3 ms·

This is entirely inaccurate. Researchers are not as you describe at all, at least those who become professors. They are exactly the same.

garmaine 6y ago
Why do you think "researchers" meant professors? That seems like a leap.
- solumos 6y ago
  I think what they're saying is that there are plenty of researchers/professors with ego, who think they're God's Gift. At the same time, there are many more researchers who are very humble and realize their contributions are a small part of a larger whole. In startups, it seems that a strong ego is an advantage - if not a necessity (see: Elon Musk, Adam Neumann, Steve Jobs). There's an attitude (usually explicit, but sometimes implicit) of "we're disrupting the _____ industry and changing the world!". Overall, I think you can find strong egos in any industry or job. However, my guess is that if you (somehow) ranked researchers and founders by ego, you'd find that the distributions were quite different. My guess is that the majority of founders have strong egos, with a long tail of those less ego-centric and that researchers would be quite the opposite - generally less ego-centric, with a long tail of strong-ego individuals.
  - garmaine 6y ago
    Right, but a professor specifically is someone who in most instances can at best be said to have once done some research before graduating into managing researchers (grad students). It's like saying "programmers don't behave like _____, based on my experience with mid-level managers in technical organizations."
    - randomsearch 6y ago
      PhD students are learning to research. The only group not included in "professors" is "postdocs" then, who are temporary staff who usually leave academia after a year or two.
- randomsearch 6y ago
  Almost all permanent research staff at universities are professors. Maybe the confusion is because some countries don't use that title? Regardless, I'd say the definition of a "successful researcher" is usually someone who has become a professor. Whilst there are many great postdocs, very few (any?) of the good ones become professors.
KKKKkkkk1 6y ago
There is a type of professor that's exactly like a VC. The guy who wrangles a team of postdocs writing grant applications, farms out the funding to students and postdocs for them to do the actual work, and then puts his name on the resulting papers.
- randomsearch 6y ago
  > There is a type of professor that's exactly like a VC. The vast majority of professors, I'd say, are like that.

garmaine 6y ago

Why do you think "researchers" meant professors? That seems like a leap.

solumos 6y ago
I think what they're saying is that there are plenty of researchers/professors with ego, who think they're God's Gift. At the same time, there are many more researchers who are very humble and realize their contributions are a small part of a larger whole. In startups, it seems that a strong ego is an advantage - if not a necessity (see: Elon Musk, Adam Neumann, Steve Jobs). There's an attitude (usually explicit, but sometimes implicit) of "we're disrupting the _____ industry and changing the world!". Overall, I think you can find strong egos in any industry or job. However, my guess is that if you (somehow) ranked researchers and founders by ego, you'd find that the distributions were quite different. My guess is that the majority of founders have strong egos, with a long tail of those less ego-centric and that researchers would be quite the opposite - generally less ego-centric, with a long tail of strong-ego individuals.
- garmaine 6y ago
  Right, but a professor specifically is someone who in most instances can at best be said to have once done some research before graduating into managing researchers (grad students). It's like saying "programmers don't behave like _____, based on my experience with mid-level managers in technical organizations."
  - randomsearch 6y ago
    PhD students are learning to research. The only group not included in "professors" is "postdocs" then, who are temporary staff who usually leave academia after a year or two.
randomsearch 6y ago
Almost all permanent research staff at universities are professors. Maybe the confusion is because some countries don't use that title? Regardless, I'd say the definition of a "successful researcher" is usually someone who has become a professor. Whilst there are many great postdocs, very few (any?) of the good ones become professors.

KKKKkkkk1 6y ago

There is a type of professor that's exactly like a VC. The guy who wrangles a team of postdocs writing grant applications, farms out the funding to students and postdocs for them to do the actual work, and then puts his name on the resulting papers.

randomsearch 6y ago
> There is a type of professor that's exactly like a VC. The vast majority of professors, I'd say, are like that.