Earlier quoted context omitted.
Which company is that if I may ask?
I'd rather not, sorry!
That's OK. I'm looking for something similar, hence the question :)
Ask HN: Who hires mathematicians?
131–140 of 152 posts
Re: Ask HN: Who hires mathematicians?
#132Quant desks in hedge funds and prop trading companies - like Jane Street, SIG and the like.
In most of those places, 'maths' will involve a lot of data science and machine learning, plus a fair bit of programming, however PhD degree is quite often a hard requirement.
(Source: am a quant)
Re: Ask HN: Who hires mathematicians?
#133Not me, that's for sure. I interviewed two maths phd's years ago, who wanted to get out of academia because they felt themselves above chasing grant money, but then didn't want to do anything that wasn't their phd topic or related (of which I didn't even understand what it was, and they couldn't explain, or give examples of what it could be used for). On the other hand, I did hire people who studied maths in programm…
This is quite anecdotal and not very helpful to the question asked. All the time people apply for jobs with different expectations than what the job role is. That is what the interview process is for, so both sides can find out if there is a good fit.
"That is what the interview process is for, so both sides can find out if there is a good fit."
Well yeah, that's exactly what the anecdote illustrates - people who aren't hung up on 'doing maths' or 'being a mathematician' will have ample opportunity; those that are better like it at universities because that's where they're heading.
Re: Ask HN: Who hires mathematicians?
#134I graduated with a BSc in Mathematics in 2008, and didn't exactly know what I wanted to do. I just typed the keyword "analyst" into job search engines. It worked pretty well! I ended up getting a job in a field that I didn't even know existed when I started (web analytics). It turns out that almost every industry has some sort of data that they can benefit from having someone analyze it, and a Math degree is a pretty…
I wouldn't say people with BSc in math are "very smart," they are in my opinion wickedly, awesomely super-smart. I have taken some math courses which contain material that math BSc:s go through during the first semester and those were much harder, by a large margin, than any other courses I have taken!
But I can't imagine going through three years of that and then have to spend your time with web analytics. It must feel awfully pedestrian. The level of the math can't be anywhere close to what a BSc is capable of.
Re: Ask HN: Who hires mathematicians?
#135I have a PhD in mathematics, and have been working in the public sector (NASA) for a little under 10 years. A mix of interest in numerical linear algebra and software engineering helped me work into a niche in scientific computing and engineering software development. Math is a very, very broad professional interest area. It branches into education, academia, and several areas in several industries around the senior…
Any chance you know someone hiring for said scientific computing roles? I studied Applied Math / CS undergrad, have been gearing up to work in Autonomous Vehicles, but really any challenging numerical work would be interesting to me.
Re: Ask HN: Who hires mathematicians?
#136Earlier quoted context omitted.
amusingly functional analysis is really important to convex analysis and optimization so yes if you have a phd/masters (maybe) you can definitely get - probably a giant company - to pay you to do functional analysis.
Of all the great replies I've gotten, this one has arguably alleviated my concerns the most.
I've seen at least one or two companies working on optimization at least here on HN. I'd take a guess that Gurobi is one option, and I saw SigOpt post a listing on the recent "Who's Hiring?" thread. Google seems to also do a lot of optimization related work as well. I'm in the same boat, though I was stronger in CS during my studies. The background is useful, but you will only ever use bits and pieces of it at opportune moments.
Re: Ask HN: Who hires mathematicians?
#137GCHQ / CESG / whatever the equivalent is in your country.
See also arms length organisations, such as Heilbronn Institute. https://heilbronn.ac.uk/
Re: Ask HN: Who hires mathematicians?
#138Actuarial work is quite maths-y and grad schemes typically want maths grads as they'll have the requisite grounding to do the actual work. It is not fully finance but it is obviously money/risk related.
Re: Ask HN: Who hires mathematicians?
#139I graduated with a BSc in Mathematics in 2008, and didn't exactly know what I wanted to do. I just typed the keyword "analyst" into job search engines. It worked pretty well! I ended up getting a job in a field that I didn't even know existed when I started (web analytics). It turns out that almost every industry has some sort of data that they can benefit from having someone analyze it, and a Math degree is a pretty…
Snap! I'm also a mathematician who works in web analytics but I graduated high school is 2008! I agree with everything you have said but I will add that you SHOULD KNOW HOW TO CODE and NEED TO KNOW EXCEL AND SQL (this is A LOT EASIER than knowing how to code)
Another Math grad here. Currently working in video game analytics. Lots of options for us it seems :)
Re: Ask HN: Who hires mathematicians?
#140Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Can you hand-code a solver for Maxwells equations or Navier-Stokes (lid-driven cavity flow)? For my undergrad, I mostly focussed on number theory and differential geometry. These topics are mostly useless unless you want to work at the NSA, which only works for the US. Most of my undergraduate curriculum is absolutely useless except for the art of mathematics itself. For my Masters I wanted to learn more about nume…
I think the comments here could do with being put in a little perspective. There are programmers reading HN (well, all programmers) for whom one important way they can improve as a software engineer is to improve their powers of abstract thinking. You people who have studied advanced mathematics, any of it, are exceptionally skilled at thinking abstractly. I think there’s a risk of underestimating how useful that is…
I think it's a bit superstitious how we think that being good at math means you'll be good at programming. I'm not complaining, because that superstition helped me. Like I said, my math degree did give recruiters an initial good impression of me. Other than that, I don't think it translates into much of a benefit when writing code. I have personally witnessed many mathematicians write the most atrocious code, myself included.
Also, if it really were about that kind of structured thinking, maybe just teaching chess to kids would be just as well.