Industry vs. Academia
 

I am curious on this forums responses on this topic, as I have seen that the active members here in the Gamingforce community have very diverse backgrounds and are a fairly intellectual crowd. I am interested in the answers of both those who are already well into their careers, and those who have yet to start or have just begun.

The topic at question is to whether you guys would prefer spending your time working in an industry in your career path, or would prefer doing research and instructing in an academic setting.

For instance, say you are into distributed or high performance computing: You are beginning your career in the computing industry and have are about to obtain your BS in computer engineering. You can either go to work in industry for well know engineering firms and make $60,000, or you can continue to get your masters and possibly PhD. Which would you choose and why?

I am at this quandary myself, and am considering both options. Sometimes I wake up in the morning with the conviction that I will go onto higher education, which promises more travel, free time(eventually), and the excitement of teaching. Sometimes I wake up happy in the fact that I can get a job out of college at a corporation and make enough money to pay off my loans and afford the electronics and video games I desire.

Which would you prefer?

There are many things you just can't learn from books. I would get a job and work in the industry for a few years. That way I can figure out if I really like what I'm doing and get exposure to the industry. After spending a few years, I'll make a decision on whether to continue on in the industry or go back to academia.

Academia isn't for someone who justs want to teach. It depends on what type of university you want to teach in and what kind of salary you are expecting. Of course, if you want higher pay (and ultimately tenure), the research/paper driven path is where it's at. But it's not leisure either because there is the added pressure of being published x times a year and having your paper cited y times. But yeah, if you just want to teach at a so-so school, then I don't know why anyone would want to spend 5+ years of extra schooling (and costs) to do so. Unless you're very, very passionate about computer engineering. A PhD dissertation is no walk in the park.

After spending a year and two summers doing research, I've had enough. It's low pay, relatively low stress (that was good), and can get boring reading scientific papers that you could care less about. The workplace isn't all that better in terms of being stimulated, but at least you're getting paid better for applicable work. I've thought about grad school for a little but decided that the only reason I wanted to go (while talking to one of my profs) was that I didn't know what I wanted to do in the next five years. Which is entirely the wrong reason to go to grad school.

I personally think it's best to get some industry experience before going directly into grad school. At least then you have a feeling of what kind of area you like or more interested in, you interact with all age groups, and you know what kind of jobs are out there for those with a masters/phd or bachelors. I know it's tempting to live student life indefinitely, but who wants to live off low pay? I think of grad school as something like a jumpboard into a higher position, higher pay, or something else career wise. I suggest finding an internship in your industry during the summer or if you can afford the time during the semester. In industry, talk to your co-workers. They have interesting career paths themselves. Talk to a lot of people now, including profs and grad students. Ask profs how they became a prof. Ask students why they chose grad school and where they want to go after.

Either way, I think the safest bet is to take your GRE before you graduate, and land a full time position somewhere. Some grad schools accept deferred applicants I think, so do your research with those schools as well.

I'll add to what Dee has said by saying that professors have to chase after funding (grants), and that can be pretty difficult. I worked with a professor whose lab almost shut down for lack of funding before he finally secured a grant to continue.

My creative side aches for the research aspects of the arts but I got to make a living. A career in graphic design has worked for me. Chasing after more cash for my effort has outweighed my fundamental interests.

I'm doing academia because I just want to know as much as I can about what I do. I can't imagine going and working for a company right now with only a BS because I've definitely learned that there's more that I don't know about what I'd like to do than what I do know, so I'd feel dishonest even trying to say I'm an expert in what I learned about.

Anyway, I love to teach, I love to learn, and I love to research. Pretty much the only thing that I'm not looking forward to with a career in academia is the more laid back atmosphere than you'll find in industry, though maybe I'll appreciate it later on in life.

As to the question posed originally about which job would you take? Well, I'm starting my Ph.D. studies in about a month. :cool:

Academia really has its ups and downs. It can be lower-stress, but pay is significantly less than industry. Still, as long as you're doing what you enjoy, you're following the true point in an ideal work-life.

Personally, I don't like academia in my field. Research in Engineering, materials, architecture, etc strikes me as things with definite possible innovations and purposes. Meanwhile, looking at research in Geophysics, it strikes me as a horrendous waste of time. The jargon is very "upper-level", but the thought process can be broken down to laymen's terms quite well.

