Engineering faculty from across the college came together on April 15 for the New Faculty Network Career Exchange, hosted by the Engineering Office of Faculty Development and Success. The session focused on lessons learned across four key areas of faculty life: teaching, research, work-life integration, and mentorship. It was designed to go beyond conversation, capturing practical tips and advice faculty can actually use. While part of the New Faculty Network, the discussion impacted more than new faculty. Participants left with strategies they can apply right away, a clearer sense of shared challenges, and questions that resonate no matter where they are in their academic careers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Associate Dean Joel Ducoste opened the session by challenging a common assumption: that teaching, research, mentorship, and work-life integration can be managed independently. Instead, he emphasized that strong, long-lasting faculty careers are intentionally designed by how these areas work together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As he shared, the most effective faculty are not simply managing tasks. They are:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
These reflections led to the session’s main activity: faculty-led conversations focused on the four dimensions of academic life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One of the most valuable aspects of the Career Exchange was how quickly the conversation moved from ideas to practice. Across teaching, research, mentorship, and work-life integration, faculty shared what they are actually doing<\/em> to make their work more manageable and more effective. While the strategies varied, four clear themes emerged.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Faculty are changing from reacting to everything that comes their way to being more intentional about the structure of their work. This shows up in minimal strategies, such as creating reusable course materials and templates instead of rebuilding each semester, setting clear expectations with students and research teams up front, and putting simple systems in place like shared documents, checklists, or workflows to reduce back-and-forth. Some faculty described redesigning class time to focus on discussion rather than content delivery, while others built writing routines or lab structures that keep projects moving without constant oversight. The goal is to set things up well once, so you are not solving the same problem every week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Across roles, faculty emphasized that long-term success is not about doing more, but about protecting the work that actually moves things forward. Whether it is carving out time for writing, focusing on high-impact teaching strategies, or creating routines that keep projects and people moving, the common thread is intentionality. Momentum is built through protected time, not leftover time. Deep work can only be accomplished when all distractions are eliminated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Relationships came up again and again as a key component to success. Faculty are being more deliberate about how they build networks, set expectations, and create accountability with students, collaborators, and colleagues. The work is not just about content or output. It is about creating the conditions for people to contribute and succeed together. Much of the buried wisdom is not written down. Exchanges like these can help with important knowledge transfer that move people in a positive direction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Faculty were candid that academic work is ongoing, not something you \u201csolve\u201d once. Instead of chasing balance, they are thinking more about sustainability over time. This shows up in setting boundaries, using strategic no\u2019s, and protecting energy, not just time. It also includes using tools and approaches that maintain quality without creating constant overload, building mentoring structures that do not rely on reactive effort, and managing research timelines and commitments in ways that are realistic long term. The takeaway is not about balance. It is about sustainability.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The reality is, all of this is connected. How you teach affects your time. How you mentor affects your capacity. How you structure your work determines what you can actually maintain over time. Faculty careers are not built by optimizing one area in isolation. They are built by intentionally connecting all of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This session was shaped by the openness and generosity of faculty who shared their experiences, strategies, and questions. Their contributions reflect a strong commitment to supporting one another and strengthening the broader academic community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thank you to the faculty attendees and contributors: Adriana San Miguel, Ashley Brown, Barbara Doll, Chuyi Chen, Douglas Call, Douglas Irving, Hui Li, Jason Hou, John Classen, Joel Ducoste, Leah Granger, Lokendra Pal, Luis Zambrano, Maria Mayorga, Mehran Mirramezani, Michael Daniele, Michael Dickey, Rohan Shirwaiker, Sharon Thorne, and Sunkyu Park.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Engineering faculty from across the college came together on April 15 for the New Faculty Network Career Exchange, hosted by the Engineering Office of Faculty Development and Success.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27809,"featured_media":1441,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ncst_custom_author":"","ncst_show_custom_author":false,"ncst_dynamicHeaderBlockName":"ncst\/default-post-header","ncst_dynamicHeaderData":"{\"caption\":\"\",\"displayCategoryID\":7,\"showAuthor\":true,\"showDate\":true,\"showFeaturedVideo\":false}","ncst_content_audit_freq":"","ncst_content_audit_date":"","ncst_content_audit_display":false,"ncst_backToTopFlag":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faculty-development"],"displayCategory":{"term_id":7,"name":"Faculty Development","slug":"faculty-development","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":7,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":9,"filter":"raw"},"acf":{"ncst_posts_meta_modified_date":null},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/engr.ncsu.edu\/faculty-development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/engr.ncsu.edu\/faculty-development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/engr.ncsu.edu\/faculty-development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/engr.ncsu.edu\/faculty-development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/27809"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/engr.ncsu.edu\/faculty-development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1432"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/engr.ncsu.edu\/faculty-development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1432\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1439,"href":"https:\/\/engr.ncsu.edu\/faculty-development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1432\/revisions\/1439"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/engr.ncsu.edu\/faculty-development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1441"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/engr.ncsu.edu\/faculty-development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/engr.ncsu.edu\/faculty-development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/engr.ncsu.edu\/faculty-development\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}1. Design Your Work, Don\u2019t Just Manage It<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
2. Protect What Builds Momentum<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
3. Be Intentional with People<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
4. Make Sustainability a Strategy<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The Bigger Takeaway<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Recognizing Faculty Contributions<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n