One year after leaving research and there are a few things I miss

Well, it's been a year since I left the lab. I survived. And, no, I don't miss research.

I miss the students
During my PhD and PostDoc, I personally supervised around 30 students and I really enjoyed working with such an enthusiastic group of people. The constant flow of new faces, new ideas and new stories was a great part of academia. Not to mention the multi-cultural nature of every lab that I worked in meant that we'd have long, hilarious discussions with new students about the weird etiquette of Britain and the UK, and how that was different in China, Russia, Germany, Austria, Mexico, India, Portugal, Estonia...

I miss being someone that knows things other people don't know
This makes me sound like a bit of a tool but when you're the long standing PostDoc, you're time is taken up with people who need you. You fast become the go-to person for all the labs needs, scientific and pastoral.

Can't get your culture to grow? Ask the PostDoc, they'll know what to do. Jim is crying in the lab because his culture won't grow - Ask the PostDoc, they'll know what to do. I'm thinking of quitting the lab and becoming a sheep farmer in New Zealand - Ask the PostDoc, they'll know what to do.

I'm starting from the bottom again and it's not easy, but I hope that I'm building up my skills and reputation so that I can be someone knowledgable enough that people will one day turn to me for advice.

I miss the confidence
I could just write 'see above', but I'll elaborate. The pressure that comes with being responsible for so many decisions in the lab means that you also have the confidence to make those decisions, defend them and know when you need to change your mind.

As a newcomer, I think I'm sometimes a bit cautious, but I need to be. I often have no idea if what I'm about to say is completely wrong. It usually pans out and it bolsters my confidence for the future, but it's not the same as the confidence that comes from being in the same job for a while.

I miss the money
I'd love to say that changing your career is easy and doesn't have any repercussions. Maybe for some people, it doesn't. I've lost a large portion of my income and after a year, I still feel like I've taken a 25% paycut, rather than feeling proud that I've worked my way up in a year from what amounted to a 60% paycut.

Money doesn't matter when you have it. The rest of the time, it matters. I'm very aware that my decision to leave research meant that my husband and I had to change our plans for our first flat and that I probably wouldn't have been able to get by if it wasn't for his help. I'm very grateful.

I don't miss the crying*
In my last 3 to 6 months in research, someone cried every day. Every day. It was pretty grim and it was often me. And I'm not a crier.

My first Comms job out of research, I think I made it until 3 months of rose-tinted glasses before I was sobbing in a park on my lunch break. I couldn't take the demands of the job coupled with the pay. At the time, it was costing me money to work. My wages simply didn't cover my bills even though I walked several miles to work and back to save £5 a day. There are a lot of highly-qualified people doing similar low-paid jobs and internships because the job market is fierce and, like me, they don't have enough non-research experience.

[For the record, I'm nearly 9 months in to my new job and I've only had to hide in the loos to compose myself once. When I found out Terry Pratchett died.]

I don't miss lab-etiquette
Perhaps because of the high pressure nature of the lab and the crushing defeat that is ever-looming, the lab can be a bit of an etiquette minefield.

There are things that you MUST put back in their place, because Jo the PostDoc from the lab next door NEEDS the solvents to be arranged by strength and not alphabetical order, even though they're not his. Don't ask Lisa from upstairs for a favour on a Tuesday. I can't believe someone has dared to use the incubator that we haven't used in over a year - the cheek! Someone just asked Stores for something and it's early (pre 10 am)/nearly lunchtime (after 10.30 am)/lunchtime (12-2pm) just after lunch(after 2.30pm)/late (after 4pm).

Of course there are politics and difficult characters everywhere but academia seemed to almost encourage this sort of behaviour, as long as the research gets done.

I don't miss the research
Perhaps this is the most surprising of all - I don't miss the research itself. I was a good scientist. I was thorough and careful, and kept a very up-to-date lab book. But I just didn't like doing it in the end. Not enough, anyway.

Now, I get to read about all the successful research. I speak to scientists when they are at their most chipper - when they've just had something published or they've presented at a conference. I twist their arms and beg for their time to help promote their research or host a lab visit. I really enjoy the interaction with research and researchers, and I hope that my time in that environment gives me a real insight into the demands they have on their time. But I never think 'I wish it was me'.

I get to explain successful research to the public, the press, members of staff and the real people that these breakthroughs could help. So I'm getting the bit of research and science that I always loved - the learning - without the heartache. I leave that to our dedicated researchers.

I'm not sure if I'm done with this blog, it's more difficult to write about your job when you want to keep it, but I might pop back with some posts from time to time.

Good luck to anyone who decides to leave the lab, it's not easy and plenty of people won't understand why you're 'wasting your education' [Thanks, Uncle, for that one].

I won't say you should do something that makes you happy because, the reality is, there are plenty of dull jobs that simply get done to pay the mortgage, and that's fine. But you shouldn't do a job that makes you miserable.

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*I wrote this before the #TimHunt fiasco. Lots of people cried in my lab - men and women. And I thought it worth adding these from 8 years of life in academia:

I don't miss:
-being in a departmental meeting with around 60 people and being told by the Head of Dep that a colleague only worked with me because they must want to sleep with me.
-being told by a colleague that women with PhDs were not 'proper' women because you couldn't have the attributes of a woman and succeed to PhD level.
-being asked to use my 'charm' to get someone to lend a piece of kit to my group as my boss was sure I'd be able to 'persuade' them.
-explaining to my colleague that my husband did not 'mind' that I had a PhD.

Sorting out your career is nobody else's job

People have started asking my opinion on job searching recently: Here's what I had to say to King's Graduate School on their blog...

