Timeline for How to respond to "Why didn't you do a postdoc after your PhD?"
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
9 events
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| Oct 9, 2019 at 7:43 | comment | added | user3644640 | @JiK They do know something but I doubt that those postdocs had a lot in length discussion about their hardships with funding or the different conventions. And OP is the only non postdoc so the hardship is not validated by what the interviewer sees. How would that make the OP seem compared to these postdocs? It does not matter whether interviewer thinks badly about OP or greatly about the postdocs. Also the answer of knallfrosch puts this guite well. Negative motivations in general are bad. | |
| Oct 8, 2019 at 16:33 | comment | added | JiK | @user3644640 OP says that the interviewers had had postdoc positions earlier. It's quite natural to assume that they have met people in academia worldwide and they know something about how academic positions differ worldwide, or at least that they differ a lot. | |
| Oct 8, 2019 at 3:48 | comment | added | InSpaceICanScreamAsLoudAsIWant | I really like the perspective from this answer; it teases out answers the interviewers may arrive at from the question. The point about it being only one question among many is an especially good one. I think focusing on why I want to go into industry, however, would be a stronger stance than why I would not go into academia. | |
| Oct 7, 2019 at 12:55 | comment | added | user3644640 | I changed that to be less provocative and open up that how from the interviewers point of view the other candidates having post-doc experience could change how he/she perceives the unconfidence for funding. | |
| Oct 7, 2019 at 12:53 | history | edited | user3644640 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Oct 7, 2019 at 12:39 | comment | added | user3644640 | @fridaymeetssunday What makes you think that the interviewer would have experience about nationally varying academic career conventions? I know about the suffering and therefore used super. I dare to claim that from the average persons point of view biased by good job market situation the talented person lands a job easily and that they apply that to some degree to academia. I know about my university where everybody gets a post-docs with social security and salary if they want to but the tenure tracks are hard to get. I assume that to be somewhat relevant as all the other applicants had done. | |
| Oct 6, 2019 at 20:06 | comment | added | fridaymeetssunday | "You are probably not the super talent as you are concerned about funding". As a former academic, who got the funding for many years (>8) without being a super talent, I can safely say that this is bollocks. Talent and funding don't come together, and it is very uncertain regardless. The norm are 1-2 years fellowships, intertwined with several months where you don't know if it get renewed or not. Also, in many countries, fellowships are not a contract and come without a social security (or health insurence) attached. There is no way the panel interviewing has not experienced this. | |
| Oct 6, 2019 at 14:10 | history | edited | user3644640 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Oct 6, 2019 at 13:58 | history | answered | user3644640 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |