Productivity & Time Management

Monday, January 08, 2024, 5:30 – 6:30 PM CST

This one-hour interactive session will provide graduate students with strategies and resources for improving their time management and productivity. We will discuss the culture and features of life as a graduate student, examine how individuals react and respond to productivity demands, and share best practices and resources for creating individual productivity plans.

Topics to be covered include:

  • Differences in stages of graduate student life/responsibilities
  • The planning fallacy phenomenon
  • Understanding short-term vs long-term project planning
  • Goal-setting (including interactive SMART goals breakout activity)
  • Overview of recommended online (& other) productivity tools
  • Work-life balance
  • Practicing self-care and compassion (including ‘how to say no’)

Learning outcomes:

  • Understanding the priorities and practices of graduate school
  • Recognizing how, when, and why those priorities shift and change throughout graduate training
  • Understanding of goal-setting based on personal values and vision
  • Introduction to relevant productivity tools and strategies

Natalie Lundsteen, PhD

Assistant Dean for Student Affairs, Anne Burnett Marion School of Medicine at Texas Christian University

Dr. Lundsteen is the Assistant Dean for Student Affairs at the Anne Burnett Marion School of Medicine at Texas Christian University. She has advised and taught postdocs, graduate students, and alumni from all academic disciplines at Boston University, MIT, Oxford University, and Stanford University. She is a PhD career advice contributor to Inside Higher Ed’s weekly ‘Carpe Careers’ blog, which offers PhD career advice every Monday, and co-author of ReSearch: A Career Guide for Scientists, and can often be seen on the American Society for Cell Biology’s online ‘Ask Me Anything’ events providing career and professional development advice.  Natalie is a Past President of the Graduate Career Consortium, an international organization comprised of professionals leading career and professional development for postdocs and PhDs.