I’m sorry to break it to you, guys, (and this is something I only really realised recently) but there is no-one out there that will be able to tell you exactly what job you should be doing and how to get it: that includes careers consultants. (Clearly they can help with your thinking and the processes of applying and so on but read on….)

About a year ago I started to realise that maybe the career in industrial research that I’d planned for the last 10 years wasn’t what I wanted. I confess it was partly initiated by the difficulty in getting a job but the more and more I thought about it, the more I realised I probably didn’t want the jobs I’d been applying for anyway.


Phew. Bullet dodged. Now what?

Well, first I started to complain. "My supervisors have never talked to me about what other careers are available", "No-one wants to talk about jobs outside of research", "I haven’t been given the opportunity to do anything else", I whined to the very nice careers consultant at KCL. I was quite whiny at this point, looking back on all the missed opportunities during my PhD and PostDoc and basically blaming other people.

Then I went to the Nature Careers Expo last September and realised things had to change. Every presentation I went to seemed to start with, "So I created this forum..,", or "I started this blog" and I sat there thinking "I can barely use my phone for email, how the hell am I going to blog?". It was at this point that the penny dropped: if I wasn’t going to take responsibility for getting myself a new career path, why should anyone else?

So I started a blog on my career search. I write down what I found out and shared it with other people. Almost every link and image I uploaded for the first month was broken and I’m still convinced that only my mother reads this but it gave me a start that lead to a free place at a SciComm conference, new contacts (yes, networking), a new understanding of the field around research and the jobs therein, a chance to blog on Speakers of Science, involvement in ScienceGrrl, the opportunity to do some public engagement with schools, joining twitter…but not necessarily in that order. Fundamentally, if you don’t know what you want to do, that’s fine: but you’re the only one who can find out.

During your PhD you can easily feel like you don’t have time for extra things but you will never get less busy, I promise you. The wonderful thing about your PhD studies is that there are lots of things you can try for free and if you don’t like doing them, you can stop. Here are some examples of things you can try…

1. Offer to write your PI’s research paper or review, even if it’s not on your specific area of work. This will help you decide if you want to do medical writing, where you have to summarise other people’s work, clinical trials and even the inserts that go in medication. I’ve written (and published) two papers this year and have two more underway. This is helping me get the most out of my PostDoc and making me practise my scientific writing.

2. Enter writing competitions to see if you like writing about science for a mainstream audience. I entered Access to Understanding with an article on arthritis (not my area) and got lots of feedback from friends and family.

3. Write news articles about cutting-edge science and submit them to the university paper/a blog/your boyfriend to see if they’re any good, to see if you like doing this and to see how long it takes you. I wrote something on antibody-drug-conjugates (sort of my area) in application for an internship at The Economist.

4. GO ON COURSES They’re free for many students, you probably have to go on some and you’ll definitely never have access to so many experts. I did a public speaking masterclass, public engagement course with King’s, science journalism at The Guardian and science writing at OBR. I paid £50 for the Guardian course, but the rest were free and it was a great way to meet like minded people for advice and support.

5. Talk to new people at every conference, meeting and seminar. If you’re absolutely awful at this then a job that requires networking is probably not for you. If you’re good at this then you will have made new contacts that could be invaluable. I ended up at a ScienceGrrl brainstorm, teaching kids about oxidation and sitting in on meetings about Science Museum lates all because of ‘someone’ I met ‘somewhere’ – not through my supervisor.

6. Read some patents. Properly. Is this something you find interesting? Patent law is a popular and competitive choice for graduates. It’s not easy so you should know what you’re getting yourself into. (I worked for a patent company as a chemistry consultant for a bit as part of my PhD – I’m pretty certain I find this dull)

7. Seriously think about how much money you’d like to earn and how little you will settle for: this will have a massive impact on what jobs you will apply for. My current job (which I love) is less than half my PostDoc wage and less than my PhD stipend.

8. Start a Twitter account or blog for yourself or your research group This is a great way to see what’s going on outside your research institution. If you do this for your research group you MUST ask permission from your superiors/head of department.

9. Plan something complicated from start to finish. A work party, a conference, a hen-do, a football tournament. The organisation this requires will tell you if you’re cut out for planning or project management and if you like doing it. I got married during my work search. I’m pretty sure I can now organise the hell out of most things. (Disclaimer: I’m not suggesting you get married purely for the project management experience, maybe just an engagement party…)

10. Apply for some jobs.  Even if you don’t know what you want to do. At least browse the job boards to see what’s out there. Some applications that I made steered me towards positions that I was better suited to. If you want a wake-up call, check out the picture below. It’s a screen shot of my ‘Applications’ folder. It doesn’t include those applications that were speculative or required only an online form…there are over 60 individual applications in less than a year. Don’t moan, just do something.

Any of the extra things on your CV will make you seem more well-rounded and not just another fed-up researcher. I was told on a forum that I was just another ‘desperate PostDoc that couldn’t make it in academia’ – you need to make sure your CV shows that that’s not the case and that you have other skills! And remember, if you try something new and you don’t like it or you’re rubbish at it, that’s fine, just stop and try something else. Then you can also add ‘perseverance’ to your CV.

I was ridiculously busy during all of this but I’m now at a job I love. I work for Sense About Science, a charity supporting projects that equip the public to make sense (get it?) of science. We create guides for the public, run events for researchers to train them in the best way to talk about their work, address bad journalism and put writers in touch with scientific experts whenever we can to make sure that science is clear, well-represented and useful for the public and policy-makers alike. It’s fast-paced, responsive, dead-line driven and no-one has cried for the whole eight weeks I’ve been here. So far, it’s wildly different to academia.

