Dr. Martha Kenney knows your time is precious. She cares deeply about employee engagement, burnout prevention, work-life balance and career development amongst professional women. That’s why she works with women in medicine and beyond find work-life alignment. She helps women gain clarity on who you are, what you want in life, and what truly matters to you.
She’s also an Assistant Professor who researches mechanisms of chronic pain in young adults who are living with sickle cell disease. I’m delighted to share this conversation with Dr. Martha Kenney in this featured interview on The Social Academic.
In this interview

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Introducing Dr. Martha Kenney, time management expert, professor, coach, and mom
Jennifer: Hi everyone. Welcome back to The Social Academic, where I talk all about online presence for professors, researchers, and other people who have PhDs. I’m so excited to introduce you to my guest today, Dr. Martha Kenney. Martha, would you mind introducing yourself and letting people know a little bit about yourself?
Martha: Sure. Thank you so much for having me, Jennifer. It’s really a pleasure to be here.
I’m Martha. I’m a pediatric anesthesiologist, clinically by training. But, I spend the majority of my time doing research. My research is focused on understanding the mechanisms of chronic pain in young adults who are living with sickle cell disease. I also do research in other pain disparities area as well.
In addition to that, (as if that’s not enough), personally, I’m married with two young kids. So, I’m a really busy mom as well. I’m also a certified coach. I’m a certified executive career coach. I coach women primarily in academia around challenges related to work-life balance, time management, burnout management in general. Read Martha’s bio.
I’m also a behavior design consultant. I got some training in a certification through the Tiny Habits Academy, of which somebody hasn’t read that book by BJ Fogg, they should definitely check it out.
I work a lot with behavior management. How do we change our habits? How do we rewire our routines in a way that sets us up for success so we can be able to execute the goals that we actually have.
Jennifer: Ooh, that is so interesting. It sounds like you do it all.
How did you get into coaching? How did you decide that research, even though it was something that you love, that you wanted to do more than that? You wanted to work with people one-on-one as a coach as well.
Martha: That’s a great question. I got into coaching because of my experience in academia. I’m a physician scientist, clinically I did a very long training path. I finished everything in the fall of 2018 and took on my first position.
“Like most people who go into academia…I don’t wanna say we don’t put in thought into our first position, but I feel like we don’t know the questions we need to ask.
We’re not really prepared to take on our first position. Nobody actually sits you down and says, ‘These are the things you need to ask. These are the red flags that you need to look for.’”
Honestly, when you’ve been through a long training, whether it’s a PhD or an MD track, you’re just happy to have a job when you’re done. Like, yay, I have a job! You’re excited about that. All of this to say that the place that I started was not a good fit. It was not a good fit for many reasons.
Jennifer: Yeah.
Dr. Kenney’s success story with coaching as a former burnt-out academic

Martha: I had clarity on what I wanted to do, where I wanted my career to go.
The problem is that if you’re in an organization where there’s a values misalignment, no matter what you do, you can’t change the values and the mission of that organization.
And no matter what you do, you can’t. Unless you change your identity, which you can’t / which is hard to do, right? Because you are wired the way that you are, and you’re passionate about the things that you’re passionate about, so you can’t really change yourself also.
So what ends up happening is I see a lot of people kind of dwell in this organization.
There’s constant push and shove where there’s just misalignment between what you value, what’s important to you, and what the organization or the department considers to be important. That’s the situation I found myself in.
One of the ways to navigate around that is that someone recommended that I get a coach. I’m so grateful that I got a coach back in 2018 before coaching was sexy and hot. Right?
Jennifer: Right.
Martha: Through that experience, what I learned is that, so this is the way I kind of often explain it to women who approach me about working with me.
Let’s say you’re on this academic journey and you’re walking your path and you encounter a huge block. Imagine a huge boulder block that’s right on your path.

You feel stuck. Not only stuck, for some people, they can feel overwhelmed. It can even contribute to burnout in so many ways. And you don’t know how to navigate it.
There’s two options. One option is you’re like, “Okay, this is okay. This is not the best situation, but I’m just gonna work really hard. And you know, eventually this roadblock, whether it’s an individual, whether it’s a systematic thing, will get out of my way eventually ‘cause my hard work is gonna pay off.”
