I think it's hit me over the past few days that I live a double life, professionally speaking.
I work at a government research facility as a biomedical researcher that's embedded into a clinic. Our system is like this because doctors who work in clinical resaerch are still doctors, and doctor's don't have time to understand all the nuances of conducting research. They're concerned with getting their question answered about whether something is going to be a better treatment or not than what's already out there. Because of the government aspect, as well as the structure of clinical clinical research. We have a very clear hierarchy in my workplace that can be described from top to bottom:
Medical Doctors
Lab Chiefs
Nursing Chiefs
Physician Assistants
Nurse Practioners
Nurses who coordinate studies
Nurses who manage individual patient cases
Non-chief scientists regardless of credentials (PhD, MS, BS/BA)
In this sense, I'm at the bottom of this hierarchy, and it does show it's teeth at times. For example, on my first day on the job I asked the doctor who interviewed me a quick question about something administrative. She didn't answer my question and only emailed me to tell me to resend the email again and address her as "doctor" in the email. I rolled my eyes and did it and then she replied again to actually answer my question the second time around. At first I thought this was just a "girlboss" type thing, until I realized that all the doctors we worked with were this way unless they specifically asked you to call them something other than Doctor Lastname. This even applied when I already knew the doctor on a first name basis from my previous job, suddenly, I had to refer to them as Doctor Lastname even If I had been calling them John/Jane prior. This is hierarchy, so be it. Since then, I answer to doctors, answer their scientific questions, and give them advice on their studies only when solicited. they're free to take or not take the advice we give them as scientists, so sometimes they do and sometimes they don't. It's no skin off my nose, but at the end of the day, there's no meaningful decisions really being made on my end.
I manage two non-profits outside of work, one science education center and one science and tech community. At the Science Center, I sit on the board and have responsibility/oversight over volunteers, new programs, and play a big role in direction setting on the board. In essence, I'm VP of the organization without the title, of which it was offered but I couldn't make the time commitment of additional hours to sign checks on a weekly basis. Under this organization I oversee over 50 volunteers over the course of a year and 4 paid staff members.
I also have a second one that I started from the ground-up that does a mix of everything I like. Research, education, startup development, community. In that capacity I serve as founder and president. it comes with social meetup groups that tally over 5000 on paper, and an active core of 180 people on a discord server that I manage. I have 8 organizers that work with me, and another 10 volunteers who work with me as well to help execute the vision I have for the organization.
Between these two, I'm an executive.
I have meetings with teams and outside organizations in nearly every bit of time I have left after my day job, I have to generate documents that help people understand the things I'm trying to do, I answer correspondence from big companies, local governments, colleges, and business people. I have a booking system that people have to use to meet with me otherwise I end up double or triple booking meetings. I've had students that have gone on to college, jobs, and other things, etc. People even come to me for advice on various things related to these non-profits, whether or not I can actually solve their issues. I don't make enough revenue from them yet to reconcile myself.
