From Member to Leader: Building Your Voice in Global Physics Collaborations

We often call our collaborations "communities" and Merriam-Webster defines community in two ways: first, "a body of persons of common interests", and the second, "a state of caring about and wanting to interact with others in a group." While the first obviously applies to large, global physics collaborations, the latter is more indicative of how one achieves success: purposeful engagement with others in the collaboration. Success involves showing up, showing interest, and a little bit of showing off (results). Often, we start small and gain our footing within subgroups, service tasks, or national communities, where these experiences foster the technical skills, social skills, and, most importantly, the trust necessary to lead at the larger scale. Residencies and visits to host laboratories can further broaden the view of the physics opportunities and people within a collaboration. I will speak from my experiences within the Compact Muon Solenoid Experiment, the DRD and RDC collaborations, and my future collider endeavors to give my perspective on how to develop a leading voice within these international communities.