Survey.... SAYS!!!

(Did you read that in your best gameshow voice, or are you not a child of the 80s?)

Hello, Readers!

Many warm thanks to those of you who took some time to share feedback via the survey I shared in the last post, or reached out to share your thoughts with me another way. The things I heard from you were that you DO find value in what I write here, and that you DO NOT care, and in fact some might prefer, if I were to release myself from the expectation that since some of you are choosing to pay me for this work, I must therefore publish new posts weekly. Thank you for that permission and freedom! (And, remember, paying is always totally voluntary, though I appreciate DEEPLY those of you who do!) Here are the words the survey takers used to describe my content:

All I can say is, to those of you who engage with my posts, back atcha!! 💜

To that point, I also heard several of you say that you wish there was more engagement on my posts. I’m not sure how to create this beyond the begging encouragement I already provide on each post, so let me say this to you —if you are ever on the fence about commenting, replying to others’ comments, etc, please, please DO jump in and help us grow the community aspect of this space!

I was also surprised to see that of my three topical areas (DEI, Leaving Academia, and Contemporary Workplace Culture), 100% of you said you are interested in the DEI content, though the other two categories were close behind at 83% each. It’s the Leaving Academia posts that get far more readership and engagement, so I’m glad I asked this question! I see this as a sign to keep leaning into all three content areas, as they are so often connected. Please do share my work with others if you have not already!

It was also very helpful to hear that 100% of the survey respondents valued the Ask Me Anything posts. I love those too, so please keep the good questions coming! The DEI 101 posts, which I had not been certain were resonating with folks, came in at 83% so I’ll certainly keep those going, too. Only 33% said they appreciate the book review posts, which is totally fine with me. I already bailed on the last book I’d announced I’d be reading (Work, Pray, Code) because it wasn’t as interesting to me as I’d hoped. I’ll probably still do some, but your feedback helps me consider how I might adjust the frequency on those. Thank you!

I started this newsletter because I missed writing for an audience of some kind, wanted to engage with others re: issues around contemporary work (academic and otherwise), and wanted to still be able to utilize my experience and subject matter expertise in contemporary racism and intersectionality to, hopefully, benefit others. I also found, and continue to find, Substack to be a place where smart, thoughtful people can find and/or create community around shared interests and goals. Thank you for helping me do that here. You can expect that I will indeed stick around, but slow my pace a bit to something closer to a biweekly schedule from here forward.

I appreciate you.