3 ms·

Years of experience don't matter (IMO). I will pay you based on the value you bring. PhDs have demonstrated the ability to read the literature and conduct resea

by RogerL 13y ago

Years of experience don't matter (IMO). I will pay you based on the value you bring. PhDs have demonstrated the ability to read the literature and conduct research under supervision. That is not necessarily very valuable (knowledge gained during that process may or may not be very valuable). And, honestly, the research often seems very mickey-mouse compared to real world problems, of the "assume a spherical cow in a vacuum" variety. That's nice, but does it get me to launch with the feature sets I need? If not, your value is not high. If so, well, name your price.

Lewisham 13y ago
I think you're heavily discounting/missing "ability to work independently" which I think is a huge win for most softeng jobs. If they can code (if), you'll find PhD holders need very little hand-holding to get stuff done.
- quanticle 13y ago
  >I think you're heavily discounting "ability to work independently" Really? I mean, anecdotal evidence and all, but I haven't found that PhDs can actually work more independently in a commercial software setting than non-PhDs. I think it's because academic settings are just too different from commercial settings. In academia, your project is your own. You're responsible for it, from start to finish. But in commercial software, your project is often just one component or subcomponent of a much larger system. This requires a much greater level of communication and cooperation with other developers and business-people. So yes, a PhD may be able to work more independently on a project that allows for independent work. But most commercial software development is a highly cooperative activity, where the sort of independence that PhD holders exercise can often turn into being a loose cannon.
  - Schwolop 13y ago
    So take your 20 man project - all of it - and give the entirety to the Ph.D. In fact, since you'll be saving so much money, get three Ph.D.s to work on it simultaneously and independently. In fact, tell them it's first to publish - sorry, I mean launch - and you'll probably see them work 24/7 until it's done. In fact, what you've just done is start an industry funded research project. You should now go to a university, "collaborate" such that they get to put their name on the project, and you get to harvest their Ph.D. candidates for minimum wage, and you're laughing all the way to the bank!
seanmcdirmid 13y ago
In this case, supply and demand wins and everyone is happy. If you value a phd at N and another company values him (or her) at 2N, they will go work at the other company. If they have expertise that you can't leverage, your lower valuation is justified. Also, it is hard to value PhDs if you aren't one yourself; e.g. it took Page, Brin, and Schmidt to figure put how to leverage PhD talent to build what was basically a new industry. Other people would see PhDs as seeming "very Mickey-mouse compared to real world problems." They wouldn't have the creativity and experience to see the connections.

by RogerL 13y ago

Lewisham 13y ago

I think you're heavily discounting/missing "ability to work independently" which I think is a huge win for most softeng jobs. If they can code (if), you'll find PhD holders need very little hand-holding to get stuff done.

quanticle 13y ago
>I think you're heavily discounting "ability to work independently" Really? I mean, anecdotal evidence and all, but I haven't found that PhDs can actually work more independently in a commercial software setting than non-PhDs. I think it's because academic settings are just too different from commercial settings. In academia, your project is your own. You're responsible for it, from start to finish. But in commercial software, your project is often just one component or subcomponent of a much larger system. This requires a much greater level of communication and cooperation with other developers and business-people. So yes, a PhD may be able to work more independently on a project that allows for independent work. But most commercial software development is a highly cooperative activity, where the sort of independence that PhD holders exercise can often turn into being a loose cannon.
- Schwolop 13y ago
  So take your 20 man project - all of it - and give the entirety to the Ph.D. In fact, since you'll be saving so much money, get three Ph.D.s to work on it simultaneously and independently. In fact, tell them it's first to publish - sorry, I mean launch - and you'll probably see them work 24/7 until it's done. In fact, what you've just done is start an industry funded research project. You should now go to a university, "collaborate" such that they get to put their name on the project, and you get to harvest their Ph.D. candidates for minimum wage, and you're laughing all the way to the bank!

seanmcdirmid 13y ago

In this case, supply and demand wins and everyone is happy. If you value a phd at N and another company values him (or her) at 2N, they will go work at the other company. If they have expertise that you can't leverage, your lower valuation is justified. Also, it is hard to value PhDs if you aren't one yourself; e.g. it took Page, Brin, and Schmidt to figure put how to leverage PhD talent to build what was basically a new industry. Other people would see PhDs as seeming "very Mickey-mouse compared to real world problems." They wouldn't have the creativity and experience to see the connections.