Colleague Corner – Get to Know Victoria

Name: Victoria Colina-Brunne

Position: Manager of Research Development

Office: Sponsored Research

Institution: Max Planck Florida Institute for Neuroscience

What attracted you to this work?

I’m attracted to working with brilliant minds. I thought of this work as an opportunity to work with people who might need some guidance as far as funding and finding support for their work, as well as an opportunity to create solutions for them. I am also personally connected and motivated to the mission of solving problems and advancing work in the mental health field.

I live five minutes away from this institution and have always been in academia, so this position was perfect for returning to work after the hiatus I took to raise my children.

Overall, I love to help form teams, help people with communication, and help them garner support for the work they’re doing.

What’s your favorite thing about your work?

My favorite thing is to see people realize their potential and actually make their dreams a reality.

A lot of times people have great intuition about what they want to do, but they don’t always know how to reach the people they need to support them. My work is part of something bigger and I enjoy the feeling of having made a difference, that I’ve helped the science move forward and helped change people’s lives for the better.

What’s a handy tool in your tool kit?

Certainly, Outlook Calendar and Google Forms are invaluable for scheduling and information collection. 

Thinking more broadly, I enjoy engaging with and getting ideas and feedback from colleagues. Talking with others in our field, honing my skills, and getting validation is rewarding. There have been times I have had ideas for new programs, but given that we are limited in personnel resources, the outside feedback helps me prioritize and focus on what is important.

What’s your wish for improving your work?

I need to build a liaison network. By that I mean, consider ways to build RA and RD skills within labs, such as training postdocs in grant writing and management. This cross-training of postdocs could help support the PI of the lab in accomplishing their research goals while also training postdocs in essential grantsmanship skills for these “future faculty” and potentially opening doors to alternative career paths.

How could our organization take steps to improve?

What FL-RDA has been doing is phenomenal, and I am grateful for the connections and conversations we have.

One idea for growing what the network provides is to start a repository of resources that would be available. We could share templates or workshop samples so members could draw from these when creating new programming or resources.

Victoria joins us to fill a new position in the FL-RDA Executive Committee called “Special Projects Officer.” This position is for a one-year term (renewable) and provides an opportunity for engagement in special initiatives to advance the mission and goals of the Florida Alliance. Going forward, this position will be filled either through Executive Committee invitation or an open application period for members.