There are some benefits on working in academia such not having to work long hours, meeting genuine good people, possibly discover groundbreaking medicine or therapies, and of course the flexible work schedule; however, I find this career path not for me. We can agree that there's pros and cons to everything. The industry sounds like a more lucrative career path to take, despite the fact it can be extremely stressful at times. There's almost job security in regulatory affairs and quality control management, so in my opinion the industry side is a no brainer. Everyone is different and everyone know which career path would work out best for them. I strongly urge every student to thoroughly do their research on both fields and possibly look up internships in them to see if this is the right career path for them.
@amandaally1029 This is a great perspective to have if you have prior experiences in both the academia vs the industry. Now mainly most of the working experiences I have had is mainly in the academia arena and I don't really know that other side of the fence in the industry side. I think it's great to have experience in both areas and I hope to be one as well to know who's been on both sides of the coin. However, with that being said I really think this decision is based off personal background and personal choice. Whatever is suited best for that individual will ultimately decide that. If you value your time more then you may want to choose a career in the academia vs industry, or if you care more about being financially successful you may want to pick a career more in the industry field.
@amandaally1029 This is a great perspective to have if you have prior experiences in both the academia vs the industry. Now mainly most of the working experiences I have had is mainly in the academia arena and I don't really know that other side of the fence in the industry side. I think it's great to have experience in both areas and I hope to be one as well to know who's been on both sides of the coin. However, with that being said I really think this decision is based off personal background and personal choice. Whatever is suited best for that individual will ultimately decide that. If you value your time more then you may want to choose a career in the academia vs industry, or if you care more about being financially successful you may want to pick a career more in the industry field.
@amandaally1029 This is a great perspective to have if you have prior experiences in both the academia vs the industry. Now mainly most of the working experiences I have had is mainly in the academia arena and I don't really know that other side of the fence in the industry side. I think it's great to have experience in both areas and I hope to be one as well to know who's been on both sides of the coin. However, with that being said I really think this decision is based off personal background and personal choice. Whatever is suited best for that individual will ultimately decide that. If you value your time more then you may want to choose a career in the academia vs industry, or if you care more about being financially successful you may want to pick a career more in the industry field.
Both Academia and Industry roles in life science have their merits. While they are oftentimes seen as different sides of the same coin, they do not have to be so mutually exclusive. It is not hard, for example, to imagine an adjunct or associate professor that holds a position in a biotechnology startup or established company. To address the topic directly, Academia offers the benefit of having more control over the finer aspects of both your schedule and the research. Professors have the benefit of choosing what they would like to delve into research-wise, and are afforded the opportunity to thoroughly craft their "passion project" so to speak. Industry jobs are more obligatory and directed toward customer outcomes. Often times within a biotechnology startup or established pharmaceutical company, you work a schedule that has been decided by upper management on occupational duties, as opposed to "passion projects". Although, industry jobs are both prolific in availability and the monetary compensation for your work is valued higher than in academic research. In other words, the pay is generally higher in industry science positions. This is another contrasting but important feature between these two sides. Moving up in industry is a more concrete phenomenon than in academia, which is not entirely merit based. It instead relies on a number of factors, from university standing, professorship status, number of publications, and allotment of funding.
The debate between academia and industry is honestly just centered around preference. I believe an advantage of academia over industry is that the work done is focused on discovery allowing for intellectual freedom. Furthermore, there is a lot of flexibility given you can choose when to teach, conduct research, and/or publish work. Conversely, pursuing life in industry is typically motivated by total compensation and exposure to other areas of specialty which people may be more interested in such as regulatory affairs, marketing, quality assurance, and project management.
