B4: Develop industry and sector awareness

Introduction

If you have been working in research and academia for most of your working life, you may not be aware of the many other sectors that would value and benefit from your skills and experience. To make an informed career choice (and provide insights when you are applying for jobs) you should enhance your awareness of:

· what other industries and sectors are out there
· what they offer in terms of employment
· the positive and negative influences on their success as an organisation (commercial awareness)
· how they recruit, and whether they specifically aim to recruit researchers and holders of doctorates

Activities

Increase your awareness of employment sectors & non-academic employers (Office document, 15kB)‌

Case study quotes

Many researchers have only a limited vision of what the private sector entails, so, get to know it, even if you won't end up there. Science is based on facts and experiments. Use the same rigour and do your homework: get information from contrasting people and sources so you will be entitled to judge the private sector. It can be a great career path too! Jean Baptiste Rouquier, Data Scientist. Vitae Career Stories

My colleagues are incredibly well informed and well intentioned. Their genuine desire is to make technology that make people’s lives better. I personally am not that surprised by this, but I know my former classmates and supervisors would be. Sam Ladner, Senior Researcher, Microsoft. From PhD to Life case study.

Try not to make assumptions about different sectors. For example, the private sector is not necessarily the place where you’ll get the highest salary. Many interesting, worthwhile jobs are no better paid than senior jobs in academia. Find out what opportunities really entail; look past the stereotypes. David Viner, Climate Change Advisor. Vitae Career Stories

Further resources and reading

· Jobs.ac.uk’s working in industry page has a series of blogs about moving from research and academic in to a verity of different sectors

· The University of Exeter’s Career Zone has a large list of sectors including useful links to podcasts, videos, professional bodies and relevant recruitment sites.

· All About Careers has a bank of information on a range of sectors, including general information as well as some truths and myth-busting.

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