Hm. What next? Part IV

I've let this train of thought sit idle far too long, especially since graduation is getting closer rather than further away (I hope). It's been a solid 6 months since I last posted on this topic, though I swear it hasn't been that long since I've thought about it. I've been thinking about it all along, but within the past 6 months I've gone from fairly sure about what I want to um, considerably less sure. What I thought I'd ultimately like to do 6 months ago is still applicable - I still think that sounds like a great job/career. However I'm not as heart-set on doing that and only that now, and what's really unclear is what might be the best professional route to get there (or somewhere) taking all aspects of my life into consideration.

To recap, I've talked about why I don't want to be an academic, what I want in a job, and what some viable options are for me. For the sake of argument, let's talk about doing a post-doc, because that's what I think I'm still fairly likely to do next (ignoring currently unknown other substantial variables). And because my advisor recently sent me a fairly out-of-nowhere email saying that she and one of my collaborators think that Oxford Prof is my best option. (Side comment, I have no idea when or why this conversation took place, or what sort of contribution my collaborator made as he is not a mass spectrometrist.) Also because I've been thinking that this blog hasn't had enough serious science/graduate school/career content lately.

Ok. Confession time. My biggest reason for wanting to do a post-doc is for the opportunity to live somewhere neat and different fairly short-term and travel new places while there. I'll admit that a post-doc is a handy cover story for I-don't-know-what-I-want-to-do, but I'm not necessarily opposed to getting a "real job" after graduation. I figure that while I'm still able (i.e. don't have family obligations to require moving somewhere specific), I want to travel. Until recently, most of my post-doc searching thoughts (granted, still vague at this point) have been focused overseas. Mostly Europe and Australia, since the only languages I speak are English and French.

A friend recently asked me if I didn't like graduate school any more, would I really be any happier in a post-doc? It's true that I'm really quite tired and fed up with research, but I think a post-doc has a few things going for it that could make it better than grad school. I could be wrong, but here's my reasoning. I've been working on my dissertation research for three and a half years now, and in the scheme of things, it's relatively recently that I've lost interest (and partly due to some disagreement with my advisor as to what "sub-projects" I should be working on). Whereas a PhD in chemistry takes 5+ years (4 if you hit the right combination of luck and no social life), a post-doc is generally only about 2 years. It would be a shorter length of time with a new project in (ideally) a different area of research. Aside from a new project, I'd also be in a new geographic location with new people. Perhaps the biggest plus is that I don't have to get a dissertation out of a post-doc. Ideally a couple of papers, but no 300+ page cohesive document.

I will eventually blog about what I think would be a great job/career is (for me), but for now, let's say that a post-doc would be a very smart, if not necessary, step towards that. At least to do it the way I'd like to do it. I'd need to be familiar with as wide a variety as possible of instrumentation and samples, and a post-doc in a mass spec group where I'd work on something besides protein complexes with something besides Q-ToF instruments would be a good way to develop a broader background, with expertise in another area of mass spec.

Unfortunately Oxford Prof - the option that The Queen (and apparently one of my collaborators) thinks is the best option - is in a very, very similar area of mass spectrometry. Last year and this year there are people from her group as well as "alums" from her group presenting in my session as ASMS. While I do think I'd still learn something, I think this professor would be a great advisor, and I could totally live in Oxford, England for a couple years (!), I can't help but think it's far too similar to what I do now to be the best preparation for job-after-post-doc. I've pointed out this problem multiple times to my advisor, and she really insists that this professor is so well respected and her group does such great work that that wouldn't matter and that I couldn't possibly go wrong working for Oxford Prof. Last year she seemed excited that I was interested in working in her lab, and said to let her know when I'm about a year away from graduation so we can talk about fellowships... That's all good and exciting, I just don't know that it would be the best move professionally.

The other European ideas The Queen has had are outside of Paris and Lausanne, Switzerland. Both of these labs do very different work from what I currently do. I'd love to live in France again, and it would be great to be able to see my host family regularly. Lausanne is also close enough to Lyon that I could see my host family often. And Lausanne as well as Paris (obviously) are French-speaking areas, so communication would be ok, though I'm sure it would be a rough few weeks to get back to functioning in French and a rough couple months to get to the point of doing science in French. The professor outside of Paris is somebody other people in my group have collaborated with - I have one labmate who would have absolutely considered post-doc-ing with her if she didn't have a husband and plans for a baby, and one labmate who had an absolutely wretched time doing a semester-long "study abroad" type program there. I think a lot of the wretched-ness wouldn't be a problem because I'd live there long term - get my own flat and such, and I'm much more familiar with living in French, but Parisians really do have a reputation for being much less friendly (to put it mildly) than the Lyonnais. I really don't know anything about Lausanne. Both of these professors are super busy and have administrative positions, so I wouldn't really get any more advising/interaction with them than I currently do with my department-chair-advisor. That would be a bummer (Oxford Prof's lack of administrative/teaching responsibility are a big part of why The Queen thinks she's such a great option), but both professors would appreciate that I can clearly function and carry out research without my guidance or supervision on their part.

There are a couple of professors in Australia that I've thought about too, and Scandinavia and Germany are also places where I could easily get by with English (at least professionally, and I could learn enough of another language to not look like an @$$hole outside of work). There are certainly options domestically as well - research/advisor-personality-wise the most appealing possibility I currently know of is at Purdue...but I really don't know that I want to live in West Lafayette, IN. :/ I'm pretty sure it's nicknamed PurDon't for a reason...

Anyways, there are several viable options without actually researching the post-doc route in earnest. I can certainly find a job, and probably one that I'd like, without a post-doc, but I do think it's probably the best next step.