Zoltaning:

This is sort of the whole point of grad school, is it not? Work you're doing should be motivated by work currently missing in the field, and your work should move the field forward. Go from there. When in doubt, talk to your advisor, whose job it is to help articulate these issues. Run a lab meeting and get feedback. The difference between a Nature paper and a second-tier is often how the work is spun.

Zoltan: Thanks so much!

Regarding the presentation, I've given many to my labmates, a couple to some outside people, and presented at one conference. So it sounds like I should try to be as nontechnical as possible. This will be interesting since some of our innovations are so deep in the math, but very doable nonetheless.

Regarding the other points, I expect they'll escort me everywhere. It's a pretty secretive company and I'd be shocked if, other than waiting in a specific room, they ever left me alone. The agenda point is awesome, I will ask about that. You are expecting they'll take me out for dinner and/or drinks? Someone else told me they thought they would, but I personally have no idea. That person told me to bring some decent business casual attire to the hotel in case they ask me if I want to change.

You want to keep it nontechnical, but not so nontechnical that you come across as a dilettante. (Probably kinda difficult for that to happen though given the field. )

In academia, dinner/social is standard for multiday visits (and often for daylong visits where you don't leave the same night). Might not be the same for industry though, since the environment can be less collegial.

good luck, keep us updated.

Sounds great, thanks again man! And will do.

Saw,

I've done similar work in the past and work for a company that interviews folks like you. Feel free to PM me any details, as I might actually be able to provide you some specifics.

In the meantime:

1) Practice your talk. And I don't mean in front of a mirror. I mean give the talk 2-3 times before you go give your "job talk." Seriously. I am _excellent_ at giving talks, and I went over my job talk a bunch of times and still learned a ton when I gave it in front of my first live audience (just my advisor and a handful of friends, some of whom knew my field, some of whom didn't). The second time I gave it, it was polished, and I totally nailed it. This gave me a ton of confidence going into the job talk.

2) Give your talk as though it's aimed at the smartest person in the world who's NOT in your area. You want to get across all the main ideas, almost none of the details (though you should be ready to rock on details if questioned -- usually when I 1-on-1 a candidate, I try to dig into some concrete examples from the work he did, just to test whether the "concreteness" bit is set). Present the overall big picture, and give a sense of the technology you're using. Give enough to get the gist but not so much that they get bored. Tell a story. Provide examples.

3) God I hate when interviewers quiz you on stuff that's not your work (or some basic skills that you really, really should have). You have a ****ing PhD. But you should definitely go back through the basics and at least not go in sounding like an idiot if someone tries to engage you on a basic topic. It's ok if you don't know much beyond the basics, but be honest with your interviewers. Tell them if you don't have much experience with certain things. But also be energetic and excited to learn about what they do/how they apply certain topics/etc (letting the interviewer talk and asking good questions is a great way to turn this around). This isn't a company that's looking to hire salemen/bull****ters I presume, so don't try to bull****.

4)Don't suck. Blend in. To take Z's example, if they take you out drinking, go out drinking, but you don't want to stand out for your drinking prowess or lack thereof. Pretend you're out with your girlfriend's dad. Be impressive but classy and respectful. Just be one of them. Remember, especially if they are small (or a small group), they are hiring not just the highest mu -- they have to clip sigma as well. One bad apple can really ruin the vibe of a group.

As usual, Wyman gives excellent advice. Another point I forgot: For your talk, consider memorizing your first 2-3 sentences, and no more. This will help get things rolling and make you comfortable standing in front of an audience of unknowns. No matter how well you know your own work (and you should know it inside out of course), the first 30 seconds are almost always tough.

Wow awesome advice, Wyman, thanks! That was great to read and will help me quite a bit in my preparation. The energetic part won't be a problem at all; I'm legitimately super excited just to talk to these guys, hear about what they do, and see how they react to what I've been doing. I will likely PM you some more details.

Zoltan, another great point, I will do that. Thanks again.

Yea, it is the whole point of grad school.

I'm actually still in high school and have the awesome opportunity to contribute to a research lab through an internship program at my school.

I have an advisor, and she's amazing. She's senior faculty, very supportive, and is letting me pursue my own ideas. She also meets with me once a week / every other week for about thirty to sixty minutes, which seems generous considering the value of her time.

However, while my advisor reviews the work I'm doing and is generous with lab resources, I'm solely the one doing day-to-day research. Essentially I've been thrown into the grad-school pool without any swimming lessons. This has pros and cons.

What advice would you give a high-schooler in an informatics research lab?

As I understand it, advice on securing an academic career almost always boils down to: publish. So that's what I'm trying to do.

Other advice I've heard is not to "go rogue" too soon, which seems to be the line I've leapt across with this current paper. I think it will go over well, but I'm also considering collaborating on future papers to learn from researchers with more experience.

Wow, that's great for being in HS. Your best resource at this point is probably the grads students, since they're "closer" to where you are psychologically. Even having any research experience at all will pay as time goes on. It will make it easier to intergrate into labs as an undergrad and prep for grad school (assuming these are all things that you want to and will continue to want to do). Don't sweat it if your interests change though.

Also, I thought this was kinda funny.

This is probably a question more case by case based, but I'll throw it out there and give it a shot.

