Climate Modelling Research Group

Bits and bytes of the climate system.

(work in progress, create a pull request to suggest changes)

Inclusivity and diversity

Mental Health

Open science

Conference Logistics

Attending conferences

Working hours

We have flexible working hours. Some people are more productive in the morning, others during the day or later in the afternoon, evening or possibly even night. That’s okay. Core hours for most are 10am-4pm plus minus an hour or so but that can also vary throughout the week. If other hours work better for you feel free to communicate this so that other group members have an idea when you can be reached and when not.

Working days and remote working

The Oxford student handbook technically requires students to live within 25km of the Carfax Tower. Depending on the direction, one might have a faster commute from London Paddington though. The philosophy of this research group is not to restrict people’s whereabouts but to encourage some in person presence, ideally during the core days Tue, Wed, Thu. These days are chosen to better facilitate weekend travels but also to have some days with a lower frequency of scheduled meetings.

Group meetings

Invidiual meetings

Collaborative work

Communication

Most of our communication happens through Slack. This is so that people feel more encouraged to write shorter messages, can edit what they wrote, more easily attach or detach media and particularly to have a communication platform that is different from email. Email has its use but team communication is not necessarily its strength. Whichever way you prefer to communicate is up to you but Milan will be most responsive on Slack.

Depending on time and given the flexible working hours responses are rarely imminent but we try to respond to group internal messages within a day or so. This is no hard requirement and there will be many exceptions to this rule of thumb but often it is also just nice to establish a responsive communication culture where we can support each other, help with IT, math or physics questions, etc. No one is expected to respond outside of their typical working hours.

One-on-one communication is normally treated confidentially particularly non-science matters of personal nature that is communicated because it impacts or can impact your or other people’s work within our research group. You are always free and encouraged to raise issues through communication with others and demand them to make time for an apropriate discussion on these issues. It is usually better to communicate but if you feel uncomfortable to do so it is unlikely your fault rather there is insufficient space and time created to raise it.

Social media and online presence

Vacation

The UK has 8 public holidays per year. In addition to those every member of the research group is expected to take about 5-6 weeks of vacation per year. The Oxford student handbook is not explicit about this but 5 weeks are typical. Working in academia can be very stressful at times and so taking time off to unwind is highly recommended. Some people need more vacation than others and that is okay, Milan does not count his days off and so also does not expect others to do so. He often combines professional trips to conferences or meetings with personal holidays to minimize travel time, costs and emissions and you are free to do so as well.

Individual days off generally do not have to be communicated unless conflicting with specific meetings (especially those that were difficult to schedule), conferences, submission deadlines, or similar. Longer holidays can just be informally communicated so that other members of the group are aware that no response to communication has to be expected. Plan and communicate those ideally a little further ahead but in general no permission is required. Milan believes vacation flexibility can massively contribute to personal wellbeing in academia by making space for other important things in life.

Acknowledgements

The group philosophy documented here borrows is heavily based on or copied from other following research lab principles, likely in order of similarity

Many thanks to those for publicly sharing their implementation of a progressive research group philosophy and more generally their contribution to making academia a welcoming place for everyone.