessed with the academic career trajectory but there are other jobs and they're usually less stressful!

That's pretty appalling considering they are post doc. I am mid way through my remote masters with UOY and have just begun my new analyst role with a well known STEM company on just shy of £40,000 including my base pay, monthly wfh allowance and 9% bonus pay. And that wage is only listed as just above entry level for my company! My team leader is on just over £45,000 base pay (not including any other bonuses) and our senior manager nearing £60,000 for their base pay. As comparison my team leader has been with the company one year and has newly completed their masters, also before this role I worked within the project support sector for around 3-5 years and my TL similar for the same time roughly in tech support. Considering the work put in, the wage isn't proportionate really for your DS to be achieving lecturer on such a low wage comparison! They should really look at going private they would be paid so much better!

Oh and just to add, with my role I wfh, have flexibility to literally work from anywhere as we are a global company and get brilliant benefits including medical, EV schemes and twice a year paid travel and stay to our HQ.

You don’t sound like you are wedded to academia in general - if this is the case, have you considered transferring to industry (biotech, pharma, journals, tech, medical communications)? I haven’t worked in these type of companies, but it is worth investigating whether pay or working conditions are better there - it sounds terrible in your current dept. Wishing you all the best.