4 ms·

I got a PhD in 2.5 years (already had a masters), a very fast amount of time, and the advice I always give people is “pick a program with clear deliverables.”

I got a PhD in 2.5 years (already had a masters), a very fast amount of time, and the advice I always give people is “pick a program with clear deliverables.” My advisor said that after publishing 3 articles in good journals, I was done. So I was very motivated, had a clear target, and had a more satisfying and quick experience than probably 98% of PhD students. I looked at programs in more attractive locations and at better rated schools, where they said essentially “you are done when we feel like you are done”. I turned them down and it was a fantastic decision.

iorrus 4y ago
IMO this is exactly not how to do a PhD which should be about exploring a topic and becoming an expert over time. A meandering path concentrated around self directed learning. If you want clear deliverables and a set path to follow, just get a job in industry.
- falcor84 4y ago
  >If you want clear deliverables and a set path to follow, just get a job in industry. I find this to be an extremely over-generous view of what industry work is like. But my actual point is that whether you are in academia or industry, you should prefer a position where you have some real control over the deliverables, rather than being a puppet on the strings of a boss or advisor.
  - iorrus 4y ago
    Yes, it's true that industry is not like this all the time. I've done the PhD/Postdoc route now working as a data scientist in mega corp. The value of a PhD IMO is the pain of forcing yourself to learn things independently, work on hard problems for long periods of time and develop expertise. I think following a set path laid out by a supervisor defeats alot of this as the hard work is being done for you, you're just following your supervisor's set agenda. Industry simply doesn't allow for this long deep, mostly unproductive work. Things change constantly and projects move, adapt etc. However the goals are for the most part better defined with a clear outcome. A post below put this well, academia is closer to a start up lifestyle.
- davidguetta 4y ago
  Both are not exclusive and at least doing like OP enables avoiding the too common abuse of graduate students in some schools.
caddemon 4y ago
3 different papers in 2.5 years with a group? Did they all have to be lead author works? And if so may I ask what is your field? That kind of requirement would be way too strict for some fields. Flexible graduation guidelines can be abused by bad programs and/or bad PIs, but they also allow flexibility in what you get out of the PhD and when you can leave. I know people that graduated from my program with 0 lead author papers (and <= 2 contributing author papers) because they had already lined up an industry job or a pivot to research in a different field. They'd be in school forever if there were strict authorship requirements. PS - some PIs, whether intentionally or not, can actually abuse strict requirements more than flexible ones. If you used PI resources to do research, which is often unavoidable in experimental fields, you need their permission to publish. Some PIs have extremely high standards for what journals they will allow their work to be published in. Often students end up with 4th author via a piece of a paper that got published in a journal like Cell, but could've been a stand alone lead author work in a mid tier journal. Nothing wrong with that, arguably it's better from a scientific perspective, but you can see how that might impact student careers.

iorrus 4y ago

IMO this is exactly not how to do a PhD which should be about exploring a topic and becoming an expert over time. A meandering path concentrated around self directed learning. If you want clear deliverables and a set path to follow, just get a job in industry.

falcor84 4y ago
>If you want clear deliverables and a set path to follow, just get a job in industry. I find this to be an extremely over-generous view of what industry work is like. But my actual point is that whether you are in academia or industry, you should prefer a position where you have some real control over the deliverables, rather than being a puppet on the strings of a boss or advisor.
- iorrus 4y ago
  Yes, it's true that industry is not like this all the time. I've done the PhD/Postdoc route now working as a data scientist in mega corp. The value of a PhD IMO is the pain of forcing yourself to learn things independently, work on hard problems for long periods of time and develop expertise. I think following a set path laid out by a supervisor defeats alot of this as the hard work is being done for you, you're just following your supervisor's set agenda. Industry simply doesn't allow for this long deep, mostly unproductive work. Things change constantly and projects move, adapt etc. However the goals are for the most part better defined with a clear outcome. A post below put this well, academia is closer to a start up lifestyle.
davidguetta 4y ago
Both are not exclusive and at least doing like OP enables avoiding the too common abuse of graduate students in some schools.

caddemon 4y ago

3 different papers in 2.5 years with a group? Did they all have to be lead author works? And if so may I ask what is your field? That kind of requirement would be way too strict for some fields. Flexible graduation guidelines can be abused by bad programs and/or bad PIs, but they also allow flexibility in what you get out of the PhD and when you can leave. I know people that graduated from my program with 0 lead author papers (and <= 2 contributing author papers) because they had already lined up an industry job or a pivot to research in a different field. They'd be in school forever if there were strict authorship requirements. PS - some PIs, whether intentionally or not, can actually abuse strict requirements more than flexible ones. If you used PI resources to do research, which is often unavoidable in experimental fields, you need their permission to publish. Some PIs have extremely high standards for what journals they will allow their work to be published in. Often students end up with 4th author via a piece of a paper that got published in a journal like Cell, but could've been a stand alone lead author work in a mid tier journal. Nothing wrong with that, arguably it's better from a scientific perspective, but you can see how that might impact student careers.