Wednesday, September 9, 2009

The grass is chartreuse on the other side?

Another postdoc told me that he can't wait to be done with academia. He's decided to go into industry instead. His reasons? He is tired of taking orders from someone (we'll come back to this). And he'd like to make more money (this one is obvious, so we won't come back to this, though a future blog with salary numbers may be in the works).

Tired of taking orders?

I happen to know his advisor and this is one of the most lenient, easy going faculty members you could hope to meet.

One of the biggest draws of the academy is that you can run your own show however you like (assuming you're able to procure funding). From what I've seen of industry, there is no end to the amount of middle management you have to answer to. This includes reasonable, smart people, but also many petty, political, possibly insane people. If anything, he will be taking many more orders from many more people.

So I told this postdoc that he's nuts. And I told him why. We'll see where he ends up...

A Ph.D. friend of mine who's in industry told me recently that the only reason academics complain about academia is because they've never been outside of it. I heartily agree.

5 comments:

  1. Ha! Agreed (from what my husband tells me about industry, anyway). Did this postdoc understand your point?

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  2. My experience in industry, was that yes, there are a lot more people with a say in how you spend your time. On the other hand, corporations are set up to delegate authority - so as capital E Engineer in the research department you are the final word within your assigned responsibilities.

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  3. CE, I think this is a situation where he wants / needs to learn this first-hand.

    Dan, you're right, but delegating is the key in academia too. Maybe the ultimate point in any job is that once you make your way high enough the food chain, there are other people to push around (I mean, mentor). I'm curious as to whether you're still in industry and if you have any further thoughts on academia vs. industry...

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  4. I worked in industry, and am now in academia. At least in my experience, in industry you are expected to conform in ways that academics would never tolerate--in dress, speech, hobbies (amateur athletics, OK; anything to do with music or art, not OK), marital status (illegal of course, but it was quite clear that only married, homeowning white men, and the occasional token nonwhite man or white woman, were considered management material.) Anytime someone says that our university should be "run more like a business" I want to squirt them with a seltzer bottle.

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