1. Emory University Department of Cell Biology
PI received only 1/3 of her grant. I was brought in to manage the mouse colonies and take care of genotyping, but that was no longer a luxury they could afford.
Interesting side note – the woman who trained me in PCR trained me to do it her way. I'd never done PCR outside of a college lab setting, so nothing seemed out of the ordinary. But I struggled mightily. After a week of errors and poor results, the PI wanted to observe my technique for herself and provide instruction, if necessary. Immediately she couldn't believe what I was doing and had me change everything. After that, my PCR results were perfectly fine (ask me what made my trainer's technique so error prone!).
This was an invaluable lesson in how not to train technicians (got lots of those!), and a reminder that there are apparently a number of different ways to perform the same protocol. If you only know one of them and have closed yourself off to anything new, you can't possibly be reaching your potential (because potentially there's a much better way that you're refusing to adopt).
2. St. Joseph's Research Institute
This was a temporary consulting job all the way. It was also part-time, so my search for full-time work never stopped.
3. Emory University: Department of Pathology
After 18 months, the grant that was paying my salary was exhausted. I was able to find my next position rather quickly and didn't have to take any time off in-between jobs.
4. Metametrix
2008 was the summer of exorbitant gas prices, and my commute was from Buckhead to Duluth. Being against traffic means little when you're hitting red lights every 37 feet. But I didn't really care about gas prices – I cared about wasting hours of my life sitting at stoplights on a regular basis. 35 to 40 minutes one-way meant 70-80 minutes of sitting in the car accomplishing nothing 5 days a week. I couldn't take it. That, and I wanted to be back at Emory on a college campus playing intramurals. I was 25… When someone offered me a job 15 minutes from home for the exact same salary, with the added benefits of being on a college campus – at the time it was a no-brainer (4-time intramural champion). Moreover I was finishing all of my work at Metametrix before lunch; I needed a lab with a backlog of samples, even if it wouldn't last long once I started. This was the 2nd of 4 labs that wouldn't have enough samples to keep me busy.
5. Emory University: Department of Human Genetics
I said it was a no-brainer "at the time" because I learned a valuable lesson. At Metametrix, my boss understood how valuable I was. He'd offered me a 20% raise and a 4-day work week to stay (4-day work week isn't appealing, though; I prefer to work 7 days a week), but I had intramural championships to defend and my position on sitting in the car all day 5-days-a-week hadn't changed, so I said no.
But I didn't truly understand the value of having a boss who understands your worth. When your boss appreciates you, life can't get much better. At least for me, because I want to be indispensable. When your boss relies on you because he knows how capable you are, you get that much closer to being indispensible.
But this lab had no room for advancement, anyway (something I failed to consider when I accepted the position). I heard the dreaded "because that's how we've always done it" more times than I care to remember. And not as an excuse for not changing something, but as the reason I should stop asking why it's done that way and accept it.
Long story short, I decided to pursue writing (comedy, specifically). And with no real ideas on how to go from biology to comedy writing, and since I loved being in school, getting a Master's in Journalism and Mass Communication seemed like just as good an idea as any.
6. Medical Neurogenetics
Even though he'd only seen me in action for about 8 weeks, seven years ago, my old boss from Metametrix tracked me down to put me in charge of his new lab. I accepted.
7. Dunwoody Labs
It's a long story. I was Employee of the Year so please believe me when I say the story isn't one that would paint me in a negative light, it's just long and complicated (and actually doesn't have much to do with me).