Academia and industry both have their own sets of benefits and present different work environments. In academia, the work is typically much more research-oriented and allows one to directly contribute to the field of biomedical engineering. Academia also opens up the opportunity to release publications and travel to different conferences to give presentations on your research. Additionally, if the individual is leading their own lab, they can determine the types of projects and the specific research field for those projects. With academia, the typical saying is that one has to love research in order to go into it. Going into industry, some pros may include higher pay as well as the work being potentially less chaotic as in academia, an individual may be involved with many more projects than in industry. The projects in academia may be different than in industry as the parameters in academia may be "looser" since the next steps in the research project may depend on previous results, whereas in industry a project may have more defined tasks to complete. Additionally, if one does not necessarily love pure research, they could work in different functions within industry, such as project management, quality, regulatory, or manufacturing.
What is the best career choice after finishing your postgraduate degree – ‘industry’ or ‘academia?'” It is really important to understand the differences between both career choices because the context of work changes when you pick one or the other option. It is very important to make your decision on basis of your interests, skills, qualifications and personality. In Industry, your work responsibilities are based primarily on supply and demand. Whatever product is in demand, in all probability your project will be focused on that specific product development. Which also means that there will be clear direction of work without you wasting time on things which might be uncertain to work. This is the best case scenario if your personal project interests are aligned with the company’s interests. In most situations, however, your work will be controlled by higher authorities. While for some of us, finance plays a big role in deciding our career, but for others, the decision could be purely based on what you enjoy doing. In general, the salaries in industry are 1.5 to 2 times higher compared to academia. While the world is brighter on industry side, you don’t even want to know about how much graduate students and postdocs earn. While you may want to buy a house or start a family, in your late 20’s and early 30’s, but these things may seem far-fetched in your early academic career years. In academic, maintaining employee satisfaction is bit more reachable. This can be a hard earned task in industry given the cost of bringing on a new hire is so high. In Industry, most research jobs are structured and standardized to coincide with the company’s management. There may be more time for you to contribute to many projects, but the instructions/ideas may be coming from a different team guiding which goals are best the company’s progress and not your personal research interests. In academia, on the other hand, the scope of your responsibilities would be much broader, and entrepreneurial. You will find yourself applying for grants, mentoring your students, publishing your research, looking over your finances, and at some places you will be responsible for teaching students, as well. If you are able to attain a tenure position, you are pretty much guaranteed a job, which can be a struggle in industry if you unable to reach the goals set with your company for that particular year. Academia also gives you the liberty of finding your own boss, whereas industry doesn’t. If you like to work at your pace or you are a family person , then academia is the way to go. In most cases, you don’t have to stick to work hours and you are able to make your own work schedule and hence work environment in your lab. You may have grant and manuscript revision deadlines, but they can’t be compared with rigorous quarterly deadlines or monthly reports in an industry. The speed at which these two sectors performs are also very contrasting, where academia focuses on long-term education and learning goals and is free short term deadlines, industry is fast paced where most of work is done on quick timeline driven by product development goals. If you are deciding which career path to choose, first understand what kind of personality you have and what your life priorities are, it is important to know your strengths, and which place they can be more effectively applied. It is also important to be open minded and keep your options open, especially now when industry is collaborating with academia to conduct research, it has become little smoother to transition between the sectors.
Dr. Simon touched on this comparison in this week’s lectures. Academia can have positives if you are looking to do a lot of research and traveling with your profession. It also can’t hurt if you have any passions for teaching. A lot of academia is about securing grants to continue your research and projects, so it involves a lot of writing as well. Being a part of academia also opens you to connections with people all across the academic scope, who may provide invaluable connections later on. Academia gives you the opportunity to be a tenured professor, which ensures your job and gives you a lot more freedom of work schedule. Industry, however, does not offer a tenure option but often presents the opportunity to earn more money. A career in industry is very results-oriented and involves developing products that have immediate, practical applications. You often have a pretty structured career path where you can “climb the corporate ladder” if that is what you want to do. Personally, I’d prefer a job in industry because I want to work on products that will be or already are introduced to the market to incite real change. I like the idea of making more money in industry as well, even though there is no chance for tenure. Growing up, I always said I wanted to have a job that helps people, and in industry I can develop products that have real affects on people all around the world.
