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This post is important and I think that your feelings echo those of many thousands of graduate students. Let me talk a little bit as a rare case: I've worked n

This post is important and I think that your feelings echo those of many thousands of graduate students. Let me talk a little bit as a rare case: I've worked now under 7 advisors on 7 different projects and now I'm finally almost done. Most of the projects have been as you describe: "after almost a year, it is fair to say that I have good view of the project and it is almost surely a giant failure." That's how most projects are. I'm not sure why, but I think it has to do with the fact that the projects are "planned research." The process of getting funding requires planning something that is intrinsically impossible to plan. You write a grant on hope, with the large picture in mind and then you get down to the details and things don't work out. This is normal.* Especially on the time frame of a new graduate student, it seems terrible. To some extent, though, the system works. It does so for the same reason that some startups work: because as you look at the details you find new things that you couldn't have predicted. Those new things are your research. I'm working on a "failed project." But after 1.5 years working on it I am ready to begin writing a dissertation that I am proud of. Why? Because I found neat things along the way. That's how it works. If you are in a good lab and surrounded by good people, I would recommend that you don't focus as much on the larger project as on learning all you can from the people around you and on understanding the details that your project will lead you to focus on. It is in helping other people, tracking down details, and playing with interesting questions that you will find the great science, not directly through the success of the larger project. By the time I finish, I will have learned a lot. But I will have spent almost 8 years in graduate school, 2 for a masters in one field and almost 6 for a PhD in another field. If I had had my current perspective from the beginning I would have been a little more patient and I might thereby have saved myself three years. So there is a cost to hopping around even if there are benefits in terms of perspective. Best wishes. *I know of one exception. He explained his system: he does the research, then he gets grants for his research. This gives him time to do new research and he writes new grants based on that. He delivers because he only proposes to do what he has already more or less done!

timr 18y ago
"To some extent, though, the system works. It does so for the same reason that some startups work: because as you look at the details you find new things that you couldn't have predicted. Those new things are your research." I think this used to be true when grants were small, and groups were scrappy and independent. However, today the funding agencies are pushing mega-projects; gigantic labs and "collaborative" research dominate the landscape, and the tendency is toward "million-monkey" results -- throw enough randomly pecking monkeys at any problem, and something good will probably emerge. This is a good career strategy if you're a PI, but it's not so hot if you're a monkey. My advice to the OP is to get out while there's still time: switch to a different group, and start over. In your first year of grad school you're (probably) independently funded, so it's easy to do, and there isn't much of an intellectual tie to whatever work you've been doing. You also know a lot more about what to look for in a PI and a research program. Write off this year as a mistake, and move on. In grad school, you've got to fail quickly, and choice of environment is no exception. If you're unhappy at the end of your first year in a group, you'll never be happy -- it only gets harder, and you don't want to be the student to who has a fantastic blowout with your advisor in year three or four, where there's little chance of recovery. So, my advice is to change labs. Failing that, quit. Grad school isn't worth it, unless you can have a great experience. But whatever you do, don't get so far in that you feel that you can't quit, even though you hate your life and your work.
- maximilian 18y ago
  Find a good advisor. I've known many people who hated grad school but when they switched an advisor they liked, their world went from hell to a great graduate experience. Its all about your advisor.
  - nihilocrat 18y ago
    People who were paying attention during undergrad should know this; I realized early on that a lot of your experience had to do more with the people involved than the material. A good advisor is no exception, and from what I hear, is even more important in grad school. It's also pretty true outside the ivory tower. Surrounding yourself eight hours a day with people who amaze you with their skills and/or having a de-facto mentor can do wonders. A lack thereof can leave you feeling demotivated, like you are just treading water and not really advancing yourself.
albertcardona 18y ago
I know of one exception. He explained his system: he does the research, then he gets grants for his research. This gives him time to do new research and he writes new grants based on that. He delivers because he only proposes to do what he has already more or less done! You have just described my thesis advisor: he was offset -2 years on the 3-year grant periods. The publication system is so slow that his whole approach was timed just right. Grant reviewers love news of great success, soviet style. They don't question how can one produce a scientific publication just one year into the grant period, which tells a lot about their review process.
- jlouis 18y ago
  The alternative is Simon Peyton Jones style: Work on some 10-15 papers at the same time. Whenever some new knowledge is gained, try to apply it to all the papers. At some point one of your papers is publishable. It is basically running research as one big investment bank and spreading your portfolio out.
gruseom 18y ago
I know of one exception. He explained his system: he does the research, then he gets grants for his research. This gives him time to do new research and he writes new grants based on that. He delivers because he only proposes to do what he has already more or less done! That is brilliant! It reminds me of two things. One is Craig Larman's work on the history of the waterfall process. Larman posed the question: given how broken the waterfall process is, how was it possible for any project to succeed? (The failures of course are easy to explain.) So he went back and interviewed people who were on famous waterfall projects that succeeded. And they told him: "Of course we knew it would never work to do all the design up front. So we built the system and then went back and wrote the spec, handed it in and got it signed off, and later submitted the actual code." The other thing it reminds me of is Andrew Wiles writing a stack of papers in advance so he would have ten years to work on Fermat's Last Theorem while still publishing regularly.
- vlad 18y ago
  That's what I decided to do a week ago in one of my classes. I have to write three analyses of other people's work every week on Blackboard, so I will create 4x3x2=24 insightful posts, then post one at a time from a nearby computer lab on the days of the lectures. I think the professor is looking for regular frequency per week, and not on whether we are commenting on work that was put up that same week or weeks ago. And while I copy-paste, if I notice a brand-new interesting work, I might write an analyses about it right on the spot, so as not to have every one of my analyses be about work from October.

