#03. Why PhDs struggle to land non-academic jobs.

622 Words | 4 Minutes

Over the past two years, I've talked to 1,000s of PhDs who want to leave academia. Many PhDs submit 100s of resumes, receive countless rejection e-mails, and then conclude (erroneously) that no one will hire them outside of academia. That's just not true. You are have so many marketable skills. That's not your problem. The problem is our academic training.

In the words of Karen Kelsky: "academia is a cult." We've spent over a decade in a weird, intellectual bubble that is completely different from the rest of the professional world. That's not a bad thing - I loved our weird bubble. I loved learning and pushing the boundaries of human knowledge. But outside of academia, generating knowledge isn't enough - you need to solve problems. Identifying and solving problems is the foundation of all successful businesses.

But PhDs don't understand the business world.

Just think about it - how much do you know about sales, marketing, or product development? As a post-doc, I didn't know anything. Even worse, for the longest time, I wasn't interested in learning. I had been studying early childhood development for over a decade. I had absolutely zero desire to "sell my soul to a company to make products for profit." Sales were nefarious. Marketing was annoying. And product development? Impossibly boring.

This is what academia conditions you to believe about non-academic careers. But if you stay locked in this thinking, you are going to stay trapped in academia. The only way out is to learn as much as you can about the business world. Because it is very different than academia.

If you want to leave academia, you need to understand these 3 things:

01. Networking is everything.

Most jobs aren't filled from submitting resumes to online job ads. Most jobs are filled via networking. If you're leaving academia, you need to form a relationship with someone who has the power to hire you - someone who can look past your lack of direct work experience, and instead, see your marketable skills and your potential. Many PhDs don't understand how to network, or believe that networking is "gaming the system." It's not. This is how hiring happens in the business world. It's all about who you know.

02. Your degree doesn't matter.

For PhDs, this is a very tough pill to swallow. Unfortunately, we've spent a decade in post-secondary education for a degree that is essentially meaningless in the business world. It is completely valid to feel regret, anger, and/or despair over this realization. But once you've felt your feelings, it's time to get to work. What's your next career move? What skills do you need to develop? Can you volunteer, freelance, enroll in a bootcamp, or do contract work? If you have a PhD, you are an expert learner. Be resourceful. Figure out what you need to learn.

03. No one knows anything about academia.

Remember: less than 2% of the world's population has a PhD. When academia is our entire world, it's so easy to forget that most people know nothing about academia (if you want a reality check, explain the stigma around non-academic careers to someone without a PhD). It's up to you to translate your academic experiences into language that businesses understand. If you don't translate your experiences, you'll be dismissed as "overqualified" or "underqualified" for non-academic careers, even when you could succeed in the role.

All PhDs who leave academia will eventually come to accept these facts - it may take some time and some healing in order to get here. Because leaving academia is hard. It's emotional. But it's also exciting to reinvent yourself, to rediscover the joy of learning.

I've been there. It's a process. But we'll get through it together.

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P.S. - The next cohort of After Academia starts tomorrow! Here's all the information, including the sign-up link. Sign-ups close bright and early tomorrow morning, 6am PST, Monday, March 11. This is the lowest price my program will ever be. Things are just going to get bigger and better from here on out. Have questions? Respond to this e-mail :)