The benefits of extraversion

[asleepawake]

I often read about and see firsthand the benefits of being an extravert in academia (and especially in the humanities), but these things don't come particularly naturally to me. I'm relatively quiet in seminars and have to force myself each time that I engage in discussion (and feel that I must be 100% sure of everything that I do say, for fear of saying something I haven't yet completely thought through). I get nervous speaking to faculty (despite having no comprehension of how my students could possibly be uncomfortable talking to me) and I'd rather be able to avoid anything that could be described as "networking."

Of course, I know others have this worse than I do. How do you deal with these sorts of issues? I think that extraverts are often perceived as having more insight and drive, even when it isn't always true. How to you effectively community with faculty and peers, make yourself known, and successfully share ideas that are not fully developed? Do you worry about the effects of your social skills on your ability to get a job?

Edit: I noticed immediately following posting that this is not the best spot for this post. Is it possible to delete or move my post? newb.

Edited September 4, 2011 by asleepawake

[juilletmercredi]

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<div>I'm an extravert, but I do find trouble doing some of those things so here's what I do.</div>

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<div>1) With speaking in class, I always felt nervous that I would say something stupid. Even the most extraverted graduate students feel this way sometimes; it's a residual effect of imposter syndrome. The best thing to do is to read the material and make little notes about comments you want to make in class. I used to use tiny neon post-it's and stick it to the section of the paper with the relevant material, so when we turned to that page I had the comment right there on the sticky note.</div>

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<div>2) Getting comfortable with faculty takes time and practice...so basically the only way to beat this is by actually chatting with faculty. No way around that.</div>

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<div>3) The way I get around the networking issue is that I try not to think about it as networking. I just think about it as chatting or socializing in a professional context. That works in two ways - one, I love to talk to people and find out about their stories and how they got where they are. Since people love to talk about themselves, this isn't difficult. But secondly, it keeps me from seeing these opportunities as solely ways to get to know people based on what they can do for me. People don't like it when they suspect that you are trying to get something out of you. If you remain calm and treat it like a conversation, you can always bring it back up later. But really, networking is just meeting people, finding out what they do and making them like you, lol. And getting their contact info, but that's easy enough since it seems everyone carries around business cards these days.</div>