A Conversation with Louise Ryan

As part of the ACEMS 2018 Mentoring Series, ACEMS Chief Investigator Louise Ryan talks about her career and has advice for PhD students and early career researchers (ECRs).

In addition to her role in ACEMS, Louise is a Distinguished Professor of Statistics at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS), Adjunct Professor of Biostatistics at Harvard University, and is President of the International Biometric Society (IBS). (More info: https://acems.org.au/our-people/louise-ryan)

Louise shared her thoughts in a podcast conversation with ACEMS Industry Engagement Officer Jessie Roberts, ACEMS Research Fellow Jarod Lee (UTS), and ACEMS PhD student Farzana Jahan (QUT).

THE PODCAST IS AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS PAGE

Here are times for Louise's answers to the following questions. You'll note there are two different times, depending on what browser your computer is using:

1:32 (-45:30) – You’ve had an exciting career!   Did you plan for things to happen as they did, or did just evolve that way?

4:00 (-43:02) - What was it like going from Australia to Harvard to do your PhD?

5:30 (-41:34) - What was it like to work and study at Harvard, and how is the PhD experience different in the USA?

7:08 (-39:57) - When you were a PhD Student, how did you plan your next career step, and what helped or guided you to make your decision?

10:45 (-36:18) - You weren't sure what you wanted to do with your career when you started your postdoc. Do you find that the postdocs you supervise share that experience?

13:00 (-34:08) - Do you have any advice or feedback for international PhD students looking for a career in academia in Australia?

15:54 (-31:11) - How do compare your postdoc experience with current postdocs?

18:13 (-28:52) - How do make a five year plan for your career, when postdoc contracts are much shorter? How did it work with you?

21:23 (-25:41) - In 2009 after 30 years at Harvard, you decided to return to Australia to accept a position with CSIRO. Can you talk about that decision?

24:48 (-22:18) – Tell us more about your job at CSIRO?

25:54 (-21:12)- You left CSIRO to become a professor in the statistics department at UTS? Would you talk about your move to UTS?

26:55 (-20:05) - In your last answer, you talked about 'blended research.' What do you mean by that?

30:00 (-17:08) - Would you talk about balancing industry expectations with the requirements of working at a university?

31:20 (-15:44) - How are you able to establish 'boundaries' of what an industry partner would expect, so that you can still get some academic research done?

32:48 (-14:16) - Does the US do 'blended research' programs better than Australia?

35:20 (-11:47) - You seem to be working as hard as ever. Do you see yourself continuing that way into the future? 

39:24 (-7:43) - What advice would you give to a young person just starting out their career?

--