A version of this post was first hosted on the King's College London Graduate School blog. If you're affiliated with King's I strongly urge you to check them out as they are really helpful.

How to have two jobs...

So...I've been a little 'under-the-radar' for a few weeks. I've been quite busy trying to get two jobs under control and I decided to throw flat-buying into the arena as well.

I was never naive enough to believe that co-ordinating two jobs would be easy but I don't think I thought it would be so 'consuming'. In order to keep tabs on both jobs (one new), I often have to plan for one, whilst doing the other. This has to be done carefully to minimise the impact on whichever role I'm doing, whilst planning for the time when I'll be at the 'other' job. If you're lost by this description of my problem, then you should try doing it!

Right now, I need the money that my second job gives me and I'm really grateful to the 'first' job for agreeing to the arrangement, so I'm doing my best to do both jobs well. I'm fairly confident that I'm managing to keep my end of the bargain (two ends of a four-sided bargain) but that's not to say that things have gone completely smoothly. For example, there was one evening where I had to leave a bar at 11.30 pm because boss number two hadn't read an email properly and I needed to quickly respond. Of course, I didn't really need to respond to an e-mail at that time but I am afflicted with a pathological need to please and therefore couldn't just say no (I probably should have thought about this before I tried to please two bosses).

Whilst a lot has been said of having multiple freelance jobs on Twitter recently (under #Scicomm14freelance), here are some of my tips to make life a bit easier if your juggling two jobs, particularly if they are in different places and you can't work on either from home.

1. Plan
I'm quite organised and like to think that I always plan ahead but with two jobs you really need to make sure that you know what you're going to be doing, when and where. Once you've decided where you plan to be, make sure that you tell the people who need to know at both locations. Then tell them again. Other people are busy sorting out their own jobs so a passing mention that you plan to be away a week next Friday won't stick. Remind them in writing and, if possible, get them to confirm that they have understood. I've had several occasions over the last few months where I've told boss two my plans only to be emailed with a list of things to do on a day that I've said I won't be working.

2. Be realistic
There are going to be weeks when you are busy at both jobs, juggling completely different deadlines, plans and objectives. If you're asked to take on something new, judge whether you're going to be able to actually manage it before saying yes. If you're doing a four day week, don't try and cram five days worth of work into four days. If you manage this, can you let me know how you did it?

3. Ask for help
I haven't found this easy an easy one, but juggling two roles is only made harder if you try to do absolutely everything yourself. If there are things that could best be done between your visits, ask someone else if they can help. They may so no but, quite often, shared goals will mean that they want to help and they may even just help out of kindness!

4. Be flexible
After all these tips about planning and organising, I would also try to allow some 'flex' in your plans. There will be times when you will need to e-mail someone about job one when you should be doing job two, or take a call for job two on your lunch break at job one. Sometimes dealing with the two jobs simultaneously is tiring but it's really the only way I've found to keep both posts moving.

5. Switch off
This is something I've really struggled with. It's so tempting to work longer hours, check your emails earlier and later, do unpaid work at the weekend to take the pressure off. I'm guilty of all of these things and not sleeping because I've forgotten to order printer toner, emailed the wrong person at the wrong time or not managed to fit in that paper redraft. I do, however, (hypocritically) recommend that you don't do any of these things and make sure that you allow yourself time to not be at work. Either of them.

I wanted to take a picture that showed the tricky nature of trying to be in two places at once so I chopped a lime in half (the only fruit I always have). Unfortunately it made me want to mix a gin and tonic (the only drinks I always have in). I had water - After all, I need to keep my head clear in case I need to reply to a work email!

Does anyone have two jobs in two locations, or more? Am I just not doing it right or does it get easier? What is your advice?

I got a JOB! AKA a positive control for CV writing...

It finally happened. I applied for something great, I went through two interviews and, after a bit of contractual bartering, I'm starting next Wednesday! In the job application and job-finishing frenzy I haven't kept anybody up to date on what's been going on but here's what happened.

On the 19th February I applied for a volunteer role at the Natural History Museum only to find out that I'd mistakenly got the date wrong and applied one day too late! I was understandably miffed so I went into my flagged e-mail list to make sure I didn't miss any more deadlines.

I noticed that I still had one day to apply for two great internship roles at Sense About Science. Their name has come up a number of times when people were recommending employers to me so I wasn't going to let this one slip away. They make it their mission to help people understand the science they are bombarded with every day. This could be clearing up something confusing (or wrong) in the media, training scientists on how to best describe their own work or encouraging people to simply ask for evidence when given a piece of information.

Look! Dara O'Briain thinks their Ask For Evidence campaign is great!

I applied for two roles that were different in practice but similar in the skill-set required. They were Campaign Support Officer and Project Support Officer. Honestly, I put the applications together in half an hour and sent them. I did tailor each CV and cover letter to the roles but I didn't have to do too much work as this organisation (charity, actually) seemed to fit exactly what I wanted. I was really busy the next day at a TV masterclass (more on that in the future) but just two days later they asked me to come in for my interview the following week.

I had to submit a form and a written exercise beforehand and the interview itself only lasted 45 minutes. Nonetheless, I felt really pleased with the way it went. I didn't 'fake' anything or pretend to be anything I'm not and we all got on really well. There was even an awkward, but nice, moment where I had to namedrop that I'd been on Newsnight a few weeks before.

The follow-up interview with the managing director was the next week, where we discussed the role and the company in a bit more detail. Again, I felt very honest, I felt that they were being honest with me and there was no pretence. I was very excited. I still am.

