Why A Postdoc Is A Waste Of Time

Hello and welcome to another edition of Ask Cheeky. I'm Isaiah Hankel with Cheeky Scientist and this week's question comes from Kartik Shirur.
"How does a postdoc position compare to a research scientist position?" How does a postdoc position compare to a research scientist position? Then he follows up with, "How does an industry postdoc position compare to an academic postdoc position?"
Here we're comparing three things and this is a great question, one we get a lot. One that we're always answering with our Associates is how do you compare an industry postdoc versus an academic postdoc versus a research scientist position in industry and which should you go for first? What are the pros and cons?
Now the first thing we always like to give this advice and all of our postdocs and our consultants who have done postdocs give this advice too that there's no real reason to do an industry postdoc especially if you want to stay in industry you want to go into industry.
Most companies, if you do an industry postdoc for them, they will not keep you afterwards. You'll do an industry postdoc, you won't make as much money as you could as a research scientist and then they'll let you go afterwards. This is really a last resort and it's not something you should focus on first. Instead if you want to go into industry and make sure that you're doing your best to transition into a research scientist position, even an entry level research scientist position. You'll get paid better, have better benefits and you'll have more responsibility and you'll move up from that role of just being a postdoc and having to do what you're told. However, that being said there is a little bit more independence in a postdoc position, even an industry postdoc position.
If you really, really value your independence and you want to stay on a typical postdoc route but in industry it might be a good fit for you. In terms of academic postdocs versus industry, obviously in academia you're going to be paid much less. Less than even an industry postdoc and the goal, the only reason to do an academic postdoc in today's world, in today's academic environment is if you still want to try to go on and be a professor. We've talked a little bit about those numbers though. Obviously the trends in terms of open professorships is going way down. Unless you really want to hold off for an academic position and you're okay going for five or six years, up to 10 years as a postdoc in your academia, I highly, highly recommend that you don't do that. If you want to transition in industry, don't do an academic postdoc, there's no reason to. There's no reason to do an industry postdoc either.
You might be asking, "Why is this? Don't some positions require an industry postdoc?" No and if you look at many of the articles we've published, a lot of our postdocs have written articles that talk about the the fact that staying in academia to do a postdoc doesn't help you at all. Many postdocs are working in research scientist positions next to people with masters degrees or just bachelors degrees and they're at the same level. They're at the same research scientist three level or the same senior scientist level. What this means is, don't get disheartened by this, it just means that once you get your PhD if you made the decision to go in the industry, the sooner you can do it the better. There's no reason to stay academia and certainly there's no reason to do an industry postdoc. If you want to eventually get into a research scientist position, you're better off going directly into that research scientist position as soon as possible.
The pay obviously will be much higher, you'll be able to climb the ladder faster in your career trajectory that will be much different. Every year you stay in academia, you're actually holding yourself back, right? That's one year of not getting industry experience or on-the-job training in that research scientist position. So finally, if you made that decision to move into industry, you just have to realize that you already all the tools you need, you have all the technical skills, you have the PhD, that box is checked. You also have developed many of the transferable skills you need to transition into industry. Staying in a postdoc is not going to help you develop more transferable skills. Now you already have what you need so you should go ahead and not hold back and go ahead and start applying to those research scientists positions.
Until next time, remember your value as a PhD and start thinking and acting like a successful industry professional.