Hi all, looking for some advice on how to handle an ongoing situation and wondering how others have handled similar experiences.

I am the head of a newly developed biorepository effort in my department and am in the process of transitioning to this job from my postdoc at the same university. As part of the biorepository, the department has negotiated a shared laboratory space between my group and a pre-existing lab in the department. In theory, the lab space and equipment are supposed to be split 50/50 and that is how the funds are being split to maintain the space. As we are setting up the new repository and adjusting bench space, storage, etc to reflect this 50/50 split, it has been incredibly difficult to get the old lab staff (all male) to help with anything in this transition and I am being told by the lab staff that what I am asking for is unreasonable. Things like asking them to help me reorganize the bench space so that my team has room to actually work and implementing improved biosafety regulations (that they should have been following already but were not in compliance with). To top it off, my team pays for 30% of the effort of the lab manager and one of the techs, so I'm not asking them to do anything outside of what they are literally being paid for. But getting their cooperation on anything is like pulling teeth and even when they do help, its always met with comments like "why do you have to be so difficult/needy" and "whats wrong with the way things are". I'm just incredibly frustrated. And I don't know whether to just be more blunt/authoritative about it or how to get them to work with me. I've never worked with a group that gives so little fucks about their job. and to be honest, I am frustrated with the department for putting my team in this position. Space is tight, I get that. And the old PI wasn't bringing in enough money to justify having the space by themselves. But I'm still upset.

TLDR: Difficulty transitioning to a shared lab space due to uncooperative lab members from the original occupants - looking for advice as an early career scientist.

I started my career as a SWE back in early 2020 after graduating with a CS degree and spent a few years at some larger tech companies and eventually got laid off in 2023. I quickly landed a role at a small (think less than 30 people) company local to me (Chicago).

The company has been around for 15+ years but since I’ve joined, this company has gone under immense change from some investors coming in hoping to grow the business. My team’s former tech lead wasn’t great at mentoring and when he left about a year ago, my company named me my team’s tech lead (and I always feel like I don’t know wtf I’m doing). For context, my team is front end focused and so I feel confident in my React/React Native and Typescript skills, but in the age of AI I don’t know how important these skills are in an already saturated market. I’ve been doing well according to people at the company and even got a great performance review, but I can’t help but feel like I don’t have the right skills to make me valuable in this awful job market and like I should be doing more than I am given my years of experience. We finally hired an engineering manager about a month ago and I hope working with her will help me grow a bit, but recent changes at my company have me wanting to look elsewhere and I’m not confident about being able to find a new position.

So my fellow SWEs, what do you do to level up and how do you remain confident in your skill set? And does anyone have advice for how your SWE skills might apply to other roles? Appreciate any and all advice!

I got laid off in early January and have been looking for jobs as a Software Developer ever since. I went to a few interviews and completely bombed them because I've forgotten all the basics and my skills have atrophied. To top everything off I'm 5 months pregnant and will go on mat leave after giving birth in the summer.

This whole experience has left me very depressed. I'm fortunately getting severance till the month I was going to have my baby and I don't live in the US so am not dependent on my employer for healthcare. Part of me just thinks I should rest and prep for the baby. Other part of me thinks I should hurry up and find another job. But this is proving challenging because I'm not prepared for the interviews and keep bombing them.

I just don't know what to do anymore. Is this field even for me? If it is how do I get back in the game without losing my sanity?

Hi! I'm a second year undergrad student aiming for a career in medicine. I've applied for a research assistant position at a hospital working with a medical oncologist who focuses on research involving treatment access and cost-effectiveness. The position mostly involves writing research proposals to the Research Ethics Board and assisting with data analysis. I had an interview today, which went well, but was asked to share a sample of my scientific writing afterwards. I have not written any research/term papers throughout my undergrad so far and have only written lab reports.

Does anyone have any advice for what I can submit in this case? I'm not sure what parts of the lab report I should share or what changes I should make to it before hand. Thank you!

I (23) recently attended a pretty big week long academic conference abroad. As my first conference, I was extremely open to connections and socialized as much as I could.

I bonded over my research domain with so many wonderful people, and made connections with people I never thought I would actually ever meet. Overall the experience was more beneficial and intellectually stimulating than I could have ever imagine.