The reality is, your hard work is just chipping a few pieces off of that rock. So, what ends up happening is that you yourself are gonna suffer for it.
What coaching does is it opens your eyes into the alternative possibilities. It doesn’t take you away from your destination first. A coach can guide you to make sure that that is the right destination, that is the right path.
Perhaps your path is a different path that doesn’t have that roadblock. And that’s really not the path you’re supposed, you really should pursue.
In addition to that, you get clarity that that’s truly the path you need to navigate, then a coach acts as a bridge. And also almost like a flashlight and a lack of a better analogy to say, “Hey, have you noticed that corner is not being blocked?” You know, “How do you feel about going around this corner? It’ll get you to your destination. It might be a little bit windy, but it’ll get you there.” A coach acts like as a bridge between where you are now and where you wanna be in the future.
A good coach will help you realize that there are so many things within your control. You can’t control the boulder block, but you can definitely find the things you can control that helps you navigate around it so you can ultimately achieve your goal. That’s what my coach did for me. I was like, “Oh my gosh, this is like, amazing.”
One of my passions is really helping other people feel great about themselves and help them be successful in their endeavors. I’m like, “I wanna be a coach too!” I wanna give individuals the same feeling that I had cause without my coach I would’ve left academia to be honest.
Jennifer: Yeah
Martha: Through the help of my coach, I stayed the path. I learned to navigate around the path and really create a career that’s authentic to me. And also, find an institution that is aligned with my values and my goals as well.
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Dr. Kenney’s coaching at Time Matters Today – Her take on work-life balance

Jennifer: Oh gosh. Thank you for being so open about that, because I feel like the vulnerability with which you shared that story, people are really gonna feel that, that people are gonna recognize themselves in a similar place or needing the kind of support that you received. So tell me about like, your coaching. How does it differ from like, the coaching that you had when you needed it?
Martha: So my coaching is really focused on work life balance, and I use that term because that’s what we’re familiar with. But I actually don’t believe in work-life balance.
Jennifer: Ooh.
Martha: To me it’s something that’s like, nonexistent, right?
Jennifer: Interesting.
Martha: ‘Cause the reality is life is an evolving process and there’s never gonna be a period where like you’re 50% work and 50% life.
And then also work is a compartment of the bigger compartment that is your identity in your life, right? It’s a bucket in your life. And so work should be a full expression of your identity and not like that this is life. This is you and this is work. You’re the same person in both spheres.
Work should really contribute to your personal fulfillment. And so really what I work with. The reality is I use that term ’cause that’s what people are familiar with.
Really what I do is help women really attain better work life alignment. And what does that mean? It means is that really gaining clarity on who you are, what you want in life, what truly matters to you.
Because oftentimes people come to me because they’re overcommitted, they’re overextended, they’re having challenges with time management.
People call me ‘a time management guru.’ I lead workshops. I can tell you all the steps you need to take. I can tell you how to plan your week. I can tell you what priority system you should use and so many things.
But the reality is if you don’t have clarity on what truly matters? If you think of your life as like a bucket, it’s gonna be filled with really meaningless things because you’re constantly going to pile things on without really passing through the judgment value. “Is this really important to me? Is it really worth my time?”
I help people really to, you know, get clarity on who they are, what truly matters to them, and then also who the people that they wanna serve. The people you wanna serve might be the people in your home. It might be the people in the work setting. And then really create goals and execute those goals around that. I believe that what my clients can tell you is that as a result, they have better clarity, more confidence in themselves. They’re able to really draw boundaries around their time and their energy.
People hear me say often over and over again: your time and your energy are finite resources. You can do anything, but you cannot do everything. And so you really have to take the cautious approach of really determining what is important to you and commit into that.
They find I don’t discover more time for them because I’m not God. There’s always gonna be 24 hours in a day. But what I do discover, what I help them do is with the 24 hours that they have, really being able to dedicate themselves to the things that truly matters. Giving them the boldness to say no to the things that don’t matter, and be released from the guilt that comes with that, especially for women in academia. And then also really develop tiny habits or behavioral steps that, okay, we’ve decided that this is the goal.
I can lead a time management workshop and talk about planning your week all you want. Then I’ll encounter people like, “Oh, I tried it, it worked really well for the first and second week, but then I’ve kind of slipped right back into my pattern.” Of course you did, because your pattern is a routine and it’s a habit. It’s an automated behavior. So how do we unwire that and really insert a more intentional and productive habit so that eventually it becomes automated? Eventually planning your week every Friday, at the end of the workday, or Monday morning, or whatever day or Sunday, becomes a routine habit that you do on a regular basis.
That’s my long-winded way of saying I help people manage their time. And feel good about how they use their time and their energy. And also modify their behaviors to be more intentional towards their goals.
Jennifer: That sounds so cool. Oh, you know, a question came up while you were chatting, when you were talking about tiny habits and behavior change. I’m curious, what is something that, like you had maybe a bad habit about that you have worked to improve using your methods?
Becoming more productive and finding a solution for bad habits

Martha: No, I mean, a great example is, so if we go back to my story, I started off of a 100% clinical position.
Jennifer: Mm.
Martha: I was in an environment where despite having a very clear plan, and even going into meetings with my leadership, with, you know, PowerPoint slides printed out and PDFs of my plan and what my research plan was, and having great collaborators who were really interested in me working with them, there’s still nobody wanted to invest in that. I was given literally no protected time.
One of the things that I realized was extremely important in all of us, this is common sense, is I needed to develop an automatic writing habit. The position I am in right now, I have protected nonclinical time dedicated to research. My research time at that time, the first three years of my career, was just free time. You know, when I’m not clinical. So it was my personal time, but I had two young kids. So I also wasn’t gonna try to kill myself to do this.
I developed a writing habit that allowed me to write, eventually write about 25 minutes every single day. And that 25 minutes was, regardless of whether I would go, I was going to the OR that particular day, or if it was a weekend. If it was a weekend, I woke up an hour earlier than my kids, would write for 25 minutes, they’re awake and I’m done.
And I kid you not, Jennifer, in six months on a full clinical load, I published three papers.
Jennifer: Wow!
Martha: Yeah. In the six month period, you know, one was a review paper, but two of them were original research papers.
Jennifer: Amazing!
Martha: Using retrospective data. This is with no protected time. And so I think oftentimes I say this and nobody really believes me. You actually don’t need as much time as you think to accomplish something.
Jennifer: Hmm.
Martha: Oftentimes the problem is our habits. Because the reality is even if I did not have that particular habit and had not developed it in that time period, right now I have 75% protected time, I could have this protected time and be very unproductive. Submit a paper, two papers in one year, despite having 75% protected time.
A lot of it has to do with our maladaptive habits and our not being intentional about building important habits. And so how I started this particular writing habit is I realized that whenever I would get up in the morning and get dressed before I would go to work, I would go downstairs to my office, and then I would actually end up, you know, checking my email before I would go to work. Well, no, there’s no ever any urgent email that I need to actually respond to.
So I created a tiny habit recipe. Any habit you want to develop, you wanna create a, an anchor moment, which is basically inserting that habit into a routine that you have. And my routine was I would turn on my computer in the morning.
And so what I said is that after I turn on my computer in the morning, and then here comes a tiny habit, I would write two sentences in a manuscript and I would have the particular manuscript that I’m working on. And then you also then wanna insert a celebration, which is, I think where BJ’s research really stands above some of the other habit books, because a lot of the habit books will teach you that you wanna give yourself a reward, but anything that you’re trying to wire in your brain, it needs to be instant gratification. And so he, you know, these emotions that create actually that desire to repeat a behavior and over and over again, behaviors guided by our emotions, right?
As soon as I would complete that, those two sentences, I’m a very affirming person. And what makes me feel good is to, you know, state positive affirmation statements. So I would say to myself, “I am an NIH funded researcher.” I was not, I was not close.
Jennifer: But you said it.
Martha: But I said it and it made me feel good!
Jennifer: I love that. So you got your two sentences, and then you’d have your positive affirmation.
Martha: Yes. Yes. It’s like an affirmation and a proclamation at the same time. Yeah. And so I said that it made me feel good. And eventually the two sentences like increased, you know, the two sentences would take me like less than five minutes, then it would increase to more.
Then I could crank out like a paragraph in 25 minutes. And I just kept doing that. Cause imagine this, you are writing in a paragraph in 25 minutes and writing 25 minutes a day. How long is it gonna take me to finish that manuscript?
