Return To Work Plan Template: Fill & Download for Free

This one's mine from a cell/molecular biology lab.Alarm goes off around 8:00 in the morning. Hit snooze multiple times. Wake up by 9:30 or so. Bleary-eyed, stumble into the shower, get ready, leave home by 10.Get morning coffee from vending machines (it's cheaper), enter lab by 10:15 and realise, as always, you're the last person to arrive.Get to your desk, turn on computer. Open a fixed number of tabs in a fixed order: Gmail, institute email, Google calendar, Facebook, weather, My NCBI (safety tab in case the boss drops by), Quora.Spend some time sorting emails, switch to Facebook in 5 minutes. Realise there's been nothing new on Facebook for 3 years, switch to Quora.Postdoc working next to you comes up to tell you something about cells, she starts chain-sneezing. Silently count the number of sneezes (they average about 4-5), then talk to her about the cells.Realise you should actually go check your cells to see if they're ready for transfection, go to the cell culture room and see that they are, but all the hoods are booked until 2. Sigh and return to Quora.Spend about an hour on Quora, wondering if your primers have arrived yet. Go down two floors to check the lab's mailbox, they haven't. Climb back up and resume reading Quora.Remember that you have some bacterial cultures for a plasmid prep, and they've most likely overgrown by now. Run to fetch them, do the prep (takes about half an hour), return to Quora.The 12 o' clock bells go off. Go home for lunch (I live 5 minutes away thankfully), make lunch, argue with roommate about who has to do dishes, watch some TV, return together around 1:30, dirty dishes forgotten.Check the lab's mailbox again, the primers have arrived. Yayy. Return to lab, search the -20 freezer for a long-forgotten template, thaw dNTPS, buffers and all, and set up PCRs.Remember that you have an old acrylamide gel sitting in the fridge, fetch it, choose some random samples to run on it. Find that the lab's out of the common 1X tank buffer, spend 20 minutes on your phone until the MilliQ machine laboriously fills out 10 litres into the dispenser, lug it back to the lab, and run your gel.Return to Quora. The boss pops over asking how's it going, hurriedly switch tabs, recite "It's good" followed by a brief description of your day's plans, boss leaves satisfied.Decide you should actually read some papers that you've been meaning to read for a while, find the best paper, start reading. Midway through, a sentence catches your eye, this can be used to design a whole new array of experiments for your project, you realize, you abandon the paper and start frantically finding new snippets of information.The PCR and protein gel should be done by now. Load the PCR products on an agarose gel, and set up the protein gel for Western blotting. Return to frantic Googling.Remember that you have to still do the transfection. Thankfully the cell culture hoods are free, collect plasmids, do the transfection. Return to lab, check your DNA gel, the PCR worked (silent Yayyyy), do a quick purification and set up a double digestion.A friends pings you on Gtalk (Hangouts is annoying, why couldn't they just have improved Gtalk?) reminding you of a lecture. Run for the lecture, fall asleep 20 minutes in, get woken up repeatedly by pokes coming from the person sitting behind you, wonder why you're even taking this course, it's so dull. The lecture finishes, the speaker asks if anyone has any questions, look awkwardly at everyone else and receive similar looks, leave the lecture.Pause to chat with friends before returning to lab, hear everyone's cribs about their bosses, complain about your own grievances for a while, suddenly realize your digestion would have finished long ago, run back to lab.Load the digested DNA for gel purification, put your membranes in blocking buffer, return to finding more information about your fabulous new theory. Convince yourself it's even more fabulous than expected.Decide that you absolutely must tell the boss about this fabulous theory so that he can endorse it and you can start working on it as soon as possible (because you're never going to admit to him that nothing else is working for you). Boss hears it out patiently, rummages around in some old papers, pulls out a paper and hands it to you. You realize your oh-so-fabulous theory has either already been done and/or disproved. Return to Quora dejected.Someone reminds you about your digested DNA running, on a gel, curse yourself for forgetting about it completely because you were writing some silly answer on Quora. Check it under the UV and find nice clean bands, but wait .. They're the wrong sizes ... Return to your desk confused and pull up the DNA sequence and restriction enzyme cleavage sites. Realize that your selected REs cut your DNA at three internal sites. Grumble. Grumble loudly and repeatedly in your head.Grumble grumble grumble grumble grumble grumble grumble grumble grumble grumble grumble. Oh well, at least you know the PCR worked fine. Grumble grumble grumble. Order new primers with different RE sites.Put your membrane in primary antibody. Wonder if it's worth waiting a couple more hours so that you can put it in the secondary antibody and detect the bands after that, it's 7 p.m. already. Decide it's not worth