In Chapter 12 of 19 in her 2011 Capture Your Flag interview with host Erik Michielsen, Stacie Grossman Bloom answers "How Did You Turn Extensive Travel as a Science Editor into Building a Better Network?" Regular travel to conferences and labs provides her a platform to meet new scientists, authors, and reviewers and build relationships over time. Peer professional relationships help Grossman Bloom use publishing contacts - first Nature Medicine and then Journal of Clinical Investigation -to build her network.
Stacie Grossman Bloom is the Executive Director at the NYU Neuroscience Institute at NYU Langone Medical Center. Previously, she was VP and Scientific Director at the New York Academy of Sciences (NYAS). She earned her PhD in Neurobiology and Cell Biology at Georgetown University and did a post-doctoral fellowship at Rockefeller University in New York City. She earned her BA in Chemistry and Psychology from the University of Delaware.
Transcript:
Erik Michielsen: How did you turn extensive travel as a science editor into an opportunity to build a better network?
Stacie Grossman Bloom: You know, one of the things that was great about working at Nature Medicine was getting to go to all of the scientific conferences and all of the lab visits all over the world. Those are great opportunities for networking. One skill that I think is important to have as a scientist is the ability to interact socially with other people. And so, being at a conference in a far away place is a great opportunity to have a drink with someone, have dinner with someone, talk to someone, become friendly with someone, and then stay in touch afterwards.
Erik Michielsen: As someone that has changed job functions a couple of different times, how did you keep that networking relevant in what you do?
Stacie Grossman Bloom: The best network I built up was really when I was at Nature Medicine. Just the pool of authors and reviewers and scientists who I worked with there, that became a really important resource for me. So when I left Nature Medicine I went to another journal called The Journal of Clinical Investigation, the reason I went to The Journal of Clinical Investigation was because my former colleague from Nature Medicine hired me to work there, so that was a key factor. But, even at the New York Academy of Sciences I was able to bring that whole network with me. There are still a lot of scientists that I work really closely with who I met way back when, I was just starting out, when I had just left the lab. I would say now through my work with the academy, that network grows and grows and grows.