Ph.D Employment?

Dr. Nik asks: "As a recent Ph.D graduate in EE, I am curious to know where other Ph.Ds are employed. More specifically, I would be interested in knowing if you have moved into careers other than academic. Have you veered from the path? Are you still working in the field, or have you completely changed direction?" A couple of months ago, Slashdot was polled for PhDs in IT. How well do other areas of the workforce compare when it comes to hiring Doctorates?

Comments

Google

[Apreche]

Google hires a lot of doctors. Granted, most of them are doctors of CS. But still.

Go back and get an MBA

[foniksonik]

Go back to school and get an MBA as well... should only take you 3 years... then you can a) have an awesome number of jobs to pick from or b) start your own company and do what you really want to do.

Having an MBA and a PhD in EE will guarantee you plenty of funding for any idea you have. VCs and Traditional lenders will be knocking down your door to give you money.

Re:Go back and get an MBA

[foniksonik]

Sorry to tell you but I know first hand that if you have the right credentials and the right idea you can in fact get VCs to not only play ball but to put serious money down on something.

I spent 4 months in a 3 bedroom apartment working on presentations and demo software with 15 to 20 people in the first months of 2000 putting together a valid business plan for CMGI@Ventures, Benchmark Capital and Lightwave Venture Funds to get 13 million in funding for a software startup company...

Yes there was $600,000 Angel investment. Still that amount is not insurmountable by anyone with a legitimate idea with any amount of connection to the business industery whatsoever... and the MBA in the company got the Angel funding as well... an SBA loan would have done equally as well.

Within 1 months there was a very basic working demo of the software... 1 month more it was closer... 2 months more we got funding... 13 million... after I personally spent 2 months of 18 hour days going over data to put together the best presentations I could create at the time and all the founders spent even more time in conference rooms with the VCs going over ROI numbers and timelines. We moved into a 10,000 sq ft building and got down to some serious work. Since then there has been Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley as funders... not too bad I'd say.

Yes.. the comment was superficial... nobody is knocking on your door... literally, but with even a little buzz they will be doing so metaphorically.

No... it is not impossible for you to get incredible attention for your idea if you actually know where to look and how to ask for said attention... and really that is what an MBA will get for you.

Having been through such an experience I forget that almost everyone else has not! Seeing the start of a 500 million dollar company from it's very humble beginnings to it's very honest success gives me confidence that anything is possible... sorry if the parent is jaded or needs salt with his meal....

All I know is that this startup had several PhDs whom couldn't get squat for funding on their own... and a Harvard MBA whom at age 26 could get 13 million using their credentials as collateral.

Imagine if either the MBA also had a PhD or at least one of the PhDs also had an MBA?

Re:My doctorate is in Mechanical Engineering

[Anonymous Coward]

I noticed that my university which is a tier 3 university according to USNews rank recently just hired an assistant professor with specialization in Digital Design/Electronics, and he is being offered salary of $88,000 per year.
I'm not sure if this $88,000 per year is for 9 months appointment or 12 months appointment though, since universities usually only pay professors for 9 months (Fall and Spring), unless the professor is teaching for Summer Course. But the point is, if a tier 3 university can pay $88,000 per year, what can a Tier 1 university such as Purdue, Stanford, MIT can pay their professors? Must be hefty amount of $$$$.