🎙️ Podcast Link 🎙️
𝐒𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐈 𝐝𝐨 𝐚 𝐏𝐨𝐬𝐭𝐝𝐨𝐜? 🤔
𝐈𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐣𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝐭𝐨𝐝𝐚𝐲, 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐝𝐨 𝐚 𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐭𝐝𝐨𝐜?
These are two of the questions that I get the most often, and also one of the most requested #HackingAcademia questions.
As anyone who has seen my videos or talks knows, I’m all about individualization of advice to your circumstances.
So I can’t really answer the first question directly, especially in a short online video – and hence I’ve resisted doing this video for a while now.
But I realized (after more requests in the past few weeks) what I can do – from a very large data sample!!! – is talk though a few of the considerations that come up the most when discussing this.
Things like positive indicators a postdoc may be for you, financial considerations, faculty versus postdoc decisions and types of postdoc roles and responsibilities. This is, of course, just scratching the surface, and what a more detailed one-on-one conversation would go into in much more depth.
And I can answer the second question as well – which is, “yes” – but with one very deliberate change in my mindset about Plan Bs…
#Postdoc #Academia #Research #Advice #careers #university
Full Video Notes
Should I do a postdoc? This would have to be one of the questions I get asked most often at talks about mentoring and career advice. It’s also one of the most requested topics for my Hacking Academia series.
I’ve resisted doing a video on this because it’s one of those questions where it’s very difficult to give general advice. It depends enormously on your individual circumstances and your personal goals.
I’ve decided to do the video anyway because, over the years, I’ve had hundreds of conversations with prospective postdocs who were trying to make exactly this decision. What I thought I’d do is share some of the key concepts that come up time and time again when people are thinking about whether they should do a postdoc. I’ll also answer another question I get asked frequently: if I were just starting out today, would I still consider doing a postdoc?
To keep the scope of this discussion manageable, I’m going to focus on a fairly common scenario. I’m talking about someone who has just finished a PhD, is considering moving directly into a postdoc, and is working in computer science-related fields such as AI, computer vision, robotics and similar disciplines. Many of the ideas will apply more broadly, but perhaps not as directly to other fields or to people coming from very different backgrounds.
The first question is, what are some of the positive indicators that doing a postdoc might be worthwhile?
The first is that someone has completed their PhD, immersed themselves deeply in fundamental research for perhaps the first time in their life, and caught the research bug, so to speak. They’ve genuinely fallen in love with research and feel like it’s an itch they still want to scratch. That’s usually a very positive sign.
The second indicator is a little more pragmatic. Many people finish their PhD with a strong desire to pursue a career in academia by becoming a lecturer, assistant professor or similar. The conversation usually splits into two parts. First, I try to establish whether they really understand what modern academia is actually like, rather than some romanticised ideal. Assuming they’ve done their homework, spoken with academics and understand the realities, then a postdoc is often a very sensible pathway towards giving that career goal a genuine attempt.
Financial considerations are another major factor. Different people place different emphasis on the financial implications of career choices, but many people considering a postdoc are also reaching a stage of life where they’re thinking about settling down, buying a home or starting a family. The financial implications therefore become much more significant.
Postdoc salaries vary enormously around the world. Some positions, even in relatively affluent countries, effectively pay not much above the poverty line. Others are very well remunerated, sometimes paying almost as much as a junior faculty position. There is tremendous variation between countries, institutions and even different types of postdoc roles within the same country. That variation can have a major influence on whether a particular opportunity is attractive.
Another important consideration is that postdoc roles themselves vary enormously.
At one end of the spectrum are postdocs that are essentially an extension of your PhD. You’re continuing to conduct research as an individual contributor, perhaps with slightly greater expectations regarding productivity and independence, but fundamentally doing similar work.
At the other end are senior postdoc roles where you’re effectively functioning as a junior faculty member. You may be supervising PhD students and undergraduates, representing your research group publicly, contributing to grant applications, undertaking public engagement activities and perhaps even teaching. Those roles are fundamentally different from being simply an individual contributor.
It’s also worth thinking about the different categories of postdoc positions.
One common category is the independent fellowship, sometimes described as a self-funded postdoc. This is where you’ve secured your own fellowship through a university or external funding agency and largely have the freedom to choose your research direction. These opportunities are highly competitive and relatively rare, but they can be exceptional career opportunities.
The more common category is a postdoc attached to a specific grant or research project. Even within these roles there is considerable variation. Sometimes you’ll need to follow the grant objectives quite closely. Other times you’ll simply have a broad mandate to conduct impactful research within a general topic area. The amount of intellectual freedom available is another factor worth considering when evaluating different opportunities.
Occasionally you’ll find yourself in the fortunate position of having both faculty offers and postdoc opportunities available at the same time.
In today’s academic environment, I would be very reluctant to recommend turning down a faculty position if becoming an academic is genuinely your goal. Faculty positions are increasingly scarce and extremely competitive.
Having said that, there are situations where someone who has completed a relatively short PhD might feel they haven’t yet fully developed as a researcher. They may want several more years of intensive, hands-on research before taking on the much broader responsibilities that accompany a faculty appointment. Once you become faculty, even with teaching relief or other support, your responsibilities expand enormously and you inevitably spend less time doing research yourself on a day-to-day basis.
One point I try to emphasise to people considering postdocs, without sounding too pessimistic, is that timing still plays an enormous role.
You can do everything possible to strengthen your track record, improve your capabilities and maximise your competitiveness, but many factors remain completely outside your control. A global pandemic can suddenly transform the job market. Funding cycles change. Universities move through hiring booms and hiring freezes. If you’re geographically constrained, those fluctuations become even more significant.
I always encourage people to do everything possible to maximise their chances of achieving the career they want, while recognising that randomness and timing will always play a substantial role.
Finally, let me answer the question I’m asked all the time.
If I had just finished my PhD today, would I still consider doing a postdoc?
As best I can answer a hypothetical question, yes, I would.
However, there would be one important difference in my mindset.
I would constantly remind myself that even if I did everything right, I could still be derailed by factors completely outside my control. That doesn’t mean I shouldn’t pursue the academic career I think I want. It simply means I would always keep in the back of my mind that there are many different ways to make meaningful contributions and build a deeply fulfilling career. Those pathways don’t all require following the traditional progression from PhD, to postdoc, to academic appointment.
As I said at the beginning, it’s impossible to answer the question, “Should I do a postdoc?” for your specific circumstances in a general video. That really requires an individual conversation about your goals, your constraints and the sort of career you want to build.
Nevertheless, there are a number of general principles that come up again and again. Hopefully I’ve covered some of the most important ones here, and I wish you all the very best with whichever path you choose.