The PhD: it’s a mindset

This post is a strange one. I’m precisely halfway through my PhD, so it’s a good opportunity to reflect, and remind myself of what I want academically in the next two years.

As a PhD student, I’m often told: “BuT a PhD iS NoT a ReAl JoB”.

The ‘student’ part of the job title ‘PhD student’ isn’t just a formality to get around taxes. Learning is a fundamental part of doing a PhD. But being a PhD student is much more than being a student.

First, some PhD students are expected to be in the lab from 9 until 5 or later. I don’t have experiments to take care of, so in principle, meetings aside, it doesn’t matter where I work from. I am also lucky that my supervisor (like many academics) doesn’t really mind which time of the day I work.

I try to make the most of the flexibility. I rarely work 9-to-5, especially in the same office/place. A fixed schedule doesn’t work the best for me (it does for others), and I am lucky that my job allows me to do what’s best for me. Because ultimately, that’s how I view my years as a PhD student:

Doing a PhD is being the CEO of a startup, except that YOU are the company.

Obviously, that’s not true for everyone. For some PhD students, their supervisor is genuinely their boss. For example, if the funding comes from a supervisor’s grant. Moreover, some PhDs get funded to conduct a fairly specific research project as their PhD, but that’s not my case. My supervisor gave me enough independence from the start, so it does not feel at all like I work for her (or anyone else).

I have a really flexible schedule and I don’t have a boss, so it’s not surprising that people think I also don’t have a serious, real, job. It doesn’t help that I also really enjoy what I do. Yes, being a PhD student can be a really good job. I never wanted a job with constant meetings and thousands of emails, so I chose a career with (relative) few of those. But as great as it can be, being a PhD student also has downsides.

The pay is generally not great. (But I’m really lucky to have an amazing PhD scholarship.) Most PhD students could be earning much more working in industry. Therefore, the opportunity cost of a PhD is quite high, just by looking at the difference in immediate earnings. And usually, it’s not that with a PhD one can get a job they wouldn’t have gotten otherwise. Most PhDs who leave research start working in entry-level positions. So PhDs can end up years behind their undergraduate coursemates. This explains why many recommend PhDs, but some exceptions, only to people who want to become professors.

Nobel-prize winner William Lipscomb said “With a Ph.D. you will have a better chance of spending the rest of your life doing what you want to do, instead of what someone else wants you to do.”

However, statistically, it is extremely hard to become a professor. This report found that in the UK, only 0.45% of Ph.D. graduates in the sciences become professors. That’s less than one in two hundred. So the overwhelming majority of PhD graduates leave academia, even if they get a postdoc after their PhD. The study is now a bit old, and there are probably some limitations and things that aren’t captured in that one number. But you get the idea. In Good Work If You Can Get It, Jason Brennan says that becoming a professor is as hard as making it to the Olympics (except it takes until your 40s).

My experience in academia is obviously extremely limited. I may be wrong to want to become a professor (why I want to do so is a topic for another post), or I might not be approaching it the right way. But I know that if you want to achieve something really hard, you must work hard for it. Making it into academia is an ambitious multi-decade project. So I am treating my PhD as the serious start of that project. Just like some student-athletes at US universities hope and train to go pro after graduation.

That’s how I view my PhD right now: setting myself up to become the best researcher I can be (and finding out what this means!). Sure, I think my current research is really cool, and I love it. Doing good research is a necessary initial step. But I hope that in 5, 10 and 20 years, I will have done much more important research. I am here to figure out what is needed to be a truly outstanding researcher and which steps I must take to get there. And I want to start taking those steps.

Probably « just » getting a PhD is not extremely hard (even though mental health figures don’t suggest so). But what I want to get out of these years is miles away from just a PhD. If I’m shooting much higher, why should I settle for the standards of a title that won’t get me far by itself?

The problem with self-imposed standards and deadlines is that it’s easy to not treat them seriously. But even if nobody gives me a bad grade, I cannot afford to not give it my best. Not only would I be wasting (professionally) these years, but I’d also lose a once-in-a-lifetime shoot at my dream career. So even if I could get away with it, I won’t slack off.

I am literally being sponsored to work towards my dreams. It is a massive privilege that I won’t waste.