Jennifer: Hmm. So you really created a recipe that ensured that you got your writing in at the start of the day, like kind of when you already had this habit of checking your email and you just switched that to writing the two sentences?
Martha: Yep.
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Why work with women in academia?
Jennifer: That’s so cool. That’s really interesting. One of the things that it seems like you are intentional about is who you work with, and that’s women. Is that, is that correct?
Martha: Yes.
Jennifer: Tell me a little bit about that decision and why you enjoyed working with women?
Martha: I got into coaching because of my personal experience. And as I started, before I became a coach, I started sharing my story. I was invited to different institutions to talk about, ’cause I, I did a lot of work around time management to folks talk about time management and career development for early career faculty at school, different universities.
And so, as I was telling, you know, given these workshops and given these talks, have all these conversations with women afterwards, and one of the things I realized was that my experience was not unique. Yes, it was unique to me, but there were so many women who had that same shared experience. And oftentimes when we’re going through some of these experiences, I haven’t really dived into some of the nitty gritty, you know, the gaslighting, the discrimination, all of the stuff that’s like in there, you know, the misogyny that kind of fueled a lot of this, right?
You think you’re alone and you suffer alone. And so as I started sharing my story, I realized that, “Oh gosh, there’s so many women that are experiencing this.”
And for me personally, I’m in a place where I love my academic career. I love being in academia, and I love being in academia because my mind is not wired to align with the traditional academic culture.
Jennifer: Hmm.
Martha: And by unwiring my mind and rethinking in a different way, it has helped me thrive. And it has helped me be successful in my career, and personally. And so, like, I really want other women to experience that joy because we’re seeing women leave medicine and academia at higher rates than men. And so, and for me, that’s extremely concerning.
Even though there’s more women in medical school, on the PhD path than ever before, we have such a leaky pipeline, extremely leaky. And so that’s why you see only 25% of full professors at schools of medicine across the country are females. You know, 25%, which is like utterly ridiculous. We make half. We’re 50% of the population. So, yeah. So, so I think that all of that is, is challenging. And I think that helping, that’s, you know, helping other women who have gone through the journey.
And I feel like when I speak to people or when I coach people, they feel there’s that level of trust because they feel like I’ve gone through that same experience as them. And I can offer, if anything, just a listening ear. And definitely as they open up to coaching, help them really transform their thinking and also their lives at the same time.
Recognizing burnout

Jennifer: One of the things that you mentioned was that after these workshops, women would come up to you and they, they’d have conversations about the things that they were experiencing, maybe how similar it was to what you talked about. What are some of the ways that women, academics especially, can recognize their burnout, recognize when maybe a change does need to happen?
Martha: Oh, that’s, that’s a great question.
Mental, physical exhaustion are like common signs of it. Disengagement from the workplace and from the things like your responsibilities and the things that even previously may have brought you some enjoyment no longer become like very enjoyable at all. Going to work with a sense of dread. You know, all of those things. And also like how your inter- how this, all of this feeds into your interactions with your family.
If you’re not happy at work, because as I mentioned, work should be a component of bringing you personal and professional fulfillment. And so if work is, if you’re not happy there, it really feeds into your personal fulfillment. It’s harder for you to be happy elsewhere. And it becomes obvious in what your kids may say, what your significant other may say as well.
I think that if people are experiencing this just exhaustion, this dread, this lack, this disengagement from work, even anxiety that’s attached to all of it, I think those are all signs that they really should reach out for help. There’s nothing wrong with asking for help. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with it. It makes you stronger, from my opinion.
Jennifer: I love that. So it sounds like the first step, if you’re listening to this and you are experiencing some of these feelings of burnout and exhaustion, your first step is to reach out for help. Can I ask, who, who do you recommend people reach out to? Is it a mental health professional? Is it a coach like yourself? What’s a good direction for someone to go?
Martha: Well, I think like the, probably the first most non-intimidating thing to do is to speak to a, a trusted peer or a colleague, right? Because oftentimes when people feel that overwhelmed like me in that situation, I, you know, I didn’t wanna speak to a stranger. I don’t even wanna speak to a mentor or have them judge me.