timr 18y ago

"To some extent, though, the system works. It does so for the same reason that some startups work: because as you look at the details you find new things that you couldn't have predicted. Those new things are your research." I think this used to be true when grants were small, and groups were scrappy and independent. However, today the funding agencies are pushing mega-projects; gigantic labs and "collaborative" research dominate the landscape, and the tendency is toward "million-monkey" results -- throw enough randomly pecking monkeys at any problem, and something good will probably emerge. This is a good career strategy if you're a PI, but it's not so hot if you're a monkey. My advice to the OP is to get out while there's still time: switch to a different group, and start over. In your first year of grad school you're (probably) independently funded, so it's easy to do, and there isn't much of an intellectual tie to whatever work you've been doing. You also know a lot more about what to look for in a PI and a research program. Write off this year as a mistake, and move on. In grad school, you've got to fail quickly, and choice of environment is no exception. If you're unhappy at the end of your first year in a group, you'll never be happy -- it only gets harder, and you don't want to be the student to who has a fantastic blowout with your advisor in year three or four, where there's little chance of recovery. So, my advice is to change labs. Failing that, quit. Grad school isn't worth it, unless you can have a great experience. But whatever you do, don't get so far in that you feel that you can't quit, even though you hate your life and your work.

maximilian 18y ago
Find a good advisor. I've known many people who hated grad school but when they switched an advisor they liked, their world went from hell to a great graduate experience. Its all about your advisor.
- nihilocrat 18y ago
  People who were paying attention during undergrad should know this; I realized early on that a lot of your experience had to do more with the people involved than the material. A good advisor is no exception, and from what I hear, is even more important in grad school. It's also pretty true outside the ivory tower. Surrounding yourself eight hours a day with people who amaze you with their skills and/or having a de-facto mentor can do wonders. A lack thereof can leave you feeling demotivated, like you are just treading water and not really advancing yourself.

albertcardona 18y ago

jlouis 18y ago
The alternative is Simon Peyton Jones style: Work on some 10-15 papers at the same time. Whenever some new knowledge is gained, try to apply it to all the papers. At some point one of your papers is publishable. It is basically running research as one big investment bank and spreading your portfolio out.

gruseom 18y ago

I know of one exception. He explained his system: he does the research, then he gets grants for his research. This gives him time to do new research and he writes new grants based on that. He delivers because he only proposes to do what he has already more or less done! That is brilliant! It reminds me of two things. One is Craig Larman's work on the history of the waterfall process. Larman posed the question: given how broken the waterfall process is, how was it possible for any project to succeed? (The failures of course are easy to explain.) So he went back and interviewed people who were on famous waterfall projects that succeeded. And they told him: "Of course we knew it would never work to do all the design up front. So we built the system and then went back and wrote the spec, handed it in and got it signed off, and later submitted the actual code." The other thing it reminds me of is Andrew Wiles writing a stack of papers in advance so he would have ten years to work on Fermat's Last Theorem while still publishing regularly.

vlad 18y ago
That's what I decided to do a week ago in one of my classes. I have to write three analyses of other people's work every week on Blackboard, so I will create 4x3x2=24 insightful posts, then post one at a time from a nearby computer lab on the days of the lectures. I think the professor is looking for regular frequency per week, and not on whether we are commenting on work that was put up that same week or weeks ago. And while I copy-paste, if I notice a brand-new interesting work, I might write an analyses about it right on the spot, so as not to have every one of my analyses be about work from October.