<aside> <img src="/icons/thought_gray.svg" alt="/icons/thought_gray.svg" width="40px" /> “I deeply appreciate the independence that graduate students have when it comes to planning my time and leading my own research projects! It feels liberating to express my creativity and ideas in my work and I feel as though I can learn at my own pace (which is different from undergrad!). One challenge that I find myself struggling with is that many aspects of conducting research in this independent way are shrouded in some level of uncertainty. I often question whether or not I’m doing the “right” thing and I guess the challenge is that no one has the answer! I suppose this is a process that I need to become more comfortable with and try my best to learn from others on how to be more confident in my work all while staying open to feedback and constructive criticism.” — Elaine Wang, 1st Year Ph.D. candidate in developmental psychology at Yale University
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<aside> <img src="/icons/thought_gray.svg" alt="/icons/thought_gray.svg" width="40px" /> “My favourite thing about my current role is the variety that I have in the projects I’m working on. After spending 5 years on my dissertation research, it’s been a really fun and exciting change to have completely different projects on the go at once. Another aspect I’ve (mostly) enjoyed is the faster pace and quicker impact of my research in my current role. However, having to work quickly can come with some downsides too. Academia gave me the freedom to think deeply about a topic for a long period of time and to spend months, if not years, perfecting it. That kind of time frame is no longer available to me, meaning my standards and processes for work have had to change. This is definitely not to say that non-academic work is of low quality, but that there’s really no way of comparing the output of spending 1 week vs. 1 year on something. It’s definitely like comparing apples to oranges.” **— Jordana Schiralli, psychology specialist (2016) & Ph.D. student in social psychology (2023), now a senior research analyst at a public relations agency
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<aside> <img src="/icons/thought_gray.svg" alt="/icons/thought_gray.svg" width="40px" /> “Answering based on PhD life: My favourite and least favourite aspect of post-grad life is probably the very flexible schedule. Flexibility is obviously nice, but it makes time management hard. Another favourite aspect is the PhD community - it's especially nice to go to our weekly talk series and listen to solid presentations and excellent discussions.” **— Anonymous, psychology specialist, graduated in 2023, now a first-year psychology PhD student at UofT
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<aside> <img src="/icons/thought_gray.svg" alt="/icons/thought_gray.svg" width="40px" /> “[The best part is] the independence and freedom to set your own research agenda. [My least favourite part is] being unsure when I will be graduating as everything hinges on the progress of my research.” — Valeria Khudiakova, psychology research specialist, graduated in 2023, now a 1st-year Ph.D. candidate at the University of Birmingham
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<aside> <img src="/icons/thought_gray.svg" alt="/icons/thought_gray.svg" width="40px" /> “My favourite aspect [of post-grad life] has been the ability to clock out of work and relax with nothing hanging over my head, unlike in academia. My least favourite has been that I miss learning and the sense of community gained through being in school.”
— Anonymous, psychology research specialist, graduated in 2023, now taking a gap year
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<aside> <img src="/icons/thought_gray.svg" alt="/icons/thought_gray.svg" width="40px" /> “A lot of freedom to make your own decisions, go at your own pace, etc. That is both the favourite and sometimes most difficult aspect.”
— Mishel Alexandrovsky, psychology research specialist, graduated in 2023, now a 1st-year Ph.D. candidate at UofT
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<aside> <img src="/icons/thought_gray.svg" alt="/icons/thought_gray.svg" width="40px" /> “I spent a year after my undergraduate degree as a lab manager, as a preparation for my PhD application. I think the best part of this year-long experience was that this was the opportunity to strengthen my research and management skills, which are both critical for my future career in academia. During that year, I was given a lot of opportunities to conduct multiple research projects as well as opportunities to develop soft skills, such as leading a project and managing and communicating with research assistants. However, I sometimes miss being a student because the life of a student is more structured, in the sense that there are clear deadlines, goals, and objective evaluations, so I initially found it a bit challenging to know if my performance is satisfactory without this structured feedback.”
— Tim Chao, psychology research specialist, graduated in 2022, now a 1st year PhD student at University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign
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