Generating a Salary Posted on October 19, 2007 Robert C. Malenka (bio) discusses being proactive on one's own behalf in finding sources of income.

The reason I was able to take years off and actually do a lot of research during my residency – and again, I hate to be so crass, but it all comes down to money – is I generated my own salary. I did not ask the department to pay me – pay for my salary while I was doing basic science research. I hustled.

So for my two-year leave of absence from the residency, I obtained an NIH postdoctoral fellowship, an NRSA. So I just applied for one on my own and was lucky enough to get it. Then even during my residency, I searched by talking to faculty who were – I wouldn’t say they were my mentors, but were at least available to help me brainstorm about sources of salary support.

And so for my last two years or residency, I was able to generate my salary. There was a private organization called The Scottish Rite Schizophrenia Research Program, I believe, and I was able to write a small grant and get enough money for a year to cover my salary. And so it was much easier for the Department of Psychiatry at Stanford to free up some of my time and allow me to do what I wanted to do because they didn’t have to pay me.
I think doing these sorts of negotiations and career planning is still certainly possible, but it takes forethought and it takes motivation and it takes energy and it takes a desire to really want to do it. You have to be aggressive, but aggressive in a good sense of the word; aggressive about taking control over your own career and not expecting anybody to hand it to you on a platter.

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