Dorinda Marques da Silva’s research activities are mainly focused on functional processes for the removal of environmental pollutants from water, including development and application of biomaterials and catalysts. In 2021, Dorinda started as a contract Researcher at IP Leiria under the scope of the MBStox project (PTDC/BIA-MIB/31864/2017) and in 2021 she integrated the Associated Laboratory LSRE-LCM. She is member of the Portuguese Society of Biochemistry and of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry. Since 2022, she has been member of the Advisory Task Force of the World CDG Organization and member of the European Scientific Committee of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry.

Q: What key moments or choices have most shaped your professional journey?

All my key moments happened when I decided that I deserved more. For example, when I
decided that I deserved a work contract instead of a fellowship.

Q: Did mentoring play a role in those moments, if so how?

Mentoring was not a practice at that time. Nevertheless, the examples I had from my older
colleagues helped me to understand the position I should assume.

Q: Can you share an experience when you had to make difficult choices in your professional life and how you handled it?

Why do we call them difficult choices? Choices are usually to choose to be in our comfort zone or risk being out of it. To be out of our control zone means the power is not in ourselves but in God. God is good, so we are in good hands. After I realised this, I became much more conscious about my prisons and I decided with more clarity. One of those decisions was to stop working on weekends and support what matters to me. To respect this translates into a much more productive and motivated time of my work during the rest of the week.

"Be flexible, give and learn to receive, make real connections with people around and enjoy."

Q: What’s the most surprising or transformative lesson you've learned from mentoring someone, or being mentored yourself?

Has nothing to do with me; it's something much bigger than me.

Q: How do you tailor your mentorship approach to support individuals from other cultures, or underrepresented genders and backgrounds?

We are all human beings. No matter the cultures, genders or backgrounds, what most limits us is our internal beliefs. And, whether we like it or not, they are much more common to all of us than we might think. My mentorship is basically focused on the deconstruction of these internal beliefs, creating space for the real identity of the mentee to exist.

Q: Looking back, what mindset or habit most contributed to your long-term success and resilience?

To believe.

Q: What’s a common misconception about our societies or systems that you often find yourself challenging?

In the last years, I learned how the truth is related to vulnerability and how difficult it is to be vulnerable. Today, I know that when I am vulnerable, I am stronger because I am being truthful.

Q: What new trends or shifts are you seeing in workplace culture or leadership?

I think that the work culture is leaving behind the slavery to money and understanding that it exists to serve us, and not us to serve it.

Q: In the age of hybrid work and AI, what is one piece of career advice you would give younger professionals or professionals who are looking to pivot?

What distinguishes you from AI? Those characteristics are the ones that will differentiate you from all the rest. Choose a purpose where time flies by; this means you like it. Be flexible, give and learn to receive, make real connections with people around and enjoy.

Q: Tell us about your society/country, what social shifts do you observe? Are tech and innovation being harnessed for good?

It's not up to me to judge as I have an incomplete vision of ociety/country and social shifts. But as a biochemist, I know that “The dose makes the poison”, citing Paracelsus, who wrote: “All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; the dosage alone makes it so a thing is not a poison.”

Q: How can we support entrepreneurial thinking among young people and women?

Believing and listening to them, directing them with our experience for time remission.

Q: A motto you live by? 

While we are imperfect, we deserve to be happy.