Season 2 Episode 03: Interview with Doctor_PMS

Recovering Academic

In this week’s episode, Ian and Amanda interview Cleyde to get the in-depth story of her experience as a recovering academic.

Cleyde’s Advice: Have a Plan

Photo by: Steven Johnson

Cleyde talks about her reasons for leaving academia, including her relationship with academia. She also talks about what her goals are for her career. We also briefly discuss if it’s possible to control your productivity—that is to avoid having 100 publications in one year and only one the next. Cleyde also brings up a very important point about how your job needs to fit your personality and how your work environment can affect you.

Her best advice? Have a plan before leaving if you can. If you know that you want to leave academia (or are even just considering the possibility), start planning as soon as you can. This allows you to find out all the options (there are a lot!) for PhDs and former academics.

Mentioned in This Episode

The Year Of Albert Einstein: His discoveries in 1905 would forever change our understanding of the universe. Amid the centennial hoopla, the trick is to separate the man from the math

Zadra, Dan. 5: Where Will You Be Five Years from Today? 2009. Compendium, Inc.

Diversity Journal Club. The premise of this journal club is to discuss articles and blog posts about Diversity in academia. We choose the paper on Mondays and the discussion happens on Mondays at 2pm EST, every other week, under #DiversityJC.