Kakali Bhattacharya, Gainesville, FL (2026)

08/20/2026

New edition of my newsletter is live.

This week: How Editors Decide Whether Your Manuscript Has a Future.

I edit a journal. I sit with submissions and make this call. Most of what determines the outcome happens before anyone reads your findings.

If you have been getting desk rejections and cannot tell why, start here.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-editors-decide-whether-your-manuscript-has-future-bhattacharya-itjpe/

Feel free to share and subscribe if it resonates.

How Editors Decide Whether Your Manuscript Has a Future A colleague who finished a few years ahead of me offered to share everything she had learned about the job market and about publishing. I had not asked her.

08/19/2026

Hey

TLDR: Sunday Live is biweekly now. The next one is Sunday, August 30th, and I am walking you through the strategic planning system I built after years of ADHD, anxiety, and procrastination.

Earlier this summer I put together a whole mentoring session on creating a strategic planner using somatic planning, seasons and cycles, rest-first planning, slow productivity, Kanban, Pomodoro, and Human Design. I also created a project tracker to help you with it.

This is after years and years of struggle with ADHD, anxiety, and procrastination. We don't have to suffer to manage a heavy cognitive load.

On Sunday, August 30th I will walk you through these and more

the seven planning philosophies and how to pick the ones that actually fit you

the eight stages a project moves through, and why some of them should not be on your calendar at all

mapping your projects to your natural energy across the day instead of forcing them into arbitrary blocks

the three horizons, what 30, 60, and 90 days feel like in your body rather than as a task list

the Grand Project Narrative, a process log you keep across the life of a project so you never spend the first forty minutes trying to remember where you were

naming your witness, the one person who holds the thread when you cannot hold it alone

Share with someone who you think can benefit from this conversation. See you Sunday.

Strategic Planning for Your Academic Year: ADHD, Anxiety, and Procrastination Responsive

Sunday, August 30th at 2:00 PM ET

Zoom link in comments.

AI Disclaimer: The text of this post was generated by the human author of this post. The image is generated by ChatGPT and Canva.

08/18/2026

TLDR: If you're on the job market this year, good mentoring matters in an AI-saturated process.

This needs to be said. If you are in the job market, be very careful of how you are using AI. This past Sunday I did a Sunday Live lecture and we unpacked the dos and don'ts of using AI in job searches.

Do

use AI to map your vita to a job offer to compare and contrast

use AI to map the market to find appropriate jobs

use AI to help figure out what to customize in your vita and cover letter to align with a position

use AI to help you understand what is your unique contribution that will be an asset for your targeted position

use AI to look at an aspirational position and reverse engineer your vita to identify and neutralize gaps in your qualifications

use AI to align the language of the offer with your vita and cover letter

Don't

use AI to write your cover letter

use AI to write inquiry or thank you emails

use AI to quickly write a paper to publish before going on the market

use AI to stylize your documents

use AI to write recommendation letter drafts for your referees if/when they ask for outlines or rough drafts to know what to emphasize

If you want to be supported through job search, interview, negotiation, getting tenure and promotions, you are welcome to check out my Strength-to-Strength mentoring program where we work with people ranging from graduate students to full professors to associate provosts and deans.

Read the page first. Everything is there.

https://www.kakali.org/s2s-mentoring

If you want to chat to figure out fit and program details, I am happy to get on Zoom. Simply complete the application, and in the bottom field where they ask if there's anything else you'd like to know, share that you'd like to meet for x, y, z reasons.

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdzkkNTXQJXeLfUQghxKSAu9tURqdEaAsez_yAuf3pdkNU64g/viewform

08/17/2026

Since Fall semester is starting for many in North America, I thought it might be a good time to offer some tips that I have gathered from being in academia for 20 years. This is the advice I wish I had received when I first started in 2005.

Save, share, and return to this as needed.

Tell me privately or publicly which one landed the hardest.

AI Disclaimer: The text of the post within and outside of the images was created by the human author. The images were created using Claude, Gemini, and Canva.

08/13/2026

New edition of my newsletter is live.

This week: Your Dissertation Is Not a Single Thing.

It contains at least 10 publishable articles. You just need different eyes to see them, and the craft to release them.

If you finished the dissertation and cannot see what is in it, start here.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/your-dissertation-single-thing-dr-kakali-bhattacharya-w0kze/

Feel free to share and subscribe if it resonates.

Your Dissertation Is Not a Single Thing It contains at least 10 publishable articles. You just need different eyes to see them, and the craft to release them.

08/12/2026

Hey

TL;DR: Sunday Lives go biweekly from here. The fall arc covers the hidden curriculum of the academic job search and tenure and promotion, beginning August 16 at 2:00 PM ET. Zoom link in comments.

Update to Our Sunday Live Frequency

I am writing to share that moving forward the Sunday Live frequency will be biweekly as I want to focus on completing my writing and other projects as I move to sabbatical this next year.

Please mark your calendar for the following Sunday Live topics held via Zoom at 2:00 PM ET. Zoom link for the upcoming live is in the comments.

August 16 - Getting Ready for the Academic Job Market: Navigating Job Search and Application

August 30 - Strategic Planning for your academic year (ADHD, Anxiety, and Procrastination Responsive)

September 13 - Phone and Campus Interviews for Academic Job Search: Top 5 Mistakes

September 27 - Writing a tenure and promotion narrative congruent with your wholeness

October 11 - Negotiating job offers at the point of hire: The hidden curriculum edition

I want to start with navigating the job market and end with the negotiation process. There is so much hidden curriculum embedded in these processes that I experienced both as an applicant and a committee member/chair of searches.