And so I reached out to a trusted friend. You know, I spoke to one of my, some of my physician colleagues, but also reaching out to like my personal friends outside of medicine who knew me really well was extremely helpful for them to act as a sounding board. And I think, I think as you begin to talk about your feelings, it will become obvious whether you need to also speak to a mental health provider.
Right now most universities also have free access to mental health providers for faculty members. And I would say take advantage of that. I absolutely did when I was at my lowest. It was just like one session and it was like a breath of fresh air. So definitely take advantage of that.
And then, you know, from there, I think coaching is really incredible guide that can really help you. And coaching obviously definitely can be paired with therapy because therapy is very different from coaching. If you need therapy to address underlying psychological or mental health issues, definitely pursue that. And then coaching can also kind of help really was like kind of the action steps.
Jennifer: So helpful. That’s great. I really appreciate you sharing those different options. And I like the one about talking with friends and people outside of academia too, how that can be helpful. So I appreciate that.
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Dr. Kenney’s online and social media presence

Jennifer: Now, this is a podcast that’s about online presence. And you’re a researcher, you’re a coach, you do, oh gosh, there’s one other thing you did that was recent. I can’t remember what it was. But with all of these things, how, how do you communicate? I mean, I imagine that your online presence has something to do with it, but tell me a little bit about what makes up your online presence and how you feel about it?
Martha: I feel like I’m in a more comfortable and great position with my online presence now. I think when I started, I just wanted to get, even, this was even before I had a coaching business.
Jennifer: Yeah.
Martha: I wanted to get my ideas out there. I’m somebody that I love to write, I love to journal. I’m very conceptual and very theory based, which is why I have a conceptual framework for my coaching. ’cause that is because I’m like that. I wanted to just get my ideas out there. And so I started off with just a blog and even I, I stopped writing my blog now, but like, I started off with a blog. It was great. Okay. I got my ideas out there. ’cause I felt like I had all this stuff inside. I’m like, I need to, I need to get it out.
Jennifer: I love that.
Martha: And I also then started exploring different social media platforms to just share my ideas. And I think for me, that was a search because, you know, my sister, who’s much, much younger than me, told me to go on Instagram because that’s her generation’s social media platform.
And I tried Instagram for about like, maybe six months or so. But I hated it. And there’s nothing wrong with Instagram. I would say as people are thinking about getting your ideas out there through social media, find the platform that is authentic to your personality.
Jennifer: Yes. I love that. Wait, wait. Before you go on, can I ask like, what helped you know that Instagram was definitely not for you? Because other people are listening to this being like, wait, I wanna delete my Instagram. So how did you know?
Martha: So no. Okay. So what I knew was like, when my sister was like, okay, you gotta create Reels, right? And you gotta figure out like what’s trending and et cetera. And I did a reel based on something that was trending and I put the video up for like, maybe two days and then I promptly deleted it because I watched a video and I was like, this is not you. Like this is just not you.
Jennifer: Yeah, yeah.
Martha: Like, this is so fake and it’s not you in any form.
Jennifer: Mm.
Martha: And I have to lean on my strengths and I need to find a platform that values good writing.
Jennifer: Yeah.
Martha: ‘Cause that is where I’m strong
Jennifer: I like that. I like that. So what platform did you end up really liking ‘cause of the writing component?
Martha: LinkedIn
Jennifer: LinkedIn
Martha: Yes. And so like, yeah, I mean, LinkedIn has been, I have, I, I think it’s been almost a year since I went all in on LinkedIn.
Jennifer: Yeah.
Martha: And, you know, I used to share posts like five days a week, but now I moved, I decreased it to three days a week just because I started a newsletter. And I wanna nurture my newsletter audience as well.
But what I love about LinkedIn is, I mean, sometimes I just put a selfie pick of myself. Like, a picture of me, like, sitting in front of my desk. That is my picture, you know, for like, my inter-LinkedIn. I think in the year that I’ve been on LinkedIn, I have done maybe two videos. I don’t have to do video. I’ve been able to really garner a, a nice engaged community without putting forward video content. ‘Cause I just don’t, that’s not where I lean and I don’t have that time also, or that capacity takes too much time as well. I find writing to be therapeutic for me.
And so whatever you do from a social media perspective, it has to be enjoyable. I enjoy writing these pieces, and so I find it to be fun.
