Two recent Ph.D. graduates, one spent 40-50 hours a week in the lab, the other spent 70-80 hours a week in the lab.  Which one is the harder worker?

On the surface, the 70-80 hour individual may be the harder worker, but they could also be inefficient and

I’m going to share a series of posts describing how I go about interviewing job candidates and I hope many of you will find this helpful for your own interview preparation.  I focus on two main areas: capability and suitability.  The capability questions

Having delivered a large number of technical presentations over my career, and sat through countless more, I wanted to share an approach to slide design that has raised my effectiveness as a presenter and that I have appreciated as an audience member.  Th

Over the years, I’ve met many scientists who have a desire to move away from the lab bench, but consistently exhibit behaviors that are destined to keep them there.  The following is an example that I use to illustrate behaviors that are likely to keep on

9 years ago, I landed my first industry job following little of the advice you may find on these discussion boards.  I was very lucky. I got my first job by responding to a job board ad for a company I had never heard of, but was developing products based

So, you’re a graduate student or postdoc looking to get a job in industry.  You’ve been told that networking is the key to this.  Problem is, networking is a two-way street.  People network with others for mutual benefit and as a student you have little t

Satisficing is a term I never heard of as a graduate researcher, but have since learned that it drives many behaviors in industry.  This term, a combination of “satisfy” and “suffice”, was introduced by Nobel laureate Herbert A. Simon in 1956 and is a dec

In industry, the risk of being late is perceived to be greater than the risk of being wrong.  In academia, the risk of being wrong is perceived to be greater than the risk of being late.

Let’s consider an example from academia first.  If a researcher publi

In previous posts on Scientific Careers in the Corporate World, I discussed the relationships between R&D staff, Program Managers, Business Developers, Product Managers, and Sales. Absent from these discussions was R&D Management – what do these individua

My last post discussed some of the opportunities that exist for scientists in industry outside of the traditional R&D function: Business Development, Program Management, Product Management, and Sales.  Because most scientists will first enter industry in

Logically, most research scientists first enter industry in a laboratory research and development (R&D) role.  From there, they may envision that they’ll one day become a lab manager and eventually work their way up the technical ladder to a Director, Vic