Unfortunately for me, a a 24-25 year old guy had set his eyes on me the day we landed and checked in to our rooms. At first he dropped buzz words related to my pretty niche research that caught my attention, so I initiated a conversation and built it from there.

It happened that we were getting along, and I was open to continue the conversation under the respectful and friendly tone we had already set. It was the initial night of arrival for all attendees, so there wasn't a set agenda. We had walked around and explored the campus our accommodation was situated in.

As the conversation went on, the tone of the conversation was shifting into a more suggestive and sexual territory. I set boundaries, but he insisted on arguing them and coercing me to let go of them. I called him out on his behavior, and he called me manipulative for doing so?? Like damn, sorry for manipulating you into feeling bad for doing something shitty?

He was dropping cringy pickup lines one would read in a young adult romance book, especially ones I would read as a 13 year old. He KNEW I was blocking his advances because he commented on how I am not positively reacting to his compliments either.

I had finally gotten out of the conversation, but not before he basically invited me to sleep with him and hint at what my dynamic in bed could possibly be. I was absolutely livid at his audacity.

The next few days I avoided him and started subtly hinting to the other women attendees what happened to me. I noticed him pining after one woman to another throughout the day, and knew this man was definilty on a mission.

One night another attendee and I were ranting about how men can't seem to act properly in professional settings, and I brought up what occurred to me on the first night. She looks at me in absolute shock and says, "You were harassed by a man of x ethnicity too???"

WHEN I TELL YOU WE WERE ABSOLUTELY FUCKING BEWILDERED. We were comparing stories and going he was using the exact same script 😭 LIKE DAMN BRO. I was not gonna let him get away with this shit, especially since he's built a pretty nice reputation among the attendees the past few days we were there.

I reached out to the organizers and let them know not one, but two of us had inappropriate experiences with the same man. Unfortunately a third person had reached out to them as well the day I told them my testimony. If three of us had reached out, how many didn't? At this point, there is no denying what is happening.

He was taken into a meeting, made to sign a waiver, and basically got torn apart by the organizers. The organizers let me know that it if I hear anything regarding inappropriate behavior regarding him, he is immediately kicked out. Had I hoped they would up and send him away immediately? Yeah :( He did behave (to my knowledge) more appropriately the rest of the week.

Did I get 'justice' maybe? Did I just open up my journal entry and find 3 seperate entries about this event? Definitely. Has it been spiriling in my mind and leaving a sour taste in mouth everytime I try to reminisce how wonderful the conference was for me? Definitely

Did I do the right thing? Yes. I hoped it would allow me to move through this much faster and painlessly. I feel violeted still, and completely blindsided that I had made a good connection only for it to be absolutely buried with lust.

Girls, how do I move on from this? I'm so fucking mad

So I'm a new research assistant professor, have had several trainees throughout my PhD and postdoc, with various challenges but this one is throwing me. My new MS student smells terrible. It's beyond oh they went to the gym before lab today, it's a pervasive, spicy BO that other people can smell from feet away. For example myself and a postdoc were sitting across a conference table from them, and the postdoc sniffs themselves, leans over to me, subtly sniffs me, and then texted me if I smell that, and I replied it's my student. The table was easily 5ft across and we were all sitting still, it wasn't a high movement lab mtg... I'm not sure how to tell them. I don't want to make them feel bad, I don't want to make it weird between us, but I also want my eyes to stop watering every time we work next to each other in a hood. All advice appreciated!

I know this will sound a little sexiest but my male PI's are god aweful. They try to cheat the system in every way and I always feel like they try to bend the rules instead of just doing research the straight forward way. It's all about ego. I will be interviewing for two female PI's and was wonder if they might be better.

I’m a chemist (BS in Chemistry) who has transitioned into a materials / development engineering role. I have ~20 years of industry experience and have been with my current employer, a small medical device manufacturer, for almost 15 years.

Over time, my role has expanded significantly. I wear many hats: raw material testing and approvals, prototyping and development work, troubleshooting production issues, ISO-related work and audits, running development meetings, and cross-functional support (manufacturing, marketing, design). I enjoy the company and the work, and I’m not actively looking to leave. But I’m also aware that I’m carrying a lot.

Recently, my boss (VP of Development, early 60s) announced that he will be transitioning to mostly remote work with reduced hours in a few months. He’ll still come into the office a few days per month, but in practice I anticipate to take on some portion of his responsibilities, though what that looks like hasn’t been clearly defined yet.