Today, I wanted to pass on the great feeling that comes when you get a job you want, a job you know you can do well and (although I was sick of people saying it to me) when it's the right job for you, you WILL get it. Also, my 'positive control' CV was tinkered with in 10 minutes and sent out with a cover letter in just 30, but I've spent 18 months writing dozens of applications so I think I must've got pretty good at it! When it comes to the interview process, I've learnt that if you feel under a whole amount of pressure to 'perform' and be someone you're not, then the job is probably not for you. If you get the job under the pretence of a skill you don't really have or a type of personality that isn't really you, then the job is going to be very very stressful trying to keep that up!

Anyway, it's been a couple of weeks now but my contract is signed and I'm due to start next week, just a month after I applied. The whole process has raised quite a few issue of job-seeking including contract negotiations, juggling two jobs (I'll be at King's one day a week sometimes) and starting at the bottom, not to mention taking a huge (-60%) pay-cut. I'm hoping to share how this is all going over the next few weeks, with honest advice and tips for such a big life change.

I've also got some research to share on (science) writing and journalism. Just because I've found my niche (I hope), it won't stop me sharing my science careers stuff with you!

Oh yeah, If you're interested in the science communication side of the posts I've written, I'm writing on another blog called Experiments in Communication on the Speakers of Science network. That's more about what I'm learning about scientific communication from courses and as I go through my new career (job?)- Feel free to take a look. The other posts on the network are pretty cool too - one has a see-through egg!

How to secure a job after your PhD

The lovely people at jobs.ac.uk recently staged a live Google hangout entitled 'How to secure a job after your PhD'.

For those who haven't taken part in a Google hangout, it's effectively like eavesdropping on someone else's Skype chat. 

In this hangout, five careers experts chatted about what they think are key recommendations and obstacles for jobseekers. If you were signed in you could ask them questions or use the Twitter hashtag #jobsq (worth a look) to interact and steer their conversation. I, for one, found it really useful and thought that a lot of their points were transferable to anyone who's looking for a new job, not just those who are doing, or have done, a PhD. 

The hangout was chaired by Aimee Bateman, who is a commercial recruiter running a careers organisation called Careercake, helping jobseekers through advice, training and interactive events like the Google hangout. 

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Sharing their thoughts were: 

Dr Chris Humphrey who runs jobs on toast - a site/blog dedicated to helping people get fulfilling careers after their degree, PhDs etc.. Chris has done the PhD, PostDoc route and has ended up in non-academic project management - he wants to show the full range of career options open to qualified people and help them to identify their 'transferable skills'. 

Claire Jones, a Careers Professional at Nottingham University who works with researchers. She opened with 'PhDs are talented people with a range of attributes' - She's generally surprised at their lack of confidence.

Dr Ioanna Iordanou, a teaching fellow at Warwick Business School. She left academia but went back and now loves it - she has seen both sides of the story. 

Dr Nadine Muller, a lecturer in English Literature at Liverpool John Moores who got her academic post straight after her PhD

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The hangout kicked straight off by answering questions submitted before the event. Here is a summary of what was discussed:

How do you show an industry that you're interested if you've spent the last x years in academia?

This question is relevant for anyone looking to make a career move in to a new sector.

Advice followed the lines of thinking of yourself as a broad professional rather than your specific area of expertise. For example, you are a professional scientist, rather than a virologist. You are an expert in communication with a broad range of individuals, rather than a teacher. The pace and deadlines in different sectors will be different and you need to make sure that the employer knows you are aware of this and can manage the difference. 

Ultimately, you need to show awareness of the sector you want to work in. You can gain this through following key performers in any given market on Twitter or via contacting people on LinkedIn. Get this awareness into your cover letter and that should make you stand out.

Another key recommendation was 'Don't be defined by your qualifications'. The discussion focussed on the fact that people are more than the letters after their name. Build on (professional) relationships on-line and in person and this will help make the job search easier. One suggestion was to surround yourself with people who are doing what you want to do and see how they work. By taking time to establish relationships with people in a given sector you show your enthusiasm and drive, whilst learning a lot and getting new contacts

What are employers looking for?

This came from a number of people trying to work out what to prioritise in their work. In most jobs, including the PhD, there are opportunities to do 'extra' things. The problem is deciding which are worth making time and sacrifices for.

Try to understand what are key activities in the discipline, institution or sector you want to work in. For example, in the humanities and subjects like politics, books and chapters of books can carry a lot of prestige, but in research science, journal articles are usually favoured. Ultimately, they are both publications that required project management and communication skills. If what you've done doesn't perfectly fit what they require, sell the skills you gained by doing the project, rather than the project itself.

If you can't fulfil some of the criteria that an employer wants yet, you can also show how you plan to meet those targets in the future. Again, this shows planning, ambition and drive. 

Specifically for academia, Claire Jones recommended publishing regularly and in increasingly 'better' journals, whilst Nadine Muller suggested that it's worth keeping some work 'in the bank', especially if you can increase it's impact with more research. This is also something you can include on your plan.

If you know in advance that you will be looking for a job soon, look at the requirements for roles beforehand and see of you can tick off any of them, with a little bit of extra work, between now and when you have to apply.

This brought the conversation onto the always popular topic of...

Transferable skills

Employers are 'buying' the person, not your CV, so make sure that you show them how valuable you are! This can be difficult after a rejection (or ten) but as Aimee Bateman said 'You're value doesn't decrease just because someone failed to see it. (If anyone manages to stay positive immediately following a rejection, let me know how you did it!)

To identify your value, Chris Humphrey recommended doing a 'Skills Audit' with a friend or colleauge. You will have varying levels of around 20 skills from practically every job and qualification you have. Work out what these are by asking others if you are not sure. This can be awkward, so try asking for specifics. Don't just ask 'What am I good at? but, instead 'What kind of problem would you come to me to help you fix', 'When have I helped you in the past?' You can then add these comments to LinkedIn or even directly to your CV.