it and leave it overnight in the cold room.Notice some old agar plates you've been meaning to throw out for some time in the cold room. Find they have a plethora of multicoloured stuff growing on them. Queasily carry them out and throw them in the autoclave bag. Spray your hands with 70% ethanol multiple times.Wonder if there's anything you can set up before you leave so that you have something to do next morning. Find some old plasmids that are running out and set up midi-preps for them. Establish that you've done enough for the day and go home.Decide to go for a run (need to work off all that winter weight). Realize how out of shape you are, and gasp and pant through the length of one kilometer of your jog. Give up and go to the nearest supermarket, load up on snacks and buy dinner and lunch for tomorrow (no cooking to minimalize dishes). Go back home and have a shower.Clean just enough dishes to make do for dinner, watch some TV, read the book you've been trying to finish for so long, give up and play on your phone instead past midnight, and fall asleep thinking you have to wake up early in the morning for lab meeting.Dream sweet sweet dreams of protein bands on a gel happily gossiping about all the sexy molecules they've hooked up with.My tally for the day:Number of times the safety tab was used - 3Longest chain sneeze heard - 6Number of times gels ran out - 3Number of successful results - 2Number of not-so-successful results - 4Number of times I've had to run and do something I'd forgotten about because I was writing this answer - 11

That wasn't what the Talosians were after. It never was.Like many of the best episodes of Star Trek, the initial assumptions drawn by the human characters regarding the Talosians and their motives at the start of the episode were completely off base. The Talosians weren't building a zoo, or trying to breed a race of slaves. They were trying to find a species that they could mold into an image of what they used to be before they retreated into illusions in a last desperate attempt to reboot the Talosian culture before the last survivors of their species died out.They'd hoped that the offer of being able to live out their lives in whatever fantasy they chose would be an adequate incentive for them to submit to this fate willingly, as Vina had, but after getting a chance to see a wider cross section of humanity they realized that the species was too rebellious for the plan to ever work. Even if Pike and Vina agreed to become the parents of this new generation, their children would rebel against any attempts of the Talosians to indoctrinate them into conforming to whatever template that had been picked out for them. So they let the humans go about their way and accepted their inevitable extinction.When Captain Pike did eventually return to Talos IV, there was no real chance that they could use him to carry out the original plan. Even if he wasn't sterile, Vina was well past her child bearing years. They did it as a kindness - both to him and to Vina - which they hoped might be enough to help make amends for the harm they'd done.

Not necessarily, but it has risks.Very exciting companies have been built by cofounders who are either dating or married. You will find some examples below.Do you want to miss out on these opportunities? Your call.This is a chapter from my book, Feminine Feminism. Trend Spotting: Love and StartupsThere was a time in Silicon Valley when VCs did not like the idea of funding couples. Nonetheless, Cisco and 3Com – two legendary Valley startups – were founded by entrepreneur couples. These days, the startup world seems to nurture a lot more romance… Sometimes he is the CEO, sometimes she.Sometimes they switch roles. To have a baby. Or a few babies. Or not. In any case, the bias against entrepreneur couples needs to be over.Entrepreneurship is a passionate affair. A powerful aphrodisiac. Better acknowledge that phenomenon.Julia & Kevin Hartz (Eventbrite)It took an engagement and the offer to work on a new business venture together for Kevin Hartz to bring his fiancée Julia to Silicon Valley. Julia’s previous work in Los Angeles was solely within the entertainment industry, but she showed great enthusiasm for entrepreneurship by independently handling the early stages of the venture. In 2006, the couple enlisted a third co-founder and launched Eventbrite, an online ticketing site that also fosters user connections and local event discovery.In early 2008, just days before Eventbrite received its first round of angel funding, Julia gave birth to the couple’s first child. Determined to continue the momentum of their success, Julia continued to work from home for the next five months before returning. Kevin holds the position of CEO, andAmy retains her title as President while mothering the couple’s two daughters. She and Kevin use a combination of family help and nanny care throughout the week until Julia works from home each Friday. Kevin and Amy continue to work as a team, balancing their business with life at home.Victoria Ransom & Alain Chuard (Wildfire)Like Julia Hartz before her, Victoria Ransom’s interest in becoming an entrepreneur was piqued by her boyfriend. Victoria joined Alain Chuard to found Access Trips, a travel planning company targeting young professionals in 2001. In 2007, when Facebook