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The other day I had an actual 3D, face to face lunch with a colleague, let\u2019s call him Simon. After months of 2D Zoom catch ups, it was lovely to be in an actual cafe on campus, eating steaming hot noodles. Simon and I were meant to be discussing business, but of course the conversation quickly took a turn into complaint territory.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s face it, 2020 is a burning dumpster fire of a year. There\u2019s a lot to complain about.<\/p>\n
Simon went first. He has a PhD, but now works in an \u2018alt ac\u2019 policy role, helping academics with their research administration. He complained about the jaw dropping rudeness of some of our colleagues during the Covid shut down. Apparently some academics, righteously pissed at being shut out of their labs and offices, took to yelling at support staff on the phone. We agreed that some people really need to get a life outside the lab.<\/p>\n
My complaint was some supervisors telling their students that Covid lockdown is \u2018the ideal time to get some papers written\u2019. Really?!<\/p>\n
As our\u00a0@ANUresearcher Twitter bio<\/a>\u00a0puts it: a pandemic is not a writing retreat. It\u2019s hard to concentrate and be creative if you are in the\u00a0deep valley of Covid shit<\/a>. But what\u2019s even worse, in my opinion, is how some supervisors pushing the idea that publishing a metric shit-ton of journal papers will keep the academic dream alive in a Covid affected job market. I pointed out to Simon that this attitude is not unconnected with people who freak out when they can\u2019t access their lab: they see more work as the answer to everything.<\/p>\n The reality is, for the next 18 months at least, academic jobs will be scarce \u2013 at least in English speaking countries where universities are exposed to the international student market. Around 50% of people leave academia at the end of their degree anyway \u2013 this crisis means more will be joining them. By encouraging people to stay in the academic race, these paper-pushing supervisors are potentially robbing people of valuable time to prepare their escape plans.<\/p>\n Simon agreed and said something both wise and funny:<\/p>\n \u201cI think most supervisors are useless at career advice. When a student says\u00a0I\u2019d like a job outside academia,<\/em>\u00a0what your average supervisor hears is\u00a0I think I would like to join the circus<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n I laughed soup out my nose while Simon continued:<\/p>\n \u201cYour average supervisor has no idea about circuses or how to join them, so they scratch their head and say\u00a0I dunno, maybe you need some clown shoes?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cOr an elephant!\u201d, I said, getting the hang of this analogy. \u201cThen they say\u00a0Hmm, I don\u2019t have an elephant to give you, but, I know an expert in elephant genomes?\u00a0<\/em>Which is frustrating because you only want to know about circuses, not the genetic composition of elephants\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s right\u201d, said Simon \u201cWhat you actually need to do is find someone who has already run away to the circus and ask them how to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n If you\u2019re really lucky, you have a supervisor who has strong industry ties, or who has come from an industry and has kept their connections, but most academics have not been \u2018outside\u2019 for years, even decades. Most people who leave academia never come back. Therefore, our collective knowledge of how to \u2018make it\u2019 as a researcher outside academia is very poor.<\/p>\n If you want to join the circus, you\u2019ll need to find someone who has walked that path before \u2013 luckily there are plenty of people out there and some of them even write books about the transition.<\/strong><\/p>\n Up until now, the best book I\u2019ve read about making the transition from a PhD to a non-academic job is\u00a0Navigating the pathway to industry<\/em>\u00a0by MR Nelson<\/a>\u00a0(which is a bargain at $2.99 or so on Kindle). While\u00a0Navigating the Path<\/em>\u00a0is great, it is a little short on detail about how to follow the advice that it offers. So I was pleased to find out about a new book called\u00a0Leaving Academia: a practical guide<\/em>\u00a0by Dr Chris Caterine through Princeton University Press this month.<\/p>\n I immediately contacted Princeton, who sent me a review copy to read and what a joy this book is.\u00a0Leaving Academia<\/em>\u00a0is both a first person account of \u2018joining the circus\u2019 and a guidebook on how to follow in his footsteps.