A survey suggests that junior researchers need guidance to properly maximise the value of a recommended training plan.
By Chris Woolston
Tag Archives: career path
The autopilot postdoc
Falling into a postdoc after a PhD is a waste of excellent credentials, say Karin Bodewits, Philipp Gramlich and David Giltner.
A year in the life: from the lab bench to the writing desk
Leaving’s never easy. Especially when leaving a world as complex and intricate as academia, says Judith Reichel.
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Know the odds
The odds of landing a tenure-track position in the life sciences are low while the chances of being stuck in multiple postdocs are high. So the leaders of nine top US universities and one research institution this month announced a plan to communicate those probabilities in an effort to grapple with a clogged biomedical research pipeline.
Abandon ship, or learn to swim: the gamble young scientists must make
For scientists, there’s nothing more frightening than a major grant rejection. With the scarcity of funding at the forefront of everyone’s thoughts, it’s time to talk about options, says Atma Ivancevic.
Job stability and a career in research are rarely put together. Science is a windy, grueling, uphill climb that might end abruptly at the edge of a cliff. Halloween is a particularly scary time for Australian scientists, as it signals the release of #NHMRC project grant results. Right now, many laboratories are facing difficult decisions due to rejected funding for next year. It’s not a surprise — we see it everywhere — yet it’s a shock that affects the entire scientific community. For early career researchers across the globe, it’s a timely reminder to carefully consider and plan for the future.
So, what are your options?
A long and winding road into medical communications
Take time to explore your options – there is no perfect path for finding your career, says Erica K. Brockmeier
How to escape a ‘paint-by-numbers’ career
Academia trains us to follow pre-defined paths when planning our careers, but the most exciting and rewarding careers are designed by their owners. If you’re willing to take some risk and create your own design, you can have a more exciting career than you ever imagined.
By David M. Giltner, PhD, Founder of TurningScience
If you’re like me, you entered university with a plan: to follow a career path that many had followed before. This is common, because school trains us to follow directions. Earning a degree involves predefined steps:
‘Complete this application adequately, and we will admit you.’
‘Answer this list of questions correctly, and you will pass the test.’
‘Pass this list of classes, and we will give you a degree.’
It’s natural to continue looking for a path to follow after graduation, but, in my view, that’s not how the most exciting careers are built. I’ve found my own way, founded a company, and enjoyed an immensely rewarding career along the way.
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Adios to academia
By Virginia Gewin
US science and engineering PhD students are losing interest in academic careers because their career preferences change throughout their training, finds a study – not because of limited faculty-job availability.
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The faculty series: Setting up your own lab
Starting up a brand-new lab is a dream to many early-career researchers, but to make the most of it, they must be wise with their money.
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We’ve covered setting up your own lab before, but there’s an awful lot more for you to consider when you begin your tenureship. Here’s some more of the story.
Equipment isn’t the only thing you need to think about when you finally get your (hopefully big) bag of cash. Staff and PhD recruitment is important, as is considering whether you need a closed or an open lab. How should you arrange everything? Does anyone else in the department need to share equipment? Should you stay traditional or move everything online? What else should you consider?
Recruiting staff
“There’s no point in paying for all of the new equipment if you don’t have enough hands available to use it,” says Rafael TM De Rosales, a lecturer in imaging chemistry at King’s College London. Too much focus on the equipment – be it computers, chemicals or carefully calibrated chronometers – and not enough on the people who’ll be using it, means you could find yourself in a brand new, decked out lab with little research output. Your most important hire will be the first one – your first postdoc needs to be skilled and enthusiastic enough to both carry out the research and teach your future hires what they need to know. Continue reading
I knew I wanted to be a scientist when…
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When did you realise you wanted to be a scientist? Justin Jee gives you his story
ELEMENTARY: 1993
I knew I wanted to be a scientist when I was five. My dad worked for NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab and brought home pictures of Jupiter and Saturn taken from space. They were printed on poster paper with a glossy finish, and I would take them out at school and show them to everyone.
I knew I wanted to be a scientist when, in eighth grade, I entered the California State Science Fair. My project: modelling the acoustics of musical instruments using sine and cosine functions. My dad taught me the least squares method, higher harmonics, and Matlab. My homeroom teacher told me my project had too much math.
I knew I wanted to be a scientist when I learned about Mandelbrot fractals and artificial intelligence from my fellow entrants in the California State Science Fair.
It felt like I would never be a scientist when the winners of the California State Science Fair were announced, and I was not one of them. Continue reading