You’re not new anymore. You’re not coasting toward retirement either. You’re in the middle — and it feels like everything is pressing in. Welcome to mid-career in academia: the squeezed middle. It’s a stage marked by rising expectations, layers of responsibility, and the uneasy realisation that early career strategies no longer work — but no one ever taught you what to replace them with.
As an academic coach who has worked with hundreds of scholars, I’ve seen this pattern play out over and over again. Talented, committed academics reach the midpoint of their careers and find themselves stuck: overwhelmed, under-supported, and secretly wondering, Is this it? Do I really want this for the next x years of my life? If this is resonating with you, know this: you're not alone, and you're not the problem. The system is built to squeeze the middle — and it’s time we talked about it.
The Hidden Pressures of Mid-Career
Mid-career is often romanticised from the outside — you’ve got a title, tenure, a research portfolio, maybe some funding wins under your belt. But inside, it often feels very different.
Here’s what I hear from mid-career academics almost every day:
“I have no time to think.”
Your calendar is an endless string of meetings, committees, student issues, admin, and ‘urgent’ tasks. Deep work? Strategic thinking? That feels like a luxury.“I’m doing so much — but I’m not moving forward.”
You’re busy, but not always productive. And certainly not fulfilled. The papers, grant proposals, and research ideas that matter most to you keep getting pushed aside.“I’m exhausted — and I can’t remember the last time I enjoyed writing.”
What was once intellectually exciting now feels transactional. The spark is gone, and burnout is creeping in.“Everyone needs something from me — but who’s looking out for me?”
You’re mentoring others, leading teams, and holding things together. But your own growth? That’s fallen off the radar.
Why This Happens
The mid-career squeeze is not a personal failing. It’s structural. Here’s what’s often at play:
You’re still operating with early-career habits.
What got you through the PhD and early postdoc — saying yes to everything, working long hours, over-preparing, people pleasing, afraid to say no — is now unsustainable. But no one trained you to work differently. And you keep on thinking, well its worked so far, surely there is something wrong with me, rather than the systems and tools and my way of being at workYou’ve taken on leadership roles without dropping anything else.
Rather than stepping back to step up, you’re just piling on. The result? Role overload, diluted focus, and chronic exhaustion.There’s no roadmap for what comes next.
The next promotion may feel ambiguous. You’ve achieved a lot, but you’re unsure how to design a career that feels meaningful — and achievable — from here.Your writing is stuck in survival mode.
It’s reactive, last-minute, and increasingly demoralising. You’ve lost the rhythm, and possibly the reason.
What Mid-Career Academics Actually Need
What I’ve found in my work is that mid-career scholars need three things above all:
1. A strategic reset
Mid-career is the perfect time to pause, reassess, and design the next chapter of your academic life. What do you actually want to be known for? What kind of work energises you now? What do you need be let go of? This requires space — and the courage to say no — so you can realign your work with your expertise and values.
2. A new system for working
You can’t work harder — you’ve already maxed that out. The answer is working differently. That means optimising your writing systems, protecting time for deep work, and rethinking what productivity looks like for a senior scholar. You also need permission (and tools) to stop being everyone else’s safety net and start putting your own projects first.
3. Support from people who get it
Mid-career can be deeply isolating. Everyone assumes you’ve got it figured out. But what you really need is a space where you can be real, be supported, and be challenged — by peers and mentors who understand.
The Path Forward
The good news? Mid-career doesn’t have to be a holding pattern. It can be a launchpad.
When I work with mid-career academics inside the Academic Writer’s Collective, we don’t just focus on writing more — we work on writing smarter, leading strategically, and building sustainable academic careers. It’s about reclaiming your voice, your time, and your vision.
It’s about reimagining what success looks like — and creating the systems, support, and habits to make it real.
And it’s about remembering why you started this work in the first place — and actually enjoying it again.
If You’re Feeling Squeezed…
You don’t have to stay stuck. You don’t have to keep doing more with less. And you certainly don’t have to go it alone. Mid-career can be one of the most powerful chapters in your academic journey — if you give yourself the space to reset, refocus, and recommit to work that truly matters.
If you’re ready for that kind of shift, I’m here to help. Book a consultation, or simply start by asking: What would it look like if this next chapter felt lighter, clearer, and more fulfilling than the last?
Because that’s not just possible — it’s what mid-career should be.
If you are ready to get out of the squeezed middle, decide today that its not going to be this way for the rest of your academic career. Book a call with me here to see where I can help.