Email and Professional Communication
Asking for help: the specific question gets answered, the vague one gets postponed
Researchers who ask early and precisely progress faster than those who protect an image of competence.
Scholar
Academic skills in English for Vietnamese researchers
Scholar — academic English and international research practice for Vietnamese researchers: writing in a second language, conferences, peer review, and navigating expectations that are never written down.
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Common legal and administrative topics
Latest articles
Guides updated to current Vietnamese law
Email and Professional Communication
Applications and CVs
Career gaps: state them briefly and move on, because silence invites worse guesses
An unexplained gap is filled in by the reader, usually less favourably than the truth.
Applications and CVs
The teaching statement: one concrete example beats three paragraphs of philosophy
Committees read many teaching statements and remember the ones with something specific in them.
Peer Review in English
Your first review: accept it, take the time, and follow the journal's questions
The first invitation is worth accepting even though it will take longer than you expect.
Conferences
Conferences on a small budget: the funding exists, and much of it goes unclaimed
Travel awards are frequently undersubscribed because most people never look for them.
Building an International Profile
Preprints: they establish priority and get feedback, but check your journal first
Preprint norms differ sharply between fields, and so do journal policies about them.
Presenting and Speaking
Slides: one idea per slide, and nothing the audience has to read while you speak
An audience cannot read and listen at the same time, and reading wins.
Unwritten Expectations
Mentoring: you need several mentors, and none of them has to be your supervisor
Expecting one person to cover research, career, teaching, and wellbeing sets everyone up to fail.
Email and Professional Communication
Saying no: declining clearly protects the work you already agreed to do
Every yes is taken from something you already committed to, whether or not you notice.
Applications and CVs
Early career funding: start with the small schemes, and read a funded application
A funding record is built the same way a publication record is — from small items first.
Writing in a Second Language
The discussion: explain the results, do not restate them
The weakest discussion sections retell the results section in longer sentences.
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