Out of curiosity, does anyone have any advice or stories on leveraging their PhD in extra supplemental income beyond their work at a university (i.e. consulting or gaining a grant that paid them).

My research has focused far more on the non-profit and sociological side of my field. I have had no problem finding organizations that would love to collaborate, but they have little to no money and require pro bono monitor and evaluation. Guess I'm just wondering if anyone out there manages to make more then their base salary and has any advice.

I would try to network. NSF grants, for instance, require an evaluation protocol, so we found an external source to throw like $10k (iirc) at for evaluation work. There was LOTS of consulting talk at a conference I attended last month (evaluation and educational stuff).

My boss does consulting, but I'm not quite there yet. (I'm in admin, not faculty side.)

What does that entail? What made you lean this way?

I'm curious as I'm still on the front end of many of these decisions.

Faculty expectations to reward ratio entirely out of line pretty much at all levels of academia. Wasn't REALLY competitive for good R1s, didn't want a 4:4 plus research load at liberal arts schools. Interesting position came open, off I went.

More and more PhDs are realizing that there are good "alternative" careers, and the dysfunctional structure of the PhD system is making "alternative" more the norm.

Hey all, so I'm in a PhD program (biochemistry) where I am considering switching labs because of several reasons. I have been unable to get an experiment to work the past few months and my PI has recently expressed dissatisfaction with my performance in the lab. I have tried many different ways to get this experiment to work but it basically does not work for whatever reason (I suspect that it is due to a huge variation in the quality of my reagents that a previous student left me). I have got other projects in this lab that have worked out but my main project is at this stumbling block where I cannot get this important experiment to work.

Luckily I am still in end of my second year (end of the first year in the lab) so I still have not passed my qualifying exams (I am scheduled to take mine 3 months from now). She said in an email to my committe that she accidentally sent to me that she will have a hard time passing me in my qualifying exam unless substantial progress is made in the next 3 months.

She suggested to me that either I find a new lab immediately and they will be able to postpone my qualifying exam a few months so that I can get some preliminary data and come up with a proposal. The other option would be to continue working in this lab for the next 3 months as hard as I can to make some progress. As it is with science, if I plan my experiments extremely well but they still don't produce any positive results before my qualifying exam she will fail me. I spoke with a few friends who were/are in PhD programs and they suggested that I switch because my PI should be supportive of me but she is already biased against me which will make it very hard for me to pass.

I am not sure what I should do but I do have a meeting with the director of graduate studies to discuss this whole situation. I don't really fear the setback of joining a new lab because I don't feel that this lab is the most ideal place for me to grow as a scientist and I would rather suffer a year setback than spend the next 3-4 years here unhappy.

Thoughts? Is this common in your field? How should I approach new PI's with interest in joining their lab?

plz tell me she also called you a freak and a weird dude.

and also quite young.

but seriously, bail. bail to another advisor and don't look back.

an advisor should be someone who gives you tough love and has your back. my advisor was great about challenging me, and asking me tough questions in my general and final exams, but at the end of the day i knew that he was on my side.

i cannot imagine doing a dissertation with someone who wasn't supportive.

and i agree with your attitude about not fearing setbacks. graduate school is all about setbacks, and accepting that is part of the game. i took 6.5 years and loved [almost] every minute of it.

haha thanks Prof Peter! I was hoping you would reply. I just spoke with the director of graduate studies and he said that switching labs isn't uncommon in our program (in fact he switched labs as well during his PhD, but it was a different program). He basically told me to look at potential advisers in the next day or two and explain the whole situation to them and let them know your interest in possibly doing rotation in their lab to see if its a good fit

My adviser is sick at the moment so I haven't said anything to her. Should I let her know that I am meeting with new advisers about joining their lab while still keeping the option of staying in her lab open?

I meant to respond to this sooner so it might be too late now, but basically i would say it depends on the nature of your relationship with your current advisor. If she is someone you would like to continue to have in your professional life, then it would probably be good to have that conversation and keep her in the loop.

Honestly though, either way i don't think it would be that bad to just explore your options without telling her. Obviously keep her in the loop once you get close to making decisions, but until then you are just having conversations.

Solsek,

I am not a lab science field (Math/Stat) but I couldn't agree more with what peterchi said. In an ideal situation you have a good relationship with most of the faculty in your department, but at the very least, the one person you need to be able to count on is your advisor.

My advice would be to speak with other faculty you have good relationships with (for example, you took there class/attended their reading group/whatever) and have an interest in their subfield ASAP.

Thanks for the advice guys, my current plan is to stay in the lab for at least another 2 weeks and see how things go from there. In the mean time I will seek out another lab and see what other options I have.

Run. Grad school is hard enough without advisors making it harder. It seems awkward and like the end of the world now, but after you switch it will be no big deal socially or otherwise.

If you stay, make nice with your advisor. You need a really open and honest relationship. Remember (s)he is writing your letters. Glgl

In the US, this is still standard in mathematics. Usually one has to pass an exam in one or two of French, German, Russian or Chinese. One has to translate a math article written in one of these languages, something like that. This is because some math journals accept publications in French, German, and Russian. A lot of the older literature is in French and German and in the 20th century there were very important Russian journals. The French in particular still publish a lot in French.