Reap what you sow

Ooooohhhhhh.....beginilah rupanya perasaan malas nak selenggara blog yeeeeee....finally I succumbed to this feeling. It has been more than 10 days since my last entry. After the conference in Kuching terus rasa macam tak larat nak buat apa2, nak take it easy aja. Although day in day out I subconciously collect material for this blog, tapi ada aku update kat sini?....o_O

Sebenarnya over the past few days ada juga terfikir tentang hala tuju belog ini...hasrat asal diwujudkan belog (seperti yang tertera di tepi itu) tak tau lah samada tercapai walaupun sedikit...yang benornya lebih menyeronokkan menulis tentang benda2 personal dan merapu2 dan handbag2 dan shopping2 tetapi since aku ni bukanlah incognito maka perlu la ada sedikit cover line di situ...

Entry kali ini terpanggil pulak untuk menulis sedikit tentang penerbitan jurnal; an entry mostly targeted to other young academicians who may be reading this blog...

KPI penting untuk seorang pensyarah adalah jumlah penerbitan yang diterbitkan pada setiap tahun. I learnt the hard way last year in 2009 that one needs to plan one year in advance in order to ensure that papers are successfully published for any particular year. I had already published 3 papers in 2008; coincidentally due to submitting them in 2007; that I let complacency get the better of me.

What was I doing in 2008? So distracted and engrossed was I with my quater life crisis that I forgot to plan for my 2009 publications. By the time I got back to my senses in 2009, it was already too late to achieve more than the minimum 1 paper requirement for a senior lecturer. Even though my KPI was met, but it felt like a huge blow when a couple of young high flying colleagues were churning out close to 20 papers! It is certainly no easy feat to publish papers especially ones with high impact factor! Nak publish a couple of papers pun sikit punya payah, ini kan pula berpuluh puluh! No wonder they were awarded Anugerah Penyelidik Cemerlang 2009 from the faculty! Apa kelebihan mendapat anugerah tersebut?

• Their own designated parking space for the year 2010, which is quite convenient considering the lack of parking space close to the faculty ;) I had already tasted this privelage when I was awarded Anugerah Pengajar Cemerlang 2008 and was allocated a parking space for the year 2009.
• Monetery incentives yang agak lumayan. Based on the quantity and impact factors of the papers I reckon they got around RM20,000 to RM30,000 each. Which is pretty decent considering that a few years back this kind of incentive was nonexistant.
• Of course the long list of publications contribute towards that Professorship baby!

Sebab aku dah sentap kan, I had to clean up my act. I invited my successful colleague to hold a publication workshop for my students at the end of 2009 to share tips of the trade on successful publication. My subsequent application from the university's Research Management Centre to bring my students for a publication retreat at a nice hotel was also granted. Alhamdulillah, most of the papers submitted following that workshop and retreat were successfully published in ISI Thomson citation indexed journals in 2010. Even though we have less than 10 papers this year, but I am really satisfied that our hardwork has paid off. I want to squeeze in a couple more publications if possible this year before preparing for 2011 publications. However, to do so I'll need to spend less time on here though...T_T

What are the tips of the trade for successful publication? Some are listed below...

• Ensure you have high quality figures and diagrams. Shoddy or unprofessional figures will often lead to instant rejection.
• Ensure the diagrams tell a story so that editors can quickly scan the paper and decide whether it is worth publishing or not.
• Sometimes it is usefult to directly contact the Chief Editor prior to submission mainly to introduce yourself and to build rapport with the journal.
• Aim for a few high impact factor journal publications or many low impact factor journal publications or even better, many high impact factor journal publications!
• Once you have penetrated a certain journal, it becomes easier to publish subsequent papers there. This is why it is useful to target high impact factor journals since once you are successful, subsequent papers are easier to publish there hence publication incentives become extremely lucrative!
• And what about writing papers even BEFORE you have any results in hand? Unheard of!!! But that is one of the effective strategies for mass publication. Because writing a couple of papers is one thing, but churning out 10, 20 papers each year is another. Nak apply for Professor pun you only need 30 papers, so bayangkan je lah!
• Unless you do everything on your own which is absolutely impossible considering the amount of multitasking in this career, supervising and managing your postgraduate students is key.
• Encourage teamwork among your students to produce papers together. This approach ensures better quality work for you and more papers for each student which is good for their own CV. A very desirable win-win situation.

Thank you Dr. A for sharing your success tips with my team. I look forward to the second workshop on mass publication with you after raya naaaaaa...Mudah2an meletup2 la publications macam anda ;)

So if you want your own Elsevier tree; a tree big and strong that provides shade and shelter and bears fruits for you throughout the seasons, start planting the seeds today and insyaallah you shall enjoy the fruits of your labour...

*Apart from Elsevier, other popular publishers include Taylor and Francis and Springer.


Kalau korang bosan baca entry ni, lepas ni saya buat entry handbag pulak eh hehehe! ;D


- A juggling act from my iPad