I have seen people make mistakes that fully disqualify them, or they look good on paper but then unknowingly sabotage their chances after the short-listing zoom/phone interview. I am happy to share what I know in case it is of use to you.

Please share widely with anyone you know who could benefit from this.

08/11/2026

TLDR: Mentoring is a time-travel experience where I dialogue with a former version of myself. One seat remains in the last cohort of Finish Your Writing Project.

This past Sunday I told the people gathered at the Sunday Live lecture that I always mentor imagining what a former version of me would need. As a graduate student and early career faculty I had to figure out how to navigate the academic landscape without knowing a thing about the hidden curriculum.

This is my last year offering this iteration of Finish Your Writing Project. Moving forward I will integrate the curriculum into my Strength-to-Strength mentoring program.

So far, based on the current attendees, we would be exploring the following as part of our responsive curriculum:

writing up thematic narratives in rich, thick, descriptive ways

amplifying and detecting tensions and messiness in your writing

writing from liminality of the west, women of color, and Caribbean perspectives as a contested juxtaposition

theorizing and writing multi-layered autoethnography

writing for cultural honoring through culturally situated philosophies, frameworks, methodology, and aesthetics

creating a book proposal and a book chapter for a qualitatively informed mixed-methods project

As you can see, these are urgent areas of interest amongst the currently enrolled community members. I am able to add maybe one more person, still holding the principle of speaking to a former version of myself who could have benefitted from writing support and making the hidden curriculum visible without compromising the fullness of my being, culture, and sensibilities.

We begin August 15.

Read the page first. Everything is there, including the investment. Most of the people who come through FYWP use professional development funds.

https://www.kakali.org/fywp

If you want to chat to figure out fit, or discuss a customized payment option, I am happy to get on Zoom. Simply complete the form, and in the bottom field where they ask if there's anything else you'd like to know, share that you'd like to meet for x, y, z reasons.

https://forms.gle/yT9yYyJG3ueC6nMQ6

08/10/2026

Ten directives on writing that made me rethink the craft.

These came from listening to Ocean Vuong, Elif Shafak, Morgan Housel, and Joan Didion talk about writing in interviews. What is on these slides is my paraphrasing of what they said, not their exact words.

Save it for when the writing feels stuck.

Which one lands hardest for you?

Disclaimer: Images created in Canva using native tools and Canva AI. All text, paraphrasing, and curation by the human author.

08/05/2026

Hey

TLDR: Dancing can lead to book publication in academia :) This Sunday, August 9th at 2:00 PM ET, I am answering your book publishing questions. Zoom link in comments.

I still remember the first time I got a book writing offer. Straight out of graduate school. I was dancing on a Saturday in late May at the University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign. My spectrumy self (I didn't know I was on the spectrum then, this is retrospective) missed social cues that I need to put people on such a high pedestal that I cannot approach them. I think I approached Norm Denzin to dance with me, and Mitch Allen and I somehow came together and danced and then talked.

Book writing is a daunting process, and at the time I thought only white men with a lot of gray hair wrote qualitative research texts. It would track, because back then that was primarily who wrote foundational texts: Creswell, Maxwell, Patton.

I told Mitch that I had these handouts and worksheets to make qual research intelligible to people who are new to the field without watering it down so much that it was oversimplified. Later I sent Mitch the handouts and worksheets, and he said if I wrote around them, it could become a text. That is how my text Fundamentals of Qualitative Research was born.

Since then I have written more texts, won some awards, helped other people write texts, they won some awards, and I am continuing to do that work to this day.

This Sunday, bring all your questions. I will answer them as a published author and a book series editor.

Things we will discuss include but are not limited to:

how to make the decision about which press to submit your work to

the process of a book publication

how to write a proposal

how to negotiate (rate of payment, artwork, title of the text, and other details)

interest convergence and the perils and possibilities

when to actually write a book in your scholarly career (hint: the answer is not after tenure)

hidden curriculum issues that people might not know readily

Share with someone who you think can benefit from this conversation. See you Sunday.

Publishing Your Dream Book and Questions to Consider for the Right Venue

Sunday, August 9th at 2:00 PM ET

Zoom link in comments.

08/04/2026

TL;DR: Publishing becomes a very different experience when you have thoughtful mentoring, sustained feedback, and a community invested in your work.

Two weeks ago I spoke about how you have 10 or more publishable pieces in your qualitatively-driven dissertation. This past Sunday I talked about the hidden curriculum for publishing manuscripts and book chapters.

Here's the top three things I have learned from these conversations:

Many graduate programs and post-graduate professional development experiences do not discuss the hidden curriculum.

Due to the lack of strong mentoring, people engage more in trial and error, and if they bump into walls, which you'd inevitably experience without good mentoring, they become discouraged, depressed even, about the publication process.

The deficit framework that is inherently baked into academia makes people diminish the worth and multiple generative possibilities of their work. Consequently, without even realizing it, people dismiss their own brilliance and their sacred work.

This August, I am offering a small cohort experience to Finish Your Writing Project. I have one seat left. If you join, here's what you'll experience:

The exact professional development you need

Deep feedback, asynchronous and synchronous

Creating and modifying the heuristic of your writing

A year's worth of monthly live mentoring so you can maintain the momentum and navigate the stuck places

A responsive community supporting you

Read the page first. Everything is there, including the investment. Most of the people who come through FYWP use professional development funds.

https://www.kakali.org/fywp

If you want to chat to figure out fit, or discuss a customized payment option, I am happy to get on Zoom. Simply complete the form, and in the bottom field where they ask if there's anything else you'd like to know, share that you'd like to meet for x, y, z reasons.

https://forms.gle/yT9yYyJG3ueC6nMQ6

Kakali Bhattacharya

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