And so LinkedIn rewards that, you know, it’s, people write great posts and people comment on it. People engage on it. They, their algorithm is like really based more on your content and not your images and flashy, they don’t even do hashtags. You know, that’s like, so that’s great.
So that fits for me. And, and for somebody else, they might be like more like the images side of things, which would be Instagram and more trendy or video, which would be TikTok, et cetera. So like, but I, you know, I just tell people, find, you know, experiments with different things and find what is authentic to your personality, where it’s not a burden for you to actually put yourself out there.
Jennifer: I have another question, which is actually about your LinkedIn newsletter. How did you decide that you wanted to go beyond writing posts and actually create a regular piece of content like a newsletter?
Martha: So I realized that when you write a post, sometimes some of the people that are following you, not everybody sees it. And so, and I was writing a lot like five days a week. So some people will miss like a, a certain post. And it also, I wanted to just build a better connection with the people who are following me. And so I started, it’s an email newsletter.
I actually, first, before I did an email newsletter, I created an email course, a five day email course for female faculty members who work in academia. And so I created the course and I got great feedback and I was like, oh, I just don’t wanna like people to finish a five day course. And then like, that’s it. I’m like, bye, you know, you’re not gonna work with me with coaching, then it’s okay, bye. You know, I wanna continue to nurture that. I wanna continue to share my ideas, share advice, and also just get feedback from them. Also insights to create more new content.
And so it was because of that, I created an email newsletter, which I’m having a blast investing time in. I love, with that people respond to some of the posts and I get emails from people, and I’m able to actually build relationships that are a little bit deeper.
Jennifer: Ooh, I like that. Deeper relationships.
Experience with negative social media reactions
Jennifer: I’m curious as a researcher and a coach, some of the professors that I talk with have fear or anxiety about them showing up as a coach online, even though it’s something that they care about and they do.
I think they’re a little worried about what their academic community might think about that. Have you experienced negative reactions sharing all of your identity on social media and being online?
Martha: I’ve gotten a lot of sarcastic comments.
Jennifer: Oh, sarcastic comments. Okay.
Martha: But I’m like, “Oh, so what?” Right? This is how I think about it. And this is what I tell other people. The reality is that each of us are multifaceted individuals. Right?
Jennifer: Right.
Martha: Oftentimes our role in our workplace is not gonna tap into every facet of your personality and what brings you joy. I’m now starting to do a teeny bit of coaching at my institution, but it’s not enough. It’s not like there’s a blog for me to write at my institution or a newsletter for me to generate. I wouldn’t want to do it because there would probably be all these rules attached to it anyways.
For me, this is an opportunity to really show a part of Martha and really feed a part of my identity and personality that’s not being fed in the academic setting.
This is just another part of who you are that you’re not necessarily able to display in the academic setting. Regardless of what you do, people will have something to say about it.
I think when I started showing up so heavily on LinkedIn, and I’ve written a couple posts about this where people started making comments thinking I’m preparing myself to quit medicine.
I’m like, no, I love my job. If you actually read my content, that’s what I’m writing about. How I got to the place where I love my job. And I love the department and the institution that I work at. I love my colleagues. This is me tapping into a creative aspect that I didn’t even know I had.
Since showing up on social media, I realized that, Oh, I am a creative person. I always thought as a science-y, brainy person, I had no creativity whatsoever. I was like, Oh, actually this is my creativity. There’s right in this stuff. It’s actually very fulfilling.
So people will say whatever they want at the end of the day. When you become an entrepreneur, whether it’s a coach or something, or it’s a consultant in academia, it does not fit in the mold in academia. It’s not part of the traditional academic culture. But the reality is also things are changing in academia. The most of the people who are going to have something to say about that are people who are kind of a little bit older or the older generation who aren’t even on social media anyways, much. You kind of just have to let go of that thought.
In addition to the sarcastic comments, I’ve also received like really encouraging comments. A I have people following me, reading me. Like, they never comment. They never ‘like,’ but I’ll meet them at a conference or I’ll see them somewhere and they’ll be like, “Oh, I love your content. I read this.” And I’m like, you’ve never liked a post, never commented. These are academic people. So you’ll actually also be surprised as well.