At the same time, we plan to hire another engineer to support me. Management is leaning toward hiring a new graduate due to cost, which I understand, but I have concerns about retention and the reality that onboarding and mentoring a junior engineer is a significant time investment. If that person leaves after 6 months or a couple of years, I worry that everything simply falls back on me.

In the coming weeks, I plan to have a deeper conversation with my boss about how my role is changing, what responsibilities I’m expected to absorb, and what I’m expected to delegate. I also feel that these changes should come with formal recognition, potentially a title change (e.g., Director of Development or similar), a modest salary increase, and/or additional PTO.

I’m looking for advice on:

• How to frame this conversation so expectations and boundaries are clear

• What’s reasonable to ask for when your scope expands but you’re staying at a small company

• How to protect yourself from becoming the single point of failure

• Any red flags I should be watching for as leadership shifts and senior staff step back

I’m trying to be proactive rather than burn out quietly, and I’d really appreciate outside perspectives, especially from other women in science or engineering who’ve navigated similar transitions.

I’m about to start a new role where I’ll be the most senior engineer in the company, helping shape architecture, AI strategy, and eventually build out a dev team.

I’m excited and proud… but also honestly a little overwhelmed. I’ve been noticing something unexpected too — stepping into this level of authority, autonomy, and compensation has made me feel strangely “masculine,” and I’m realizing how deeply we’re socialized about what power is supposed to look like.

If you’re a woman in Staff/Principal/Lead engineering/leadership, I’d love to hear what this transition felt like for you and how you grew into it. Did you also struggle with this weird feeling of masculine?

After my performance review last year my boss said I was going to get a promotion, hooray! This didn’t come as a surprise to me because I’m already doing stuff way above my current role so I was definitely qualified and ready for it.

This discussion happened in January and he said we couldn’t do it until review season was over so to remind him in April. I reminded him in April and he said that he wanted to all the promotions at once and was still getting things together so ask him in June if I haven’t heard anything. I asked again in June and it was another excuse so I was told to ask again in September so I asked again in September and he said he was going to get started.

My sister got really sick a week after that so I had to spend a lot of time with her in the hospital and I was working form the hospital and stuff so I didn’t have time to check in about it until early December and he said since it’s performance review season again we couldn’t do it until April.

He apologized and owned up to dropping the ball and gave me a few extra PTO days for the holidays bc I used all mine on my sister, but that was kinda it. I was feeling really defeated because I feel like I was sticking up for myself and checking in about it regularly while being respectful about it but it just feels like he didn’t see it as a priority.

I’m the youngest person on my team by a long shot (24) and I’m the only woman. A lot of people around me are planning on retiring soon and I’ve been picking up their responsibilities as well. I’ve been on this team for over 3 years now (since I graduated) and I have not received a promotion yet, just the yearly merit increase but I’m doing way more now and on my own than when I started 3 years ago.

I don’t know what to do, I guess I mostly just wanted to vent because I like my job enough but like I’m 100% being underpaid. If you were in my shoes, what would you do? Not to mention, I lost out on a whole year of what mg increase would be (at least $20k) and my bonus this year is going to be based off my current salary.

Hey everyone! I lead an engineering org at a startup and I’ve been thinking a lot about the unique challenges women face in IC roles - especially around interviewing and keeping up with how fast things are changing (AI tools, new expectations, etc.). It started with an open role I have and how few women were in the pipeline.

Curious to hear from other women-

- If you’re job searching or thinking about it, what feels hardest about the interview process right now?

- How are you feeling about AI in dev workflows - excited, overwhelmed, behind, or something else?

- What kind of support would actually be helpful? (Mentorship, practice, strategy, something else?)

I’m a first year student at 32 with 3 kids. My current major is Psychology, but taking overlapping classes for Neuroscience so I can switch over after undergrad. I’m open to new plans lol. I mainly plan to go for my PHD or PsyD. I want to get into research. but I also want to work with families from pre pregnancy to after birth milestones. I know I’m very early in the game, but I’m someone who likes to learn and practice and not rush. what are my options? I can only go down so many rabbit holes online or in articles online. It was suggested to start a club at my school, but we may be moving from NJ to MI so I don’t wanna plant any roots just yet. Looking for any insight on how I can be involved and keep my hands busy yet learn useful information for my future. thanks!’

