More than a decade ago, I worked as a postdoctoral researcher right after graduate school, in 2009 when the Great Recession started. Although it was at the bottom of my list of preferred jobs, graduating at a recession, and being an international student/worker did not give me many options. I applied for various positions from high-end consulting jobs to working at the Environmental Protection Agency, but I did not hear back from anyone.
I needed a job to stay in the U.S. and was glad to have a job when other folks were losing theirs. Just a few months after I started the postdoc, I received an invitation for a job interview at one of the National Labs. This is a position I had applied for 6-months prior and one that paid exactly double my postdoctoral salary. I had just moved to a new city and I wondered if I would want to move again in such a short time span, as the National Lab was located across the country from where I was living.
I told another postdoctoral researcher in the lab about the interview opportunity. They told me that I should not do the interview because I had just joined the lab and that I should at least publish one paper before I move on to help our advisor’s career. It would “not be nice” to leave soon because I had not had time to be productive.
I was a postdoctoral researcher earning an extremely low salary compared to my education credentials and my advisor was a tenured full professor earning a six-figure salary.
I see a shift in academia in recent times especially after the pandemic where folks with PhDs are not so keen on low-paying postdoctoral work, and I am glad. A quick search led me to articles in Science and American Physiological Society which validated such conversations I had with friends who are in academia. Rethinking career paths, prioritizing mental health, and being aware of the monetary value of one’s contributions to society have shifted the idea of mindlessly applying for postdoctoral positions after a PhD. A close friend and their spouse, both science PhDs, recently shifted from postdocs to industry because their salaries cannot keep up with living expenses in a HCOL.
Looking back, I cannot believe a peer would suggest that I stop advancing my early career to “help” my advisor who was at the pinnacle of their career. A journal publication from me would have added one more line to my advisor’s long CV, nothing else. In the end, I did not do the interview with the National Lab for reasons other than to “help” my advisor and I did publish in the postdoctoral lab before I left the lab.
Now that I have my own research lab with undergraduate students (I don’t have graduate students or postdoctoral researchers), I am cognizant of how each of my decisions in the lab affects my students. I prioritize them, their publications, and their future careers ahead of mine. After all, I am at the pinnacle of my career, being tenured, and I do not need one more line on my CV at the expense of my students’ opportunities and mental health.
Photo: Alaska