I attended research seminars, AGU meetings, etc, and not a single topic impressed me. I entered this one lecture at the '05 AGU meet, seeing its topic as "Mineral Discussion and Theory". Its description beneath that made me think it dealt with exploration breakthroughs, which are what I'm curious about. Cheaper, easier, more effective ways to find what you want.

I go in and its two guys arguing within a percentile of the core's composition. A ONE PERCENT DIFFERENCE. I raised my hand mid-debate and asked how long the two had been doing research on this topic (even though both were adamantly against eachother). Both had been doing this topic for ten years.

Ten years. On a topic like that? That isn't living. I prefer industry, where I'm directly helping the economy or work-flow. Not sitting in an office thinking about meaningless theory. Don't get me wrong, there are many, many practical research topics and fields. But in mine? I've had enough. It's all bullshit, pure and simple. I've heard my buddies who stayed for masters referring to my work as "wasted potential". I would be doing "trained chimp work". I'd prefer helping chug the lifeblood in to the economy as opposed to maybe altering a sentence in a college textbook as my highlight of my career.

In addressing the topic put forward, I would say that my experience in choosing to work in industry, as opposed to choosing to pursue higher education past a Bachelors Degree has been very beneficial in my particular field.

My field of study and employment is Accounting and Taxation.

Having worked full time for 18 months in Accounting, Tax and Audit I can say that I am happy with my decision to move into industry intead of taking an honours year. I have also talked to HR staff who say that they value candidates who make the decision to move into industry first and are wary of those who are highly academically qualified without any professional experience.

All of this adds up to me recommending those who have studied Business/Commerce/Accounting to get some experience as soon as possible before undertaking further study and considering teaching.

In business, most people are far better served to get two or three years of real world experience after obtaining a bachelor's, and then pursuing a master's. In the more liberal arts type fields, it is the other way around, generally speaking of course.

It depends on your field, I guess. For me, deciding to learn more about film production after college seems like a waste of time. Teaching it may not be a bad idea later on down the road, but for now, there's no better teacher than experience, and that's what I'm after.

I've done a lot of free-time Academia category research on my own in the past, and at this point, I NEED the Industry experience and knowledge. I wouldn't mind and probably am already capable of teaching in an Academic setting, but its just not possible right now. However, if about 10 years down the line, I might consider a university or college teaching profession (If only because I'll be dealing with less annoying twits). Yeah, to answer the thread, Industry is what I want and need right now.

The academic world is HORROR, at least here in Europe. People who have only just acquired their PhD will think that they know everything, researchers will only boast about thier research and don't care about anyone else. On top of that, I've seen more backstabbing and betraying in academic circles than anywhere else. My dad has a PhD in Immunology, he did research for a few years after that but got so disgusted with that world that he switched to Industry. It also depends on what you are doing, exact sciences are wellfunded, but if you are specializing in human sciences you WILL have to fight to get money for you research, which brings backstabbers and traitors back into play.

And fresh college grads coming into the industry think they know everything too.Replace "research" with "projects" and you describe the industry.Doubtful. More politics and in some cases more competition? Yes. But more backstabbing and betrayal? I don't see it.

It may be easier to get funding in a big country like the US, but when you live in a small country like Belgium, where funds are limited, people will go through great lenghts to get funds. Maybe it's just my uni, which has the reputation of being elitist as hell, but I've SEEN physical fights over research funds.

Maybe in the movies. None of my friends that are going to industry felt they are pretty much clueless about what they're going to be doing once they start at the companies they were hired at.

Yeah, I felt like I had no idea what the fuck I saw doing. Most majors/colleges/schools are absolutely terrible at any sort of job prep.

Academia for its own sake is fine and good, but if it isn't teaching a student anything about a reality of the world and the way it works, what good is it?

For instance, and excuse the base example, but math makes that claim that 1+1 = 2. However, it doesn't necessarily tell you as to why such measurements are important in day to day life. It is the job of the student to see where that applies, but this is not always obvious. Therefore a certain aspect of the teaching, in whatever subject that comes up, seems arbitrary in nature.

As a musician, I am largely self taught. Many of my colleagues do well with theory, but not with actual composition. Therein lies the rub. We can know something, but if it is force fed to us a certain way, it kills the potential for creativity.

I think its good if we can teach ourselves to do things, provided that we have a means for properly learning the material. Thats where the process of learning/applying principles truly begins so it can't be underestimated.