Kicking the 'Last Minute' Habit

Creative Commons image by Rob Irgendwer.

Reading Dr. Burton's post about the phases of academic blogging, a ping of terror struck me. The kind of terror that makes you go, "oooh, that is exactly right." Terror because it also makes you go, "I need to break some habits."

He contrasts the measure of success during the first phase of academic blogging -- frequency of posts, familiarizing with the tools -- with the final phase, which I would summarize as: people need to take you seriously. You need to contribute something meaningful.

One a big difference between academic blogging and traditional academic work is that online, the goal is widened from not only producing good content, but producing good content and then connecting it with others.

This is, of course, the goal of traditional academic research too, always has been. But professors, rather than students, have generally partaken more in that wider, connective aspect of academia as they publish their own work. Students have always been focused on the "produce content" target, their papers more often winding up in a professor's recycling bin rather than a publication, dying the ignominious death of the undergraduate, having gained an audience of one.

To succeed in academic blogging, we can't just be focused on creating good content, we need to think about -- and plan for -- bringing that content into a wider sphere of usefulness. And it changes the way we think about deadlines. Traditionally, I have worked on my papers right up until the last minute before it's due -- and the bulk of my work has gravitated toward that deadline. My mindset needs to change in order to succeed in academic blogging. If I do not give myself enough time to connect my content with others, its death will be even more meaningless than that of those recycled pages.

Time to kick the habit of last-minute work.