Jennifer: Oh, that is so familiar to me. Someone asked, “I’ve seen your social media post recently and I feel like you’re not getting a lot of likes?” And I’m like, “No, but I’m getting clients.” The professors that I work with email me and they say, “I saw your post and I wanna work with you,” but they’ve never followed me or liked, liked anything I’ve shared. That’s totally fine. People engage in the way that makes sense for them.
Martha: Yes.
How to connect and work with Dr. Kenney

Jennifer: Before we wrap up, I really want anyone who’s listening to know if you’re like a good fit to work together. Who are your ideal clients? Like who do you want to reach out to you, who are you excited to work with?
Martha: I’m excited to work with any woman in academia who’s like, “Okay, I love being a scientist. I love being an academic physician, but I don’t know how long I can do this for, because I’m burnt out, because I’m exhausted, I’m overwhelmed, but I just don’t know what my next steps are.”
Jennifer: Ooh.
Martha: Those are the kind of women I love to work with to help get clarity on your next steps. If you’re overwhelmed, struggling with time management, I’ll help you to define the boundaries or boundaries around your values and create better work life alignment.
At the moment, I’m not taking one-on-one clients because I just launched a group coaching program that’s gonna start in two weeks. Yes. Super excited! Most of my clients will probably be through the group coaching program. Another cohort will start in January.
Jennifer: So cool. If you’re listening to this, you can get on the waitlist for the January cohort.
Martha: Yes.
Jennifer: That is so exciting. Martha, thank you so much for talking with me today. Is there anything else you’d like to add before we wrap up?
Martha: Thank you so much for having me as well.
One of the things that I would love to add is the fact that oftentimes I think in academia, we don’t like to do a lot of these introspective, what we call soul searching things.
I’m still relatively early career about to go to mid-career. I’ve been struck by the number of senior women, five, 10, even 20 years ahead of me career-wise, who have come to me for coaching.
They have come because they never took that time to really get clarity on their values. They were like, “You know what? I went on the ladder. I got to this particular position and realized that the last 10 years, the last five years I’ve just been going through the motions and I’m so unfulfilled. I’m so unhappy, I don’t even know what my next steps are.”
Time is such a precious thing. And so the person who is gonna value your time and your energy the most is you and your loved ones. Taking that time to really get clarity on what you want.
- What do I want?
- What truly matters to me?
- Who am I here to serve?
- What are their problems?
- How can I be of help? What solutions can I provide to them?
- Am I really walking on the path that I truly desire?
Taking that time is so precious and it’ll make such a world of a difference for you so you don’t look back as a 90 year-old with tons of regret about what if.
Jennifer: Aww, Dr. Martha Kenney, I have loved this conversation.
How can people get in touch with you, connect with you on social media after this ends?
Martha: People can send me an email at Dr. Kenney, so it’s [email protected]. Or one of the easiest ways to link up with me is go on LinkedIn, connect with me and send me a message.
Jennifer: Amazing. Thank you so much for joining me here on The Social Academic. Thank you!
Martha: Thank you. Thanks for having me!
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Bio

Dr. Martha Kenney is a board-certified pediatrician and pediatric anesthesiologist who completed undergraduate education at Brown University followed by medical school, residency, and fellowship training at Johns Hopkins University. She is currently an Assistant Professor at Duke University where she leads the Pain Equity and Disparities Lab. Her research is focused on pain in people living with sickle cell disease and marginalized communities and is supported by a 5-year K award from the National Institutes of Health. She also holds several prominent leadership positions, including guest editor for the Journal of Pain, member of the professional development & education committee and co-chair of Diversity, Inclusion & Anti-racism SIG for the US Association for the Study of Pain, member of the National Pain Advocacy Center’s Science & Policy Advisory Council.
Outside of teaching medicine and conducting research, Dr. Kenney is a certified professional life coach and certified behavioral design consultant with a deep-seated passion for employee engagement, burnout prevention, work-life balance and career development amongst professional women. She is particularly passionate about working with young female professionals and entrepreneurs. She is a sought out speaker and has spoken at prominent universities and national conferences and facilitated workshops.
Dr. Kenney is married with two young kid. In addition to coaching business, she and her husband own a commercial print shop based in Durham, NC. She loves to read, journal, and serve and support members of her community and church.
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