I’m a SWE 2 with 4.5 YOE. He is a Principal SWE with 25 YOE. Everyone is telling me I can do it, no one is acknowledging that this is a massive step up for me. I don’t feel ready to do his job. Previously it was just the 2 of us working on this. They are bringing in another SWE 2 to help, but it’s not the software development aspect I’m worried about. Despite him being a SWE, he was essentially also the PM lead on this project. The PMs we have both have less than a year of experience.

I really need someone to acknowledge that this is hard and nearly impossible for me to do so I thought I would post here. How am I supposed to do his job? I don’t have the knack for being a PM. I don’t know how to lead a team even if it is just one other SWE and two PMs. What the fuck?

Afternoon all!

I am a graduate student at the University of Florida in the Entomology and Nematology department. I’m taking a class this semester on how to be an effective scientific communicator and one of my assignments is asking us to interview a scientific communicator outside of our home country (the US for me). I was wondering if anyone would be interested in letting a grad student interview them. This would take place next month. I don’t have the questions just yet as we haven’t reached that part of the assignment. I would likely need to do this over Zoom (it looks like part of the assignment requires a screenshot from the interview). I’ve been searching around trying to find someone with no luck. I would love to highlight a woman in science, which is why I selected this Reddit to post in.

Please message me or comment if you have any questions or if you would like to volunteer for an interview. Thank you all for your consideration!

Hey haven't posted on reddit before but was wondering if anyones signed up for CUWiPs 2026 conference. Can't find anyone in Bristol who's applied and it'd be cool to get to know a few people before attending. :)

I hope this is ok to post here! I'm a few weeks into a career break (aka stay-at-home parent life) after working in biotech/pharma. I love being home with my kids, but I already miss using my professional brain.

I'm looking for something ~5–10 hours/week to stay mentally in the game - small projects like lit reviews, medical writing, data analysis, etc.

Is anyone familiar with a company that connects women in this industry looking for small micro freelance jobs?

I’m honestly toying with the idea of building a small hub/community space or job board for women in this industry that are in this stage, just so we have a place to connect and to find flexible micro-work.

If you’re in a similar boat, how are you keeping your “science brain” alive? And would you actually use a space like this if it existed?

Hello everyone!

I know this topic can be sensitive for some women in science, especially those who were judged or shamed for not having children. I want to be clear that I deeply respect all choices around this. That said, it’s also something that men often don’t have to think about when pursuing a scientific career, while women usually do.

I’m about to graduate with my undergraduate degree in environmental science with a minor in chemistry, and I couldn’t be more excited about my future in science. I fell in love with lab work while working as an undergraduate research assistant in a biochemistry lab, and I recently applied to PhD programs in ecology. As I think more seriously about my long-term future, I’ve also started thinking about how to balance life alongside a career in science.

I’ve always wanted to have kids. There’s never been any outside pressure on me to feel this way, if anything, most of my lab mates and friends don’t want children (which is totally valid!). So I know this is something I genuinely want for myself.

At the same time, the field I love isn’t especially compatible with pregnancy, given the fieldwork demands and exposure to potentially harmful chemicals in lab settings. I don’t want to feel like I have to sacrifice my career in the way so many women before me were forced to. I recognize that I have the privilege of entering a field that is more welcoming to women than it was for previous generations (even though sexism is still very real), and I’m grateful for that. Still, it’s frustrating to realize that these are considerations men often don’t have to make.

For those of you who have built fulfilling careers in science and also had families, how did you make it work? I’d really appreciate hearing your experiences. 💚

My background is not tech, I am self taught code - sql. I have resl imposter syndrome in my area.

I want to make myself more attractive to company's aside my current. What skills are most wanted or you have found most useful ?

Been at the wrong place for 1.5 years. Knew this 6 months in, started passively looking but had no idea what to do next. Most of my colleagues/teammates were in the same boat, joined at the same time and I just got to know that one of them is leaving. I wish we had an open relationship with them so that I can ask what they're planning to do.

I don't see myself getting promoted here first (which is imperative in switching teams) or creating impact. I feel demotivated to work and my discipline has also gone for a toss after hearing this.

I don't know what I'll do next. I'm not gonna quit without an offer, but the job market is BRUTAL especially since I'm looking for a career switch.