Defend, Publish & Lead Podcast

In this episode of Defend, Publish, and Lead, host Christine Tulley interviews Brenda Ulrich, a publishing attorney and board member of the Textbook and Academic Authors Association (TAA), about the organization and the upcoming 2026 TAA Summer Institute.   Brenda discusses TAA's unique value as a cross-disciplinary organization focused on supporting textbook and academic authors throughout their...

In Episode 262, host Christine Tulley offers practical strategies for faculty to optimize their spring semester teaching while protecting their scholarly writing time. She presents five countdown tweaks: Establishing and knowing your teaching, grading, and prep schedule   Implementing pattern teaching to save preparation time Identifying grading-heavy weeks and adding extra writing time beforehand...

In Episode 261, Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach at Defend, Publish & Lead, presents five key questions for academics to consider about their writing in 2026: whether to commit to or abandon zombie writing projects that have stalled, clearing out outdated writing debris like old files and emails, deciding how many hours per week to dedicate to writing given other obligations...

In Episode 260, Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach at Defend, Publish & Lead, emphasizes the importance of celebrating writing wins as the holiday season approaches, arguing that CVs often function more as stress-inducing evaluation documents than celebratory records of accomplishments.  She demonstrates her approach using Penzu (a free digital writing journal that she loves b...

In Episode 259, Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach of Defend Publish & Lead, addresses the common question of when to start writing after the holiday break, emphasizing the importance of making this decision ahead of time rather than letting it remain nebulous as the calendar year flips. She shares her personal approach of designating January 5th as her first official day back...

In Episode 258, Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach of Defend Publish & Lead, discusses the importance of planning ahead for summer 2026 writing opportunities and skill development, even though it's only December 2025, because many programs open registration in January. She recommends several writing retreats and institutes she's personally experienced or researched, including...

Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach of Defend Publish & Lead, presents her annual holiday gift guide for writers. This year the list focuses on budget-friendly items all priced at $50 or less. Here is her countdown of the Top 10 gift items for 2025 for writers or yourself: 10) Sardine Pens 9) Book - "Guide to Making Time to Write: 100+ Time & Productivity Management Tips for Te...

Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach, explores the concept of maintaining an "origin story" for academic writing projects in the context of surveillance, power dynamics, and emerging technologies—the theme of the 2025 Big Rhetorical Podcast Carnival. She examines how various stakeholders (universities, publishers, plagiarism detection software, AI tools, and tenure committees) h...

Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach, shares practical strategies for maximizing conference value while attending the POD (Professional and Organizational Development) conference in San Diego. Rather than focusing on pre-conference planning or post-conference follow-up, this episode addresses the often-overlooked middle phase: what to do once you're actually at the conference. S...

Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach, explores how to use Academic Writing Month (November) not to add more work, but to improve your writing habits and practices. She shares four strategic tweaks that can help academic writers become more satisfied with their work as the calendar year closes: finding one ideal writing day, creating a dream project list, taking stock of nine sat...

Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach, shares her experience using AI (Claude) to create a comprehensive writing plan for her upcoming book on sabbaticals, commissioned by Princeton University Press for their Skills for Scholars series. With a deadline of February 20th and only 18,000 of 65,000 words written, she demonstrates how AI can be a powerful project management tool for a...

Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach, discusses how academics can determine whether they have a viable publication idea by examining four key factors: first, whether you can execute the project with available resources including time, materials, and access to necessary data; second, whether the idea fits with a target journal or publication outlet and potentially a backup option...

Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach, addresses the mounting pressures academic parents face as they juggle grading, writing deadlines, children's activities, caregiving responsibilities, and the approaching holiday season. She offers four practical strategies for managing overwhelming periods, including leaving margin in your schedule, connecting with other academic parents for...

Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach, counts down her favorite episodes in this 250th episode of the Defend, Publish & Lead podcast. Starting at number five, she highlights "Your Writing Project Mix" (Episode 108), which helps academic writers strategically plan which projects to tackle each semester. Number four covers "5 Steps for Effective Writing and Research Collaborations"...

This episode shares three ways to keep thinking about scholarly writing when you are not actually doing it. Recommendations for podcasts and books on academic writing are shared, along with suggestions for joining an organization or other initiative where regular contact with your writing is encouraged. Episodes Mentioned Episode 89: How I Got Back into Writing after a Month Off   Books Mentioned:...

In Episode 248 Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach AT Defend, Publish & Lead, shares four practical strategies for managing grading responsibilities while protecting writing time: front-loading writing at the beginning of the semester before grading intensifies, leaving detailed notes after each writing session to facilitate re-entry after breaks, prioritizing writing before gr...

In Episode 247 Christine Tulley, Defend, Publish & Lead President and Executive Writing Coach, shares multiple strategies for a resetting a day, a week, a project, a mode of writing, and more.  Resources: Tuesday Toolbox - contact christine@defendpublishandlead.com for subscription information Set your writing goals with us! Try us out in a free consultation . Check out our current and past worksh...

In Episode 246 Christine Tulley, Defend, Publish & Lead President and Executive Writing Coach, shares three insights the Tuesday Toolbox writing initiative including: Academic writing benefits from formulas as starting points, writing sessions need single focuses beyond project selection (like argument clarity or sentence variety), and surprisingly, academic writers lack opportunities to regularly...

This episode describes the critical importance of building adequate margin into academic schedules. After a week that went "off the rails" due to unexpected emergencies including children's health issues, emergency dental work, and even a mouse invasion, Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach at Defend, Publish & Lead, discovered that while she thought she had built sufficient 30-...

This episode demonstrates the importance of creating realistic weekly templates rather than making assumptions about available writing time and compares before and after templates after first mapping an ideal week and then making real time adjustments based on the semester's workload, demonstrating how templates require ongoing refinement based on actual workflow patterns rather than theoretical s...

In this gentle re-entry strategy episode, DP&L President and Executive Writing Coach, Christine Tulley shares a low-pressure approach for returning to scholarly writing after extended breaks, particularly useful at the beginning of semesters when writers feel disconnected from their projects. Her "just look and notice"  method involves reading through manuscripts without committing to write new co...

This episode provides practical strategies for systematic organization through visual systems (using color-coding in Canvas to distinguish primary sections from copies) and strategic time blocking for competing priorities (dedicating specific days to writing, grading, and administrative tasks). Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach of Defend, Publish & Lead, demonstrates creating...

This episode emphasizes establishing scholarly writing habits during the first week of classes before semester demands overwhelm available time and energy. Acknowledging the natural tendency to prioritize immediate teaching concerns over scholarly writing, Christine Tulley, President and Executive Writing Coach, provides a strategic framework for habit formation through early commitment (establish...

This episode introduces the innovative Tuesday Toolbox, a new weekly writing support initiative designed to provide academic writers with practical, immediately usable tools and strategies throughout the semester. Recognizing that faculty need consistent writing support but lack time for lengthy resources, the Tuesday Toolbox delivers 5-minute video lessons every Tuesday for 14 weeks each semester...

This episode addresses a challenging landscape of academic professional development funding in 2025, offering a priority-based framework for maximizing limited resources amid budget cuts and funding uncertainty. Christine's systematic approach begins with the "number one priority test" (identifying resources you'd pay for personally), moves to immediate commitments like fall conference registratio...