Examples of transferrable skills you may have:

Project management - delivering your thesis, research project (or wedding) to strict deadlines, with good planning

Management of people - student supervision, getting people to work in a team etc., childcare

Computer skills - manipulation of text and images for reports, as well as the use of more niche programmes specific to your role

Organising events - conferences, presentations, meetings.  

Various types of communication - influence, negotiation and clear explanations 

Ultimately, employers will be interested in HOW you did the things on your CV and not just what you did. You should always value the breadth of your experience. In research, you have the opportunity to learn new things, so try not to focus on the end target, the degree, the research, or the articles, but on the skills you developed in the process. This can help you focus on the things you actually liked doing and sell your skills to the employer.

How do you balance the job search and the job?

Fundamentally don't get 'lost' in your job (the PhD) and understand your priorities. If your priority is an academic post then you need to plan your papers. If your priority is a job in industry then it's worth networking BEFORE you leave. 

Try not to think 'I have to find a job' as this is a bit daunting, think 'I need to build a relationship with someone who could help me understand the job better'. This will make you a much better candidate when it comes to applying and can actually be enjoyable!

One great bit of advice was, with all business relationships, give something to the other person three times before you ask for anything from them. This might seem a bit contrived, but if you send someone a paper, a recommendation or a job advert they might be interested in then, by the time you ask for advice on applying to their company, you're more likely to be thought on favourably. Nobody wants to be the guy who got in touch just to ask for a favour the first time.

Alternatively, if you're not ready to apply for a job yet, try practicing your application. Get a feel for how long it takes to just prepare your CV each time!

How do you convince an employer you are not over qualified?

If you have a degree or PhD and you want to move field, then you will often have to go for a junior role. However, how do you show an employer that you are not over-qualified and just using the post as a stepping-stone. Remember that the fear of being over-qualified can be in your own head and you need to show them that, in fact, you are perfectly qualified. Show that your other skills demonstrate you are an ideal fit for that role. 

In your cover letter, talk about why you are applying and why you want to work for them. Don't make it sound like you've filled in five applications and this just happens to be one of them. Fundamentally, they want to give the job to the person who wants it the most - make sure it sounds like that is you!

Don't make it sound like you don't care about the company, either - You will have to fit into the wider organisation as well as just the immediate team.

Don't start your cover letter with why they should pick you, start with why you picked them. Use something personal, not something you found on the website mission statement because anybody could use that. Find an article on-line or a blogpost that shows you've gone the extra mile.

How do you stay positive and motivated when filling out job applications?

If you apply for a lot of different jobs, your enthusiasm for each application can start to drain. Learn to value yourself during your PhD, degree or job and when you value yourself you can see that it's worth the time and effort to find a job you will enjoy! Take time to remind yourself what you're good at. Remind other people you work with that they are good at certain things (if they are) and this positivity should come back to you. 

Employers of all kinds rarely tell their people how valuable they are - try to remember your personal value, rejection doesn't mean you're rubbish - The right job will be the one you actually get! 

Should you take things off your CV?

Whether you take your PhD off your CV for a temp job, or take temping work off your CV for an executive job, the general response from the experts was a resounding 'No!'

Think of your time at university as a 3-4 year job. Talk about running a research project to deliver x number of papers or a patent. Employers may not realise that the time spent in your PhD is much like a (long hours and poorly paid) job. Repackage it and include it in your employment history.

When it comes to temporary jobs or low-skilled work, these positions show that you are willing to do something that is not perfect in order to reach goals and targets. This can simply be working in a bar in order to pay the rent while you look for your perfect job. It is a rare employer that would prefer to someone who sat on the sofa eating biscuits to someone who took a temporary job.

Ultimately, don't EVER devalue yourself. 

Final thoughts on embarking on a new career

Don't think of yourself as inferior because your early in any career path. Just because you haven't reached a certain target, you could sell that you plan to reach this target whilst working for them. 

You shouldn't feel you are begging for something your not entitled to! 

A PhD is a wonderful asset and you managed it on your own - Communicate and understand the value of your PhD, or any experience, to yourself and then you'll be able to communicate it to others.

Use any resources you can, such as libraries, careers advisers or any other colleagues that could give you advice and suggestions. 

Have a story that explains why your entering this new field - You're not 'chopping and changing', you've fulfilled one challenge and now you're now ready for the next opportunity. 

When looking for a new job, remember that all jobseekers are in the same boat - try not to behave as competitors or enemies, use each other as a network.  

Start building quality relationships as soon as possible and the whole process should be much easier!

You can go to #jobsq on Twitter, as well as jobs.ac.uk, for any further discussion of these topics but  (CHEESE ALERT) don't give up, keep at it and value yourself!

Forget alternative careers- a career in science can be fun, well paid and very rewarding.

Apparently. 

So yeah, I can see why you're reading this post- the title sound jazzy, kind of positive and well-informed. That's exactly why I got sucked into going to a presentation 30 minutes away from work at 5.30 pm on a cold Thursday night with this exact title recently. I'm now a bit (probably disproportionately) pissed off.

I should start by saying that the two professors that spoke at this seminar for postgraduates were really good speakers, they were engaging and positive and they were giving up their time after work to speak to mis-guided post docs who might (horror of horrors) be thinking about leaving research. Or as they called it 'science'. 

That was my first bug-bear really. The fact that for them 'science' is (exclusively) synonymous with 'academic research'. They didn't even mention industry, never mind all the people who work in science but around the periphery of research. When it was brought up by an audience member that perhaps not all scientists want to do research, the first speaker just assumed that the question was about technician jobs and said that there were less and less about as things are now mostly automated.