<\/p>\n Dr Chris Caterine has a PhD in ancient Roman poetry, so he\u2019s a good person to write this book. Graduates in the sciences often have a range of quite \u2018marketable\u2019 technical skills, and can restyle themselves as data scientists. Sadly, humanities grads can have a harder time convincing non-academic employers that their skills are relevant. In\u00a0Leaving Academia<\/em>, Caterine talks you through the whole process of landing a role that will use your research skills, whatever your background.<\/p>\n Caterine starts out with comparing the non-academic job path to looking at a black hole:<\/p>\n \u2018You know the object is there, but it\u2019s impossible to see past the event horizon that shrouds its true workings in mystery. Its gravitational pull actually makes that limit a point of no return: anything that moves beyond the event horizon is unable to cross back over again, at least not without being irrevocably and utterly transformed. These attributes make leaving academia awesome in the word\u2019s original sense: enormous and terrifying.\u2019<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n The twin elements or fear and the unknown, he says, means many people \u2018keep even the event horizon in the distance\u2019. In my experience this is very true: during a PhD, academia can become an all encompassing world with rituals that you understand and know. The work is challenging and interesting, so many people stay, despite the poor pay and uncertainty. And hey \u2013 no judgment here! I did this myself for over 9 years and I understand the stuck feeling only too well. Contemplating leaving means reimaginging your professional identity and building a whole new professional network. It\u2019s so hard to know where to start.<\/p>\n This book has some great suggestions. In the first chapter, \u2018Dread\u2019 Caterine talks about the feelings of \u2018approaching the event horizon\u2019, sympathetically and senstitively. Here is a man who understands the boulevard of broken academic dreams and the series of unpalatable choices pursuing an academic career entails. Do you move to a town where you know no one for a job that might get your foot on the first rung of the ladder? What are the trade offs for you and your spouse? This part spoke to me as someone who is \u2018living the academic dream\u2019. I\u2019ve written about\u00a0my own struggles with anxiety and adventures with medication<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 would I have to be medicated in another career? Reading this made me wonder: is the sacrifice really worth it?<\/p>\n We are encouraged to think of academia as a vocation that offers a comfortable \u2018life of the mind\u2019, but in reality, it\u2019s been at least 20 years since this was true. What academia really offers is a lot of work with precious little job security to back it up. From an early age, my son told me he didn\u2019t want to be an academic because \u2018you work so much harder than Dad and get less money\u2019 (burn!). What my son noticed was the number of hours I must work to meet the continual pressure to \u2018perform\u2019. My workload doesn\u2019t leave a lot of time for other hobbies\u2026 in fact, you could argue that all my hobbies (writing blog posts and books, podcasting) are really more work in disguise.<\/p>\n I can understand why Dr Marie-Alix Thouaille has labelled the academic dream a form\u00a0\u2018cruel optimism\u2019\u00a0<\/a>where the \u2018good life\u2019 fantasy is motivating, but also damaging. The hope of getting \u2013 and keeping \u2013 a permanent academic job can lead you to make life choices that are ultimately not in your best interest. At the same time, the nature of academic work means you are probably passionate about what you do. Academic work offers a sense of purpose and the promise of making a difference.<\/p>\n In short, if you will excuse the expression: academia is a total mind fuck.<\/p>\n Giving up the academic dream and finding other ways to give your life meaning and purpose can be disheartening. That\u2019s one of the reasons I am glad this book has been written. Caterine steps you through the \u2018admitting you have a problem\u2019 stage and how to move from \u2018living to Learn to Learning to live\u2019, where you put your happiness and wellbeing first.<\/p>\n The meaty part of the book and where, I think, Caterine adds significant value is the step by step guide to networking your way into a job. Many \u2013 perhaps most \u2013 job opportunities never get as far as a job advertisement. I\u2019ve got most of my jobs this way, so I know this method will work \u2013 but it takes work. Caterine can save you a lot of time by guiding you in the set up and execution of a networking strategy.<\/p>\n It would take too long to outline the networking method here \u2013 and you really should read the book if you are interested \u2013 but I interviewed Chris Caterine recently and asked him for some tips. You can listen to our conversation on my\u00a0SoundCloud page<\/a>\u00a0or click the link below:<\/p>\n