The November 2023 Career Stories featured Katie Lindl, Deputy Director, Program Development Support Office, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL).
Dr. Katie Lindl has been at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) for 5+ years working in the Program Development Support Office (also known as the “proposals” group or PDSO), first as a proposal manager and for the past year and a half as the group’s deputy director. She has a bachelor’s degree in molecular biology from Princeton and completed a PhD in neuroscience at the University of Pennsylvania. Together with the PDSO director, she heads a group of 12 people.
Calling this an accidental career, Dr. Lindl found her first job as a grant writer at a neuroscience start-up in Menlo Park through her rowing team, a sport she picked up during graduate school. Following her stint at this start-up, Katie took a break from research development and began work as a Pilates instructor and studio manager, hoping to have time for creative writing while also dabbling in freelance work in scientific editing. Once again chance pulled her back into research development when one of her Pilates clients found out about her science and science writing background and recruited her into the PDSO at LLNL. Currently, her day-day job includes proposal management and editing, training and mentoring, approving and assigning work that comes into the PDSO, and interacting with PIs and leadership at the Lab.
The diversity of work proposed across the lab keeps Dr. Lindl’s job interesting and exactly matches the breadth of work she had hoped to find when she finished graduate school, as she adds “During my time in graduate school, I realized that I’d rather help others communicate and improve their science than do my own research.” She is inspired by writing proposals for big science, having a very appreciative group of PIs, participating in training and growing her skills, as well as investing in and growing the careers of others. Two of her biggest sources of inspiration are her dad, a scientist, and her curiosity about people and the world around her.
Even though Dr. Lindl’s work is very rewarding, she knows research development work can be overwhelming at times and that people in our field of work tend to want to “take it all on.” Hence, her tip to the NORDP community is to learn to say no when needed.
Dr. Lindl continues to row regularly on a competitive masters team in Sacramento, CA; hike year-round with her overgrown puppy, Koda; ski in the winter; and teach Pilates, while splitting her time between her ranch in Livermore, CA in the San Francisco Bay Area and her place in Truckee near Tahoe in the Sierra Nevada. Her full-time remote work option at LLNL has allowed this lifestyle, for which she is grateful.
When asked if she had learned anything from her time in rowing that has helped her in her career in research development, Dr. Lindl noted that, yes, she learned that “You can’t win the race by yourself, but you can lose the race by yourself.” She has loved the connections she has made through NORDP and feels she has benefitted from learning the ways others do their RD work at their institutions and has shared these insights with her team at LLNL.
Dr. Lindl would love to answer any questions you have for her, so please feel free to email her at lindl2@llnl.gov. To listen to her full interview by the career/kindle team, please click on this link (you must log in as a NORDP member to access): MC LMS – NORDP LEAD presents: “Career Stories” – Katie Lindl – November 8, 2023
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