If you have been following this blog for a little while you may have noticed that I have published a few posts about ‘life after PhD’. In particularly, I have recently posted about what’s next and whether a PhD makes you overqualified. I am sorry if you are not into these types posts, because I have a feeling there will be a few more about this topic as it is currently consuming my life.
I have found applying for jobs a weird experience, in part because I think I am not clear exactly what I want to do. I change my mind regularly. The benefit of a PhD is it provides people with a diverse skillset that suits a variety of career options. The negative of a PhD is it provides people with a diverse skillset that suits a variety of career options.
I think that for a while at least I want to get out of fulltime academic work. I love teaching, I love my online teaching work, and I particularly love supervising my honours student. However, I don’t like the pressure of grants and the unrealistic hours that are involved with academia (just to name a few things).
Knowing that I don’t want to work in academic full time is a great start- however it doesn’t help me pinpoint what I want to do. My ideas are market research which will give me the opportunity to be involved in lots of different research projects simultaneously. Or I am interested in environmental education or environmental project management which will allow me to work in a conservation psychology area which is what my PhD is in. I also often daydream about just not doing much. I have been in education since kindy- that is around 21 years in a row. Even in the undergraduate holidays I worked, so I have never really had a break. So maybe I want to do my teaching work and research assistant work and get a job in a café and just spend some time figuring it all out. Do something crazy like write a book (it has always been a dream of mine) or work on this blog.
I know that these three ideas are all very different, and I genuinely don’t know which one I will go for. My current plan is to apply for jobs that genuinely interest me and let the universe decide. If nothing comes up and I finish my PhD, then I will take my time to figure things out.
As I said, I think I will be writing more posts about this topi and I will particularly share my experiences applying for jobs and if I get any offers!
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