Thursday, May 7, 2015

From Trolley Problems to Transactional Databases: My Move from Academia to Business

This post was originally written for use at VersatilePhdD.com with help from the founder of Versatile PhD, Paula Chambers.  Versatile PhD is a site devoted to helping graduate students and PhDs transition to non-academic careers and to be successful in them.  The site provides a community of support, job postings, and transition success stories, among other resources for those thinking about such a transition.

Below is an edited version of my own success story.  Enjoy!

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            Early in the spring of 2011, my first year of a two year MA program, I began to have serious doubts about entering into a teaching career and continuing on into a PhD program in Philosophy.  I became more aware of the job market and what lay ahead of me if I wished to continue studying philosophy at the professional level.  Faced with the prospect of many years of graduate study, followed by a long struggle to find a tenure-track position with little financial incentive, even at the peak of my career, I began to doubt whether this was the right path for my career to take.
I started to discuss my situation with professors and classmates.  Fortunately, the professors I talked with were understanding and sympathetic.  They affirmed that my concerns were legitimate and discussed their own experiences of struggle in obtaining secure teaching positions, the pressure to publish, the challenge of teaching unmotivated students, leftover debt, and the lack of choice of where to live.  Why then did they continue to teach?  Simply put, my professors were so passionate about philosophy that they could not imagine doing anything else.  They would sacrifice money, drive long distances to teach, and move away from friends and family, all so that they could continue to study and teach philosophy for a living.  In other words, doing philosophy was their highest priority.  Like my professors, many of my classmates felt the same way.  I recall that one of my classmate’s idea of taking a break from writing a metaphysics paper was to read an epistemology book.  He, like many others, could not get enough philosophy and didn’t want to do anything else.
Given the sacrifices and choices I would have to make, I realized that, unless I was also passionate about and fully committed to studying and teaching philosophy, I should not do it professionally.  That is, unless I could not conceive of doing anything else as a career besides philosophy, I should choose to do something else.  If I could conceive of alternatives, it was probably better for me to pursue those.  Consequently, later that spring, I chose to stop looking into prospective PhD programs and began to look into alternative career paths. 
Generally, my professors and classmates were supportive of my decision to not apply for PhD programs and to pursue other options.  Some professors were a little disappointed as they recognized that I could have placed well and been successful.  And some classmates, when I voiced my reasons for not continuing on to the PhD level, pushed back and tried to persuade me to stick with philosophy.  Nevertheless, I mostly received support for my decision as the best decision for me.  My department head even told me that his view of success for graduating MA students was not that they would necessarily go into top ranked PhD programs and teach in philosophy.  Instead, it was that each student would graduate with valuable skills in writing, reasoning, and analysis that would make him or her successful in whatever career path the student chose. Thus, I largely had support to move forward in pursuing other options.
            Having come to peace with my decision to leave academia after completing my MA, I needed an alternative career path.  But what would I do now?  Discussing my situation with a close college friend, he suggested I intern with his dad’s database consulting company, over the summer.  As I began my internship, I discovered that many technical skills were simply applied philosophy skills I had already learned.  For example, object oriented programming was simply applied logic, and SQL querying was simply applied set theory.  I had a BA in Mathematics and a logic background from my philosophy training, so the transition to learning SQL and understanding database design and technology was relatively smooth.
The internship went well and I decided to continue on in that direction.  When I returned for my second year of graduate study in philosophy, I took introductory C++ programming, advanced computer programming, and continued to read about database design, programming, and SQL querying on my own.  As such, upon graduation with my MA in spring 2012, I was immediately marketable as an entry level database administrator.
            I continued on as an intern with my previous company that summer until I could be placed on a project.  I worked on internal projects, met with prospective clients, helped my coworkers, and continued to study and develop the skills I would need for this line of work.  Meanwhile, my boss continued to look for opportunities to place me on a project.  In July 2012, one of my friend’s network connections let him know of an available contract position on his team at Microsoft.  My friend then let me know about the position and suggested I consider it and meet with the client for an interview later that day, which I did.
The interview went very well.  The client knew of me from several of my friends and had no concern about my ability to do the work.  Our commonality in having an MA in philosophy probably cemented the deal as he knew I would be able to think intelligently and creatively in dealing with the day to day work requirements.  And, thanks to my internship, classes, and independent study, I had the technical expertise to actually do the work.  In any case, I was offered the job and I accepted.
While continuing to develop my skills on the job, I enrolled in a certificate program in Data Science through the University of Washington.  Through this program I learned more about database design and administration, Business Intelligence, data mining, and predictive analytics.  Now, having graduated from the program and through my experience on the job and continued learning off the job for over a three years, I have become marketable as a database administrator, business intelligence consultant, and data scientist.  Thankfully, and in great contrast to academic teaching at the college and university level, these positions are widely available and those that can fill them are greatly in demand.  As such, I continue to consult in the Seattle area as part of a consulting firm, working in these areas of data management and data analysis.
Some specific practical advice for getting a nonacademic job.  First, you need to prepare yourself technically.  My experience, and the experience of others I know, is that in the business and technology world you don’t need a degree in something to be hired to do it.  You just need to know how to do it.  So continue your education by reading books, taking continuing education courses, doing certificate programs, and taking classes outside your degree while still doing your degree.  Tailor your independent study towards the set of skills needed for the sorts of jobs you are interested in.  And continue your studies at least until you have acquired all of these needed skills.
Second, network.  Most people I know that work in the business and technology world that don’t originally have that background are in these positions because they knew someone who knew someone else who knew someone else… who needed someone like us for a job.  A personal recommendation from an intermediary that knows both the employer and potential employee is incredibly valuable in terms of securing a position.  Talk to your parent’s friends, your friend’s parents, and your friend’s friends that work in fields you are interested in.  Learn how they got to be where they are and get to know them personally.  Ask them what you need to do to get into that field.  And ask them to keep an eye open for an opening wherever they work.  Very likely, your first nonacademic job will come from this sort of connection.

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