'Automated' - kind of how I felt during the presentations, actually - although it was no fault of the speakers who did their very best to paint a rosy picture of life in academic research. Maybe I'm being unfair and I'm definitely quite tired (read 'jaded') but, as a PostDoc who's being looking for a job for nearly two years, outside of academia, it's really frustrating to here 'there are jobs out there if you're willing to go after them'. I thought and hoped that the presentation was going to be about careers in science and not 'here's how I became an academic'. For most people in academia, there is not a scarcity of people to talk to about this - our bosses, colleagues and their bosses and colleagues, I was hoping for something different.

To be fair, this blog is supposed to be about careers for scientists outside of the lab and most academics are rarely seen in a lab, unless they are looking for someone they couldn't find in the office or they've forgotten to tell you about the immiment arrival of a new student (or six). So I suppose I have a duty to sum-up this career choice too. 

How do you start?

Once you've completed your PhD or Post-Doc, there may be an area of research that you'd like to investigate further - Something your boss isn't interested in researching or they don't have the funding to research. This is when you say to yourself 'Maybe I could research it?' 

From here you can go down the heady road of applying for (very competitive) academic positions at universities where you tell them what you'd like to research and they might give you a year or two of funding until you can prove to the funding bodies that you have the nous to pull this off and they give you some more money (usually for another couple of years) or, alternatively, you can apply for (even more competitive) fellowships where the situation is much the same but you get more autonomy and prestige. The pain in the arse here is that you will 'lather, rinse and repeat' this step for the rest of your career. One set of funding or another will always be running down, running out or running away from you. The upside is that you get to do the most important thing in the world to you, your ideal job - that of an academic researcher. All academics bemoan the funding system but I think they all (at least, the ones I know) really love what they do.

So, back to this presentation: Both talks had the common theme of the requirements of hard work and luck. T o ensure the science theme, one even quoted Pasteur with 'Chance favours the prepared mind'. In other words, you need to be bloody lucky in this game, but a bit of nose-to-the-grind-working-until-4am hard work won't do you any harm. What made all this hard work so worthwhile is that they don"t mind reading papers at the weekends and staying in the lab until 8 pm (or 10 pm) because they're so obsessed with the work, because they honestly love it so much. And they genuinely seemed to.

In the interest of completeness and giving this a 'fair test', I'll add their pros and cons of their career choices, I stress, these are 'lifted', with only a little rewording for clarity, from their presentations:

Downsides:

- You go into this job because of the science, but, increasingly, the job is administration.

- You end up getting worse at the technical stuff (see above)

 - You have increasingly little control over the experiments (see above the above)

- Frustrating negative results (regardless of the hours put in)

- Agonisingly slow progress (regardless of the hours put in)

- Endless rejections (regardless of the hours put in)

- Lack of grant funding (regardless of the hours put in)

- Career insecurity (regardless of the hours put in)

- The work never finishes (regardless of the hours put in)

- Are you really making a difference? (regardless of the hours put in)

- The constant, aforementioned, begging for money

- Due to the above, there are not always the resources to do what you want.

- The financial buck stops with you: YOU need to find the money!

For those for whom this is their correct career path, so many things can make it worthwhile...

Upsides:

- You get to do your hobby for a job

- You are fascinated by your work (genuinely - not just on your CV)

- You get to show off (what you've done and the fact that you did it)

- The field is rapidly evolving

- Getting things right and getting things to work is really satisfying

- A new discovery is thrilling

- You feel (however unlikely it might be) that there IS a chance you could make a difference

- A university is actually a pretty nice place to work - it's got a young, usually international atmosphere and people are pretty friendly (most of the time - not when grants have just been refused)]

- It's rewarding to teach and communicate your work to other people (not all researchers actually like this bit)

- There's a lot of opportunity to travel if you can fit it in to your schedule

- You get a lot of independence (eventually)

- You get paid well (eventually)

- SOMETHING is usually working, so the failures get 'diluted'

-You get pretty much all the glory and recognition for others' lab work (honestly not my words!)

- No career can compete with complete freedom for discovery

Perspective is important

One of the presenters was also a doctor, a 'real' one (the kind that is actually useful on a plane or as a relative to show a rash to. You can show a PhD a rash but generally all you're going to get is 'Urgh' or 'Oh, yeah, Mike in genetics had that once'). Anyway, I digress, she was a clinician, as we say, so she had a really good sense of perspective. She basically said that she could much more easily see the point of her reseach when she met patients struggling with a disease she was trying to understand, or, she didn't find herself too bogged down in depression when an experiment failed for the seventeenth time when she has to deal with someone terminally ill. I think this is something that is really hard to do. You need to care about your research enough to put in all your hard work, but not be completely depressed when your three weeks of work come to nothing.

The overall message from one of the professors was that you need to know what you want to do if you expect to get far. This was great advice for life in general, I suppose, but when someone from the floor asked 'What if we don't?' There was much shrugging of shoulders. Fundamentally I think if you want to be an academic researcher, you probably already know, you're probably already on your way to being one. In my opinion, which I've previuosly suggested may be completely wrong (but it's all I have) I don't think this is an area people need to be or should be convinced to do - if your not taking your research home (like I'm not) and you're not happy to be in the lab until 10 pm (which I'm not-more on that below) then becoming an academic is probably not for you. I'm certain, no more than ever, that it's not for me.

