I have a PhD. The acquisition of that certification was perhaps the most meaningless thing of my life. Behind my Bachelor's by far. No one was really proud of me, and I only finished it because I have a problem with not finishing things. Finish it if you have it in you, cut it loose if you do not. Dr. means nothing, and no one in the real world will care either way.

Quite the opposite for me. It gave me the needed time and open-ended-ness to play around with methods and tackle problems in a way that best suited and interested me.

The things I learned during my PhD makes my bachelor’s and master’s subjects seem almost worthless.

What field is your PhD in?

Computer Science. But it was quite qualitative and involved a fair bit of human research as well.

> If you fail during your postdoc you are left with basically nothing.

Can't you go into industry? You'll have a PhD + more papers done along the way in your postdoc.

Yes, of course one can do that and it’s probably the most reasonable strategy (as opposed to another postdoc, for example). But then, what was the point of the postdoc? I’d rather move earlier into industry. It’s ultimately a gamble.

My suggestion - never do a job just because it might lead you a better place. It probably won't.

Fair enough - a lot of the time people have to take bad jobs. If you can't move due to family, if the economy is bad or if you have no leads for some reason you have to take what you can get.

But if you can pick, pick something you actually want to do, if that leads to great things - wonderful. If it doesn't three years of your life isn't up the chute.

These may be the last three years of your life. Remember that.

> But then what was the point of the postdoc?

To continue to develop as a researcher and build up your research skills, publication portfolio, and network, ready to move into industry.

If you do an ok PhD you could spend a couple of years as a postdoc refining that research and building on your foundation to really making a name for yourself and then apply to industry at your peak into a senior position.

It varies by field, but in my experience companies value experience in academia at about 1/2 the rate of experience in industry. So someone who spent five years in grad school getting a PhD and then spent another three years as a postdoc might be considered the equivalent of someone with four years of experience in industry. If you are going to leave academia anyway it is much more efficient to do it as soon as possible.

It does depend on the role though. If the company is hiring someone who is a world expert in your specific research subject it makes sense to have stayed to become the world expert. But I think that's unusual. Much more commonly people leave academia and go into more generic "data science" type roles in which case extra postdoc years don't really help you.

Of course if you enjoy the research and don't mind the opportunity cost then there's nothing wrong with staying.

Really insightful comment, I completely agree. It also has to do with the resources available in industry that increases the time value. You can get so much more done in industry because you have larger budgets and tighter timelines. The beauty of academia is it allows you time to ponder. So yes, it's less efficient but you typically find serendipity on the long way home compared to taking highway.

This is not a great idea, unless you’re sure the specific expertise you are building will get you a job.

In tech, we typically hire PhDs and postdocs in at the same level. Sure, you’ll probably advance a little faster with experience from a postdoc, but not faster than if you started straight out of your PhD.

Postdocs are preparation for academic research in a specific field. Most industry jobs don’t work like that, and most PhDs don’t end up working in the subfield of their PhD, either.

Don’t mislead yourself into thinking that a postdoc is a good default option for a PhD graduate. Way too many people do postdocs, and end up looking a little foolish when they look for industry jobs later.

Into a senior position straight from university? That's going to be interesting.

That's pretty normal for hiring PhDs in my practical experience. My first job was 'senior' and it's the same for everyone else I can think of. You are senior - you've been part of the community for around four years by that point and by graduation you're probably part of several committees and starting to mentor others. Why isn't that 'senior'?

Not the case in my field - biomedical. The hiring manager at a large pharmaceutical company told an audience of postdocs & graduate students at a career event a few weeks ago that they prefer to see a postdoc of at least 2-4 years to be considered for a senior scientist position.

Whether you have senior in your title is just nomenclature at pharma companies. Plenty do have it in your title just after PhD, reserving Scientist roles for those coming out of BS who are doing grunt work. That said, other companies have those as “technician” and PhD (maybe masters) is start of Scientist.

Getting hung up on title in Pharma is not a good move. It isn’t uniform at all.

I agree that nomenclature is just jargon. There's also the context of the parent, that senior jobs are typically available right out of university. I do not know the field the parent is in, though. In my experience of the biomedical field, this isn't the case. I'm a postdoc at a good medical school in the US, and most of the postdocs I've interacted with would happily take an industry job if they could manage it - there just aren't enough jobs to go around. The prospects for fresh Phds are even more grim.

Worked pretty smoothly for me. Probably helped that I had some relatively good looking private sector consulting gigs during my doctorate and post doc.

I think this depends on the field. If you're working 5+ years at a postdoc earning no money that time would have probably been better spent in industry.

the point of the post doc is to give you additional chances to get an academic positions, it's also an opportunity to work on cool projects, and experience a different culture if you do it abroad.

Postdocs seems...poorly understood by industry.

I have what should be a relatively employable background (ML + Neuro with a smattering of biology), and yet I rarely hear from recruiters (though I would love to).

I see it the exact opposite way: 5/6 of a PhD rounds down to nothing, more or less, so you’re somewhat trapped. As a postdoc, you have a lot more flexibility to leave whenever.

I just find a typo! I meant

> even if I had not been academically successful

Sorry about that.