expanded business presence with the introduction of fan pages, Victoria and Alain created an application to run a sweepstakes through their page. The app gained such traction that they quickly expanded to the standalone application Wildfire, a social media marketing provider.Wildfire draws upon the viral effects of social media to run campaigns, manage analytics, and develop online leads. Wildfire grew to nearly 300 employees, and included 30 of the top 50 global brands among its clients. In July 2012, Google came knocking, and scooped up Victoria’s company for over $350 million.During their work together, the couple remained a strong team by playing to their strengths. Alain’s skill set cast him as Head of Product with a focus on design, running engineering and overseeing development. Victoria’s business sense saw her collaborate on the product but run the show, holding the CEO title. Victoria expresses admiration for mothers in business, but does not yet have children of her own. She continues to work in Silicon Valley, championing the cause of women in technology.Collis & Cyan Ta’eed (Envato)Collis and Cyan Ta’eed traveled from Papua New Guinea and New York, respectively, to meet and marry each other in Australia. Collis was independently pursuing design work and Cyan was working toward a design degree when the two were introduced, and in 2004 they began a freelance design business together. Their company, GoodCreative, was focused around charity design work. The sale of Flash files online prompted the move toward Envato, an online marketplace network to buy and sell creative services and digital goods.Today Envato sees nearly 10 million visits per month, and a file is sold every 10 seconds. The largest marketplaces feature web design templates and Adobe After Effects templates, as well as a background music marketplace for use in advertising. In 2007 Collis’ foray into blogging resulted in a second dimension for the site. Envato now has a total of 12 tutorial sites on every topic from game development to DJ-ing.Cyan’s affinity for project management creates a simple workflow for the couple, in which “Collis would create fantastic business ideas and [Cyan] would then take on the ideas and put a team around them.” Collis thus heads the company as CEO, and proclaims himself much less lonely than other CEOs because he can work with his wife – though, like Victoria and Alain, the couple is so far without children. The two are extremely close, relishing the entire day together and sharing a passion for their work.Amy Pressman & Borge Hald (Medallia)Following her business degree from Stanford in 1993, Amy Pressman’s work at a Norwegian-based consulting firm focused her attention on the falling standards of American manufacturing. While formulating a business plan to address the neglected sector, she fell in love with her husband Borge Hald, also working overseas after attending Stanford business school. The two returned to the Bay Area in 1999 to found Medallia. Medallia offers web-based surveys and related workflow to build customer loyalty for retailers, hospitality chains, and other services oriented businesses.After a long run of bootstrapping, Medallia was profitable by the end of 2002. In the 10 years since their start, Amy and her husband have built a sizable company that does well over $30 million in revenue. Though Borge handles primarily product and engineering, while Amy facilitates sales and generates new business, the two split leadership of the company. Only when the couple’s second child was born did the designation shift to Borge as CEO and Amy as President. The mother of three balances work and life through daily morning meetings with her husband to remain in touch with the progress of the company. “Life is chaotic,” Amy admits.Wendy Tan White & Joe White (Moonfruit)After earning a degree in computer science from Imperial College in London, Wendy Tan White was recruited to help construct the UK-based Internet bank Egg - Yorkshire Building Society. It was a project that would introduce her to Joe White, and what inspired her to begin her own venture. In 2000, Wendy founded Moonfruit, an on-demand website development platform providing a simple interface for users to share their passions. Both Joe and a close college friend served as her co-founders; Wendy and Joe were married soon after.Moonfruit’s financial stability wavered during the Dotcom crash, at which time Joe left the company for full-time work with McKinsey. Through freelance help and additional funding, Moonfruit was back on its feet by 2005. In the midst of their growth Joe returned, as Wendy took her turn away from the company from 2004-2008 to raise the couple’s children. She continued to contribute to company growth, attending design school and developing media campaigns.When Wendy returned to work, roles were shuffled. This time, Wendy took up the CEO title while Joe became CFO. The two handle running a business as a couple by each working out of office one day per week. They arrange a weekly date night, and leave phones out of reach upon coming home each night. It’s a system that appears to work well, as Moonfruit’s revenue for 2012 was over $5 million, with an 80-90% retention rate on their e-commerce platform product.So you see, love in startups is a real trend these days!