I feel like I should comment on the fact that I'm actually not happy to work on weekends and until 10 pm and the fact that I feel I need to justify that feeling tells you a lot about academia and a lot about me. I feel I work hard and I like to have that recognised (rightly or wrongly) and if not recognised, then at least not made to feel like a slacker if I want to leave after a meagre 9-10 hour day and this is how I feel academic research is. That's fine and admirable if you love it and it probably is those completely dedicated people who should go for (and get) these jobs, but I feel I paid my 'dues' during my PhD and now, whilst I'm happy to work hard, it should probably be on something I enjoy.

I'll try and wrap up with a positive and say that if you're passionate and if you're resilient, you'll probably make it in this field. There are support schemes and fellowships open to help early researchers but a mentor will help. Ask around, who in your department do you admire? They'll probably be really busy but everyone loves being told they're great and giving advice, so ask them for pointers. In academia, I think people can be afraid of asking for help because we're all supposed to be experts. I think we should be experts at asking questions. If that question is 'How do I get to be you?', then you're likely to at least get an answer! 

If you get a rejection, particularly for a grant or fellowship, follow up, call them or e-mail them, and tell them why they've made a terrible mistake. The worst they're going to do is think you're arrogant or a bit rude but they just refused to give you any money to further your career, so what do you care if they like you? You'll notice I haven't included links to the grants or funding bodies for academic reserach - this is because there are loads and they're often very field specific. If you don't know who best to speak to about this, ask your departmental secretary. Like most things, it's not really their job to help you with this, but they're so busy and over-worked that it's quicker to just tell you who you need to ask than to berate you for asking them in the first place.

Something you should probably be aware of in academias is the general trend towards men in this environment - particularly the higher up you go. One slide in particular that stood out depicted the number of female professors in the major London universities, as well as some places in the countryside - it was pretty obvious that professorships are mostly male-dominated but there is a drive to change this. I don't mean that you'll get a job if you're crap if you also happen to be a woman, but you might find that the consious or unconcious bias that has lead to such complete under-representation is starting to get better. Oh yeah, if you're a potential male academic, keep applying - the stats say you're much better at showing confidence on your CV so that you can shine in person at the intervew, so genuine kudos for that one.

The seminar started to get a bit lost towards the end with off-topic talk of open-access, peer-review and maternity leave for Post-Docs, which there simply wasn't time to get into. As we inevitably veered into the rights and wrongs of competition in science and the best way to combat this I'm honestly not paraphrasing (much) when I wrap up with a quote from one of the professors with:

                'There need to be sacrifices on the altar of science and to hell with everyone else'.

 

Some people say I'm chatty...

Some others would go for 'bloody annoying' and I do occasionally wonder, particularly after meeting someone for the first time, if I really had to tell them their tie/socks/t-shirt were nice and where did they get it? Have they been to that really great tie/sock/t-shirt shop in McNowhere? Do they prefer ties to, say, the cravat? Where are they on the neckerchief?

Anyway, you get the idea, I hope. I like talking to people, finding out about them and increasingly often nowadays, telling them about my job/science or how they can do things in the lab.

This got me thinking that maybe I could use this as part of my job. I was recently advised to think of something I'd do anyway and find a way to get paid for it. So yeah, it makes sense to get paid for talking to people if, like me, you do it automatically and like doing it.  I also like to think I'm good at it. I don't mean that the way I talk is particularly good, it can be unintelligible when I get excited, tired or angry and my Welsh accents gets (even) broader. What I mean is that I think I can talk to most people about most things with a bit of enthusiasm. Even if it it's something I know nothing about, sometimes especially then - I like talking things over with people.

So, what's the point...

Well, I'm going to spend a considerable amount of time over the next few weeks looking into an area of science called 'Scientific Communication'. Scientific communication has become a 'catch-all' term to describe the relay of science between different people and covers a multitude of jobs.

Traditionally, in my view scientific communication has usually meant science fayres and festivals, possibly Outreach* schemes run by institutions and science journalism. There are a lot of roles in this area that I'm really interested in and I'll be scouring sites for posts that involve organising events related to science, as well as being the scientist that does the explaining and sharing what I've learnt with you lovely people. Fundamentally, I'm going to be looking for roles in scientific communication  that involve putting into practice the transferable skills we learn from our degrees that we hear so much about - communication, organisation, independence, decision making, prioritising, perseverence, people skills, time-management, the list goes on.

On the subject of an actual job, I'm writing this blog in order to 'precipitate' my thoughts (check out my science-pun, a must have for these sorts of blogs), get some practice at 'communication' and promoting my stuff and to see if I actually like doing it. I'd recommend you do the same if this is something you think you might be interested in. There's also a vast amount of scientific communication that goes on on-line and I'd suggest getting on Twitter and checking out the blogs to see how others are doing it.

If you want to get an inside line on what's getting 'communicated', and by whom, then check out the next blog where I'm going to start a more formal list of blogs/tweeters on sciencey stuff. I'll include a synopsis and my opinion of each source (much as that matters) and try to keep it up to date as I go. I started something similar a few weeks ago but I've come across many more and thought a regularly updated list would be more useful - watch this space. Literally. It'll be in this space.

By the by, four more jobs applied for this week, I'll let you know.

*Another 'catch-all' to cover any event where an institution 'reaches-out' to people -Often prospective students. The students learn about science and (by proxy) the institution, the institution gets exposure to a wider audience and the person carrying out the activity gets bombarded with enthusiastic questions that they often can't answer.

So, you want to be a medical writer...

If it’s not writing the leaflet that goes inside medication – what IS medical writing? 

If we turn to a higher power, e.g. Wikipedia…

 

                        ….well that’s much clearer. Or not.

