• Question: Is your work stressful

    Asked by 07jeyre to Gioia, Iain, Jo, Leo, Mariam on 14 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Iain Moal

      Iain Moal answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      Some times it is. Too much stress isn’t good, but too little stress isn’t good either. If I didn’t have any pressure, I wouldn’t be as motivated as I am. My work is funded by a charity, so people do all sorts of things to raise money for it. That means that I feel a big responsibility to them to make sure that I do everything I can. At the moment I’ve been really busy. I haven’t had a day off in two weeks, not even weekends!

    • Photo: Leo Garcia

      Leo Garcia answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      My work isn’t very stressful at all, although many other PhD students tell me that they are stressed out!

      I suppose that almost any job has the potential to stress you out – the important thing is to stay on top of your work, and put your job in perspective. Also, there are systems in place in my PhD for help if you can’t cope with your workload – so whilst a bit of stress from time to time can be expected, there’s no reason for the whole experience to be stressed out!

    • Photo: Joanna Watson

      Joanna Watson answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      Hi 07jeyre.

      Sometimes my work is stressful – like when there are deadlines for meetings or funding applications. It can also be stressful when I’m trying to get my work published in a journal and you’re waiting to hear back about whether they liked it or not.

      Most of the time it’s not stressful though because I enjoy it so much. The people I work with are great, and always having someone around to help out, or just to talk to when I’m trying to work through a difficult problem really helps too.

      Jo.

    • Photo: Gioia Cherubini

      Gioia Cherubini answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      Hi 07jeyre,

      it’s not always stressful, but there are times when the pressure goes up, for example when I need to have the result for an experiment by a specific day or when I have to give a meeting or when I have to present my work to an international conference! I love the thrill, but after that I always feel exhausted by the stress!

    • Photo: Mariam Orme

      Mariam Orme answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      It can be stressful at times, yes. Sometimes there’s time pressure to get a result because you want to present it at a meeting, and sometimes experiments just don’t work and it can be very stressful trying to figure out why. But probably the most stressful thing is finding funding to do my work: I have to apply to charities and to the government to get the money to pay for my research, and it can be tough!

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