Employees Get Career Advice at Women's Conference

Ioana Patringenaru | March 28, 2011

Kim Barrett, UC San Diego’s dean of Graduate Studies, was the keynote speaker at this year's Women's Conference.

Listen. Be generous. Take pleasure in other people’s accomplishments. Build a network of friends and peers. These were some of the pieces of advice Kim Barrett, UC San Diego’s dean of Graduate Studies, shared at the campus’ third annual Women’s Conference Wednesday at the Price Center.

This year’s theme was “(Re)Defining the UC San Diego Woman: Marketing Yourself.” Barrett is particularly well-suited to address this issue because she is one of the faces of the university in the outside world and the face of Graduate Studies on campus, said Tricia Bertram Gallant. Bertram Gallant is the staff co-chair of the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on the Status of Women, the conference’s main sponsor.

Barrett encouraged female staff members, faculty and students to try and become as extrovert as they possibly can. She also described herself as the shyest person in the world. If she can come out of her shell, anyone can, she said.

During her 30-minute talk, Barrett talked about her childhood, her academic career and her struggle to balance work and life. She grew up in the United Kingdom and was always interested in science and started checking out chemistry books from the library at the age of 7. She also begged for a chemistry set, which became her most prized possession. Her parents, who left school at age 14, were puzzled, she said.

Her parents split up when she was 13. But she earned a scholarship to an all-girls school with high academic standards. “That was the making of me,” she said. She still remembers the names of her teachers today. They were great mentors to her and encouraged her to go to college, she said. Barrett eventually chose University College London, which actively recruited her and where she went on to earn a doctorate. “The first day I walked into the department, I knew I’d come home,” she said.

There too she met a mentor, her doctoral thesis advisor, who convinced her to go to the United States. Barrett went to the National Institutes of Health, as a postdoctoral researcher. She works with diseases that don’t make for good cocktail party conversation, she joked. She specializes in gastrointestinal disorders, specifically cholera and diarrheal diseases. “You don’t get to choose your research path,” she said. “It chooses you.”

She figured out she would have to come out of her shell to raise funds, get papers published and impress students, she said. “You have to be a shameless self-promoter,” she said. “You have to get yourself on the map.” Still, she wonders every day how on Earth she got to UCSD, she said. She’s been here since 1985. “Everyone is so brilliant here,” she added.

Barrett said that throughout her career, she’s tried to build networks of colleagues and friends, and she advised her audience to do the same. She’s met with the same three School of Medicine professors for lunch once a month for 15 years, she said. She is also part of the campus’ Women’s Leadership Alliance.  Those in leadership positions need to make sure that people are on board with their unit’s mission but also get satisfaction out of their work, she said.

Barrett also acknowledged she has some regrets. For example, she never quite found the right time to have children, she said. She advised her audience not to wait until it’s too late. She also struggles with balancing work and life, she said. “My work is my life,” she added. But her husband of 11 years gives her a good reason to come home, she said.

The conference is just the beginning, Susan Marx, the faculty co-chair of the Chancellor’s Advisory Committee on the Status of Women, said after Barrett’s talk.

“You are on the start of your journey,” she said.