At the Nature Jobs Careers Fayre 2013, I spoke to EnvisionPharma and Oxford PharmaGenesis about the details of medical writing and I've also squeezed info out of friends via facebook and the like. They were generally enthusiastic about their jobs and had worked on writing the 'copy' (pointless word for 'words') in many varied types of project.

Projects included:

- Leaflets for doctors (to explain a prescription regime for a particular medication),

- Whole books on a particular disease

- Papers describing a pharmaceutical company’s or biotech’s clinical trials.

- Information for patients who are taking part in clinical trials

- Congress reports
- Posters

So it seems like there are a lot of ways to ‘medically' write and I think it can take some time to find your 'niche'. For example, even if you decide you like medical writing, you may well change project types if you find you're better at manuscripts than patient leaflets.

What kind of skills do you need?

If you go in as a Junior, then there is a lot of training provided on the job, so don't worry if this is not something you're formally 'qualified' for. For example, taken directly from a vacancy as a Junior Medical Writer at Envision Pharma, I've added some comments in red...

As a medical writer you will need:

— To demonstrate sound scientific understanding and analytical skills
    as you will be required to explain complex concepts and data to a
    wide and varied audience

By the time you’ve graduated, and then carried out your PhD (and possibly PostDoc) you’ve probably had ample opportunity to discuss your work with people and know if you’re any good at it.

— To work independently to research, write, edit, and proof copy to the
    highest scientific and editorial standards across a diverse range of
    educational materials including abstracts, posters, manuscripts, and
    slide kits

For me, I know I can do all of this, but I’m not really a fan of the rigmorale that is manuscripts – would I be employed to continually write othe people’s manuscripts. Forever.(?)

— To be able to manage your time effectively, enabling you to work on
    multiple projects and meet deadlines

If you've managed a lab and/or your research pretty independently, you'll be fine with this.

— A professional and enthusiastic approach to working with both clients
    and physicians

I’d be happy, nay ecstatic, to find some genuine enthusiasm in the workplace

— To be an ‘advanced’ user of Datavision™

No idea what this was – a bit of research reveals it to be a bit of planning software. To be honest, I don’t think they’d expect you to know how to use this when you start, probably something you’d learn whilst there.

If you have graduated with a science degree (preferably a PhD), enjoy writing and have an exceptional eye for detail, and ideally have previous experience in medical writing and editing, please contact us….

Day to day...

A good friend who is now a medical writer gave me a description of what her work entails when writing 'patient recruitment documentation' - information for patients and doctors taking part in a study. I'll try and do her justice here...(any mistakes are my own!)

1. A project is allocated to you based on your experience by your project manager.

2. Timelines and key information to include are provided by the project manager (this normally takes place in a meeting involving other team members). For this area of work the timelines are normally short, i.e. 3-4 weeks rather than months.

3. Read the clinical trial protocol, do any background reading and formulate the information.

4. Written work is checked by a senior medical writer.

5. Material is finalised and sent to the editorial team.

6. Liase with the editorial team to answer questions and fill in any gaps.

7. Document is sent to the client for review.

8. After a few rounds of review (1-3), the word files are then sent to be 'prettified' by a 'source team'.

9. Pictures are added, layout is perfected etc.. As a writer you may be able to request appropriate imagery which is found by the source team and then added.

10. The finished piece goes for a final client review which can involve more, usually minor, changes.

11. Print and distribute.

Anything given to patients must be reviewed by an 'independent review board' who ensure that the materials are not 'promoting' the study and this can add time to the process. There are lots of rules governing patient and public-facing material.

The overall process of deadlines, writing and review by the customer appears similar for most types of documents. However, how and where you get that information from and the guidelines you must follow vary substantially from document to document. For example, for a publication on a clinical trial, a report of all the data is usually received by the medical writer in the first instance. They then contact the author(s) by phone or e-mail to define key points that need to be made. The drafts are compiled and edited internally before being sent to the authors for approval - This usually happens several times before submission to a journal, just like the rounds of drafting (and redrafting) we do with our own manuscripts, I expect. Clinical trial publications have their own set of strict guidelines about full disclosure and author contributions.

There's also promotional writing around a particular medication and researching the market in order to be able to do this - it appears that there is a lot of 'reading around' required in order to be a good medical writer. As a result, medical writers learn a lot about the disease area or trial that they are working on, but, of course, carry out very little science themselves. This could perhaps be a drawback for people who like to be on the ‘business-end’ of the work but I’ve been told it’s very rewarding to turn often incomprehensible data and facts into readable, digestable text. 

Depending on the company and job, it seems that although there’s a lot made of the team-atmosphere,  you are largely working on your own document that you refer to a senior member of staff for 'proofing'. The job appears to be quite flexible and 'family-friendly' - as it is desk-based you should be able to work from home occasionally or adapt your hours to suit your home life, if needs be.

A few quotes (positive and negative) from our medical writing colleagues...

- I am learning lots of different things all the time about therapy areas and the industry in general, and generally speaking I find it less stressful than the lab!

- I would definitely recommend the line of work though, overall it is pretty rewarding.

- ...sometimes feel that it is not 'scientific' enough.

- Sitting at a desk all day is...one of the downsides of the job.

- It definitely wasn't an easy decision to leave the lab, but I don't have any regrets now!

For information on how to start a career in 'medcomms' (as the cool kids call it) try NetworkPharma and MedComms Networking where you can find lots of information on how to get started in medical writing such as a free careers guide, career days and job ads. The site seems to be heavily involved with a recruitment agency called Carys Mills who can be a great help in finding the elusive first post, I've been told. There's also the comprehensive (and more formal) European Medical Writers Association website with details on jobs, conferences and even their own journal. 

As with most jobs nowadays, this appears to be a competitive market but it is actively seeking new skilled people. So, have at it!