Thursday, April 9, 2009

Stressed



I'm hyper-stressed nowadays, mostly about my career/job stuff. Friday we have off, labmates wanted me to come in, i resisted. Gotta come in Sat. anyway. Got a deadline on April 15th (next Wed.). Got two papers to finish up, write up, send out. Got a trip in June. Got a trip in July. My fellowship is up end of June. Not sure what will happen then. I really want to switch out of academia, but the job market is abysmal.

My friend, a new assist prof, took 7 years to get from PhD to prof. Most prof. openings have 100-200 applicants. It requires a grant in hand (or K award), at this point. Can't teach, no experience. Not that great at research.

So, what do you have after 10 years? Not much. A few papers. A few awards. Not much at all. Starting over in another field is starting from ground level, high school level. That after 10 years of education is humbling. I probably wont get another fellowship; was lucky to get the first. The competition is too much. It's always the top 1% or 5%. This means 95% of the field isn't getting these awards. What do you do? The field is collapsing, Pharma, the dream for us, is just not hiring at all, actually almost all of them are laying off research staff. Outside of pharma and academia, there is the Fed; gonna apply to them next week.

I wonder what will happen after the depression is over. I think for our industry the fundamentals are still there; not much profits, few new drugs; this isn't a wise career move I think. I think the whole giant is going to collapse; it may take 20-30 years, but they can't afford many more cycles of producing one or two good drugs every 5 years.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Hey Rob,

It's really just hard times all around. I really feel for you dude....seriously. Just stay focused and stay employed. I cant stress that "stay employed" part enough. The jobs just arent out there right now.

You'll figure it out bro, you always do.

Hang in there.

azgma said...

Since the gov't is abt the only area really hiring right now, going for a gov't job might be a wise move. Keep chipping away at the job search. Even though I LOVE being retired, I also really like my little P/T job. It helps me stay connected to my field. Stay employed if you can. There can be better connections that way, and it looks better on a vitae. We will miss you at Easter! Talk to you soon!