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Ask HN: Will getting a PhD lead to a more interesting life?

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Re: Ask HN: Will getting a PhD lead to a more interesting life?

#111
I've been thinking all morning how to answer this. Rather than give advice, here's some thoughts about what I've seen in the industry. The quick answer is that, yes, a PhD should give you a more interesting life...but you might not want that.

I have a PhD in Chemical Physics. I got it about 15 years ago. The need to go deep into computation to solve chemistry problems is what gave me the computer skills that have served me well. That is, after I got my PhD, I haven't done any work in in chemistry or physics at all, but have been a high-performance computing expert everywhere I go. So, in my case, having the PhD really helps, but that's because I work in a field that secondary to my PhD work. I would wager, that's probably true of any academic field. The actual PhD work is so esoteric that it's not going to have any good application to reality (industry) in a reasonable time frame, but the underlying skills needed to get the PhD are going to be super useful.

Now, as for getting a job...I have had very bad luck (until recently) getting the FAANG-like companies to take me seriously: I'm expensive, I don't want to sit around all day gluing APIs together, and I don't have a public repository of code to point to. They want folks who fit into their mold of whiteboard interview. But now that I'm senior enough (15 years + PhD), I'm starting to get the target calls rather than the generic recruiter nonsense.

The point about not having the public repository of code is important: when you're a PhD, you job is to solve problems that _have never been solved before_. That is, it's not a rehash of the same problem in a new language, or a different architecture, or anything. It's new! The world hasn't seen it yet. That means 1) you can't go find an answer on stack overflow, and 2) your day-to-day work is HARD, and often demoralizing - at least I feel stupid every day until I find the solution, and then the dopamine hit keeps me coming back!. Since work is very hard (now, I also don't put tons of hours in, because the work is hard, so that's good). I don't have the mental energy for any side projects. I'm ok with that, I love what I do! But there is no public ego stroking and thought-leadership and all of that other stuff you see with other semi-famous developers. I can't point to a public project and say "I did that" or "I helped build that" because what I do is propitiatory.

Getting the PhD itself was a slog, and I didn't really enjoy the grind. But it is good have that credential. I know SV is all about "meritocracy" and whatnot, but having the PhD is a good signal that a person knows how to think and problem solve with little to no supervision, especially when the problem space is ill-defined. When hiring, I always count a PhD very high. I know a bunch of companies do too. So while the initial work of getting the PhD wasn't terribly fun, I've always had an easy time finding a job or getting a promotion.

I think another commenter said something to the effect that a PhD is a good signal that you can (and have) owned a full project start-to-finish. Don't discount that. It shows you as a closer. That's a good thing.

Sorry for the brain dump, but this was an interesting question you posed...tl;dr - I think a PhD can make you super valuable if you set it up in a way that the skills you learn while getting the degree are transferrable (now) to industry. You will have a leg-up on everyone else entering the field. Just don't get caught in pure theory that will not have an application for another decade. But you need to be ok with feeling stupid everyday because the problems you're solving are hard and new.

Re: Ask HN: Will getting a PhD lead to a more interesting life?

#112

CS PhD from Stanford in dynamic program analysis. Lost all my friends. Ghosted by companies for jobs directly related to my research. Everyone I knew who went directly into industry is doing way better than me. My salary has only tracked inflation. I sorely regret the decision and consider it to have fundamentally ruined my life beyond repair.

This will sound rude and I’m sorry but there is no way your entire life is ruined because you decided to get a PhD from one of the top 5 most prestigious institutions in the entire world.

Re: Ask HN: Will getting a PhD lead to a more interesting life?

#113

CS PhD from Stanford in dynamic program analysis. Lost all my friends. Ghosted by companies for jobs directly related to my research. Everyone I knew who went directly into industry is doing way better than me. My salary has only tracked inflation. I sorely regret the decision and consider it to have fundamentally ruined my life beyond repair.

> Ghosted by companies for jobs directly related to my research

This is unexpected. What's going on there?

Re: Ask HN: Will getting a PhD lead to a more interesting life?

#114
I'll give the US perspective.

You don't forego anything if you choose not to do a PhD right now. You can always do it at a later age - even in your 40's.

Red flags: You don't love studying. You don't love the process of research. You have loneliness concerns (loneliness is a reality for most PhD students). You don't want to think about sitting in the office reading papers all day. I can assure you - reading journal papers is boring - they're often not written to be read easily.

Don't worry about not being bright and it being a huge intellectual challenge. Many/most students feel they're not bright enough, and whether it will be a huge challenge depends heavily on the topic and your advisor.

Worrying about not being able to do interesting work: While I do think a PhD makes it easier to find interesting work, I think largely that's a separate skill in itself. I would wager that most PhDs do not find particularly interesting industry jobs if they do not learn the skills to find such jobs. Merely going through the motions of acquiring a PhD will not help too much in that regard. And if you do develop those skills, chances are good you'll be able to get interesting jobs with your MSc.

If you have a view that academia is about doing fun problems, the truth is yes and no. The "yes" is obvious. The "no" is that very, very often the reality is papers/conferences are the currency of academia, and the typical professor these days is more interested in optimizing that metric. So there's a good chance you'll end up publishing work that is dubious, or end up doing hacks to get more papers (e.g. republishing the same stuff with minor tweaks).

Definitely do not go into academia with the assumption that people there are more intellectually honest or have more integrity than in industry.

Re: Ask HN: Will getting a PhD lead to a more interesting life?

#116

CS PhD from Stanford in dynamic program analysis. Lost all my friends. Ghosted by companies for jobs directly related to my research. Everyone I knew who went directly into industry is doing way better than me. My salary has only tracked inflation. I sorely regret the decision and consider it to have fundamentally ruined my life beyond repair.

>I sorely regret the decision and consider it to have fundamentally ruined my life beyond repair.

Are you sure you would not feel the same way had you gone straight to industry? Musing over those who stayed, got their PhDs, and are in fascinating, high paying jobs?

My suggestion is that you try not to have an external locus of control.

I spent 7 years in grad school, realized a PhD won't get me the job I was seeking, and quit. As a result, everything you say is also true for me, and I don't even have the degree to show for it.

But I also know that grad school was a great time for me, and I did get most of what I wanted out of it. As for my not-so-great industry outcome, I do know I'm not really putting a huge amount of effort to improve it.

The PhD is about the journey. The certificate at the end is just a technicality. Could it be that you valued the certificate more than the journey?

Re: Ask HN: Will getting a PhD lead to a more interesting life?

#117

CS PhD from Stanford in dynamic program analysis. Lost all my friends. Ghosted by companies for jobs directly related to my research. Everyone I knew who went directly into industry is doing way better than me. My salary has only tracked inflation. I sorely regret the decision and consider it to have fundamentally ruined my life beyond repair.

This will sound rude and I’m sorry but there is no way your entire life is ruined because you decided to get a PhD from one of the top 5 most prestigious institutions in the entire world.

As sort of rude as this is I have to agree. If your life can be fundamentally ruined by this then there's a major blindspot in play.

Re: Ask HN: Will getting a PhD lead to a more interesting life?

#120
The conventional wisdom states, if you have a burning passion about the topic you're going to research on, go for it; otherwise, no, and I agree with that. I don't think it will add much to your life except 2-3 letters of a title, especially if you have written a thesis for your MSc which you probably are going to do since you mentioned you are doing research.

Mind if I ask if you have had any experience working as a software dev? That's what everyone else does (including me, even after my masters), and it is not bad because so. Can you elaborate on what you are afraid of if you transition to the industry?

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