How to Be a Happy Academic

Alexander Clark - University of Alberta, Canada
Bailey Sousa - University of Alberta, Canada

Additional resources:

Courses:
Career Planning & Professional Development | Career Planning & Professional Development | Study Skills | Study Skills |

April 2018 | 240 pages | SAGE Publications Ltd

Want to be an effective, successful and happy academic? This book helps you hone your skills, showcase your strengths, and manage all the professional aspects of academic life. With their focus on life-long learning and positive reflection, Alex and Bailey encourage you to focus on your own behaviours and personal challenges and help you to find real world solutions to your problems or concerns.

Weaving inspirational stories, the best of research and theory, along with pragmatic advice from successful academics, this book provides step-by-step guidance and simple tools to help you better meet the demands of modern academia, including:

Optimising your effectiveness, priorities & strategy
Workflow & managing workload
Interpersonal relationships, and how to influence
Developing your writing, presenting and teaching skills
Getting your work/life balance right.

Clear, practical and refreshingly positive this book inspires you to build the career you want in academia.

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ISBN: 9781473978805	Paperback	Suggested Retail Price: $47.00	Bookstore Price: $37.60
ISBN: 9781473978799	Hardcover	Suggested Retail Price: $143.00	Bookstore Price: $114.40
ISBN: 9781526449054	Electronic Version	Suggested Retail Price: $42.00	Bookstore Price: $33.60

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Introduction

Why is this Book Needed

Get the Most from this Book

Doing the Right Things Right: The Success Pyramid and The Core

Language and Terminology Issues

Theoretical Basis and Features

Chapter 1: Academic Knowledge Work as Extreme Knowledge Work

What is Academic Knowledge Work?

The Nature of Academic Knowledge Work

The Challenge of 'Extreme Knowledge Work' for Academic Workers

Section One: Choosing the Right Academic Work: The Success Pyramid

Chapter 2: Values in Academic Work

Values and Identity in Academic Work and Workers

Exploring Your Values

Values and Integrity

Reactions to Value Conflicts in Academic Workplaces

First Steps to Workable Strain: Increase Your Values Literacy

Chapter 3: Success and Its Indicators

What Success Looks Like in Academic Work

Success Is Not Equal (Especially Around Gender)

Success Is About Work and Life

Success and Quality Are Different

Is Success Subjective or Objective?

Approaching Success in Academic Knowledge Work: Occluded Games and Genres

Success Indicators and The Success Pyramid

Success Indicators over Academic Careers

Challenges in Selecting Success Indicators

Chapter 4: Doing the Right Things I: Effectiveness, Priorities, and Strategy

Priorities: The Key to Effectiveness

What Is Strategy?

Common Challenges with Good Strategy

Chapter 5: Doing the Right Things II: Goals, Tasks and Time

Time in Academic Work

Goals in Academic Work

Common Challenges when Goal Setting

Tasks in Academic Work

Handling Tasks

Common Challenges with Tasks

Section Two: Developing The Core

Chapter 6: Creativity: Adding the Vital Spark

Being and Staying Creative or ‘The Battle for Creativity’

Threats to Creativity

Chapter 7: Human Work and Self-Work

The Scope and Nature of Human Work

What Affects Human Work?

Human Work Done Well: First Steps

Relationships in Academic Work

Building Relational Networks

Feedback

Teams and Working Groups

Conflict

Human Work, Self-Work: A Journey Without End

Chapter 8: Learning: Success, Failure and the Growth Mindset

Mindsets in Academic Work

Learning for Growing: What and Why

Failure: Necessary and Useful

Successful Failure: A Six-Step Approach

Chapter 9: Influence: Persuasion and Connection

Rhetoric: The Basis for Better Influence

Invention: Arguments, audience, and success

Arrangement, style, and delivery: Connection and identification

Memory: Practised, effortless spontaneity

Above all: Be self-aware, but be yourself

Chapter 10: Write Anything Better

The Vulnerability of Writing in Academic Work

Different Types of Writing in Academic Work

The Quality-Prevalence Paradox of Academic Writing

The Limitations of Trick, Tips and Social Media

Genre: A Different Approach to Academic Writing

Chapter 11: Developing Better Habits and Systems

Everyday Tasks: Marginal and Fundamental Gains

Taming Everyday Tasks

Other Systems, Routines, and Habits

Section Three: Bringing It All Together

Chapter 12: Projections, Introspections, and Reflections on Academic Work

Thinking Forward: The Future of Academic Work

Thinking Inwardly: Reading Your Own Reactions

Thinking On: What We Learned Writing this Book

Supplements

Effective Academic website
Visit Alex and Bailey's website The Effective Successful Happy Academic for information about their workshops and publications.

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Chapter 3: Success and its indicators

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How to Be a Happy Academic
A Guide to Being Effective in Research, Writing and Teaching

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