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I'm currently in the middle of a PhD, and you've touched on the exact fear I have. I intend on finding a job in industry after I graduate, and the biggest fear

I'm currently in the middle of a PhD, and you've touched on the exact fear I have. I intend on finding a job in industry after I graduate, and the biggest fear I have is a restriction on freedom. I totally get that there are jobs out there that still give you some amount of freedom to pick your own tools and/or approach a problem in your own way. Every now and then, I casually leaf through job ads and I have no idea how to tell which are which. I think that's what scares me. I get this feeling that when it comes time to join industry, it's just going to be a crapshoot---maybe I'll get lucky and maybe I won't. (Note that this isn't a criticism lodged in comparison to academia. I've already made up my mind that I'll be leaving once I graduate.)

a_bonobo 13y ago
Ask your supervisor if (s)he supports you doing an industry project for a month, (s)he might even get you a position with collaborators. I worked with a huge crop science company for four weeks and got some valuable insights (mostly, I had to justify every little step, and the local boss was a huge fan of micromanagement: meetings, meetings a few a day. But they did have a lot of money and were willing to throw it at possibly not profitable projects; and people did proper 9-5, not 9-5678910 like academia)