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Still waiting. I think we are alive now. Yes. Um Hi, everyone. Just do give me a sign if you can't hear us or if you can't see us. If you have any techni technical difficulties at all, just feel free to use the chat, but I hope you can see us and hear us at the moment. Um So welcome to another trainee research network education seminars um today. And my name is Ava and I'm a pediatric resident currently uh a research fellow uh based in London. And I am working with the R CPC Training Research Network as part of the Organizing Committee of Trees webinar series. Uh So for those uh who haven't joined us before to give a little um Background Trees is a um monthly webinar series uh particularly for trainees to help you get more um involved in research meets cap capabilities on portfolio. Um And I understand the basics of research uh research. Mainly we do run these sessions every last Tuesday monthly at 1 p.m. with a different team every month. And today's team will be mentorship in research and our amazing speakers will be um sharing um the experience with mentorship with us. So, unfortunately, our first speaker, Doctor um Sabe Ward um has only 20 minutes until her clinic starts. So um we will do the questions after each session. Uh For that reason, please do put them in the chat box. So I will be reading them if, if, if um doctor uh can, can't see them. So, without, for um I would like to introduce you our first speaker, Doctor Elizabeth, she's a consultant, pediatric neurologist based in Cambridge and a physician scientist uh committed to improving the diagnosis and care of Children with neurogenic conditions. She did her phd at the University of Cambridge investigating the role of genetic inheritance and genomic imprinting in developmental programming. Uh Thank you so much, Doctor Bedford for being with us today and I will let you tell more about your background and yourself. Um So the floor is yours, but I think I'm gonna have to share your slight. Um Please, apologies for that. Can everyone hear me? Fine? So I'm I'm Lizzie. Um As, as I said, um I'm AAA New pediatric urology consultant in Cambridge. Um I thought just very briefly, I would kind of tell you about my kind of research journey as it as it is. Um I never really intended to get in into research. I didn't grow up in this country. I had a very clear um career pathway in mind which was to leave the, the these rainy cold shores as soon as possible. And that didn't really go to plan largely because I got very interested in research. And I think the only thing I really want to highlight from this sort of overview of what my research journey has been is that it is a my experience at least has been absolutely not linear. So I think some people are able to construct really focused beautifully linear research careers where they step seamlessly from one related project into the next and everything aligns with their clinical interest. And um uh uh I have been someone who follows opportunities as they arise and I started doing research very early in my university career um and on something completely different. So my, my um my degree dissertation was a research project on on the notch pathway and hyperplasia. So much more relevant say to to cancer, for example. And then I did a phd in genomic imprinting and epigenetics and the major focus was the placenta. Although with time I became very interested in in the brain um and then have, have my clinical specialty. Uh I realized I wanted to be a neurologist. And so I've progressively shifted my research interest into uh neurology and neurogenetics. But I think sometimes we feel that we have to craft a kind of linear journey. And II that hasn't been my experience at least. So if you go to the next slide, so, so II guess I wanted to say, you know, why has mentorship, been useful for me and, and to reflect on, on that, I think the primary role for me has been one that my journey has been very nonlinear. And so having someone help me piece together what the next steps might be has been enormously powerful. And then this is the other thing that I want to say. So I think I my research career is viewed as successful. Um But um you know, if I was to present to you a linear CV, it might just say 2018, I started my academic ship 2024 I was successful in securing a welcome early career award. And that would give you a very um it would look as though my success was um seamless and the, the path was, was clear from the outset, but this has actually been the reality of my experience. So these are all of the different grants and projects that I have applied for uh in that time between 2018 and 2024. And my lectureship lasted six years because I had two babies during that time. So I had two maternity leaves as well. And um and I worked at 80%. And so for me having a mentor, uh having a variety of different mentors has been really important to a identify opportunities and b to help me pick myself up after these failures or rejections. And, and if there is one single skill that you need in in, in clinical academia, I think it's perseverance and, and having people around you that help you to regroup from a failure or rejection, identify the learning points, um act on that, build on it and move on to the next thing. So ever if we go to the next slide, so you know, what sort of flavors of mentor have I had or what flavors of mentorship exists? Well, there, there's, you know, temporary mentors lasting more longer term mentors. And, you know, I think both are really important and I certainly have had mentors who have been very influential either around particular scientific topics. You know, when I've been trying to learn a new technique, when I've been trying to reach into a new scientific field and also a career age specific, you know, the transitions are always difficult transitions to more responsibility, transitions from phd to a lectureship or a POSTOP and then from the lectureship on to something else. So each of those transitions are always challenging, particularly if there's a step up in responsibility or a change in role. And mentors are really, really valuable. And I think at the sort of beginning I've been very fortunate to always have very positive relationships with my research ps and they have been very generous and valuable mentors to me. And so initially, I didn't really think I needed another mentor because I felt that I was getting very valuable mentorship from them. And then on really just um recommended by um others who are further along the academic pathway. To me, they really stressed the importance of having an independent mentor, who's someone who's not a collaborator, not related to your specific scientific or, or clinical field and is from a different research institute. And initially, I wasn't, I trusted their knowledge and expertise and their sort of point in the career pathway. And so I thought, OK, well, then I should, if this has been so valuable to many other people, I should try to get one. And as a clinical lecturer, I was very fortunate to be able to take advantage of the Academy of Medical Sciences mentorship scheme, which is open to clinical lecturers, but also not just to clinical lecturers, also fought to others on different postdoctoral fellowships. And for a time, it was open to any clinician with a phd, although that may have changed now. But if, if you, I would a advise if you're interested to look at your eligibility and see if you would be eligible. And so I have a really wonderful generous mentor who's one of the Academy of Medical Sciences Fellows. She is not um uh she's uh you know, not related to my field. She's at a different research institute. And that independent view has been really valuable. I really wanted a clinician scientist because my research ps are not clinicians. And specifically, I had a lot of questions around navigating clinical academic career pathways and next steps. And she has been absolutely invaluable in helping me to kind of piece together my way. Um And she was also very valuable. I really struggled on my return from my first maternity leave, which wasn't something that I was expecting. And she was very generous in helping me work out what I was finding difficult and, and, and put in place some sort of structure and training and support and so on to navigate that and, and, and supporting me in thinking about what conversations I needed to have and how to approach it. I've really um benefited from near peer mentors.