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11 Suggestions for Career Planning: The Machiavelli Short Course for Young Researchers The life of the researcher is concerned with publications. Although you may think that the researcher’s favorite pastime is research (offering the prospect of doing good and then talking about it), the focus on publishing has prevailed in research for a long time. The picture of the slightly fanatic but quite lovable researcher prevails in the general population, but it has nothing to do with reality. The true picture can be observed among physicians. The population of medical students at the beginning of their studies consists of a jumbled heap of average individuals, and at the end of their studies, there is a group of careerists who, after long years of arduous training, have discerned the rules of the system and now want to use the rules for their own purposes. These are the individuals who are responsible for the picture of a demigod in white, the omniscient genius who hovers through the passageways and through the entire world, who can at least explain every illness and pontificates from above to the others down below. After the completion of their medical studies, the careerists usually strive to make their career at a university clinic. The second group, the idealists, are students who have studied medicine, are able to help other people, and after many years, must recognize that they have failed with this concept. They are generally the more sympathetic of the two groups; they withdraw after completing their studies and practice in a town or village to be forgotten by the world and the system. There also are careerists to be found in the natural sciences. Because biology classically plays no role in society, the researchers have unavoidably developed their own small world: the university, with its own rules, to which publications belong as a measurable dimension of success. The system is quite clever, because it permits the recording of quantity (the number of papers) and quality (the journals in which the experimenter has published). Even the position of the name in the long list of the authors involved is included in the calculations to allow a sort of fine-tuning. Only the conversion between these two groups seems to cause problems. How many run-of-the-mill papers does it take to counterbalance a paper for Nature? Is a third-author position in a Cell paper worth more or less than two first-author publications in the Journal of Ophthalmic Turbulences? Because of the haziness of this evaluation system, the style of publishing has prevailed to allow researchers to play it safe. A doctoral thesis must be terminated with at least one publication, and dissertations are not immune to this mania, which—considering the short period in which a dissertation must be accomplished—is on the verge of perversion. Publish or perish is the battle cry. That is reasonable as long as you do not lose sight of reality. Publications in the circles not dealing with research have about as much significance as cowrie shells in a Swiss bank: quite decorative but worthless. Whoever engages in this game should not forget that it is mental masturbation at the highest level. The male peacock developed splendid plumage for this purpose. Strange also is the manner in which this ritual, involving writing a paper, is carried out. The first draft is classically written by one individual, who has carried out the work. That is good, because he or she is the only person who truly knows what occurred. The draft is then presented to his or her boss, who therefore is awarded the last position in the list of authors. The boss then reaches for a red pencil and begins to make corrections. Generally, these are so comprehensive that nothing remains from the original draft. The corrected version is then returned to the first author, who performs revisions and generates a new version, which is then presented again to the boss and again comes
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228 · 11 Career Planning back corrected. Depending on the particular boss, the number of cycles can easily be 20 or more, until a version has finally come into existence with which he or she is satisfied. It may also occur that earlier revisions are returned to the paper in the course of this process. What qualifications does the boss have in regard writing papers to be published? With what right does he or she have the audacity to determine whether an article should appear? Usually, no special education is involved, and the knowledge has been acquired through a learning-by-doing process; the boss patiently submitted himself or herself to the corrections of his or her boss until he or she became the boss. Knowledge about writing papers has been transmitted from generation to generation. It is surprising to find the rites and behaviors of nomadic civilizations once again at the forefront of modern research. This approach explains why corrections are not usually undertaken directly in the document, which would be the most economical method in the age of electronic word processing. The novice would learn how a paper is written through typing corrections in the paper. Are there criteria for the objective quality of a paper? No. The style is not evaluated. Allegedly, the assessment depends on the content so that the question of style has no place in the brain of the scientist. Paradoxically, not even intelligibility appears to be an important criterion, although every researcher becomes angry when confronted by a poorly written article that does not get the point across, because it costs him or her time. If you get angry about the absurd corrections received from your boss, consider that he or she had no more training as a scientific writer than you did. Trust yourself occasionally to quietly insist on your formulations if you find that they are better. After all, it is your paper, and your name is found first in the list of authors. In cultures whose knowledge is based on passing on information by word of mouth, the resulting tradition is highly dependent on the specific master. For that reason, careerists look at the list of publications from their future bosses before agreeing to take on a new position. How many papers has he or she written? In which journals have they been published? Important are primarily the publications of recent years, because they provide information on whether the writing style demanded by most important journals has been mastered. The right tone is decisive when striving to publish. Only those who are able to write a paper in the style of Nature will be published in Nature. The others will then have to publish their papers in third-class journals. Please do not misunderstand me. The corrections made by the boss are necessary because the scientific journals have no editors who will transform your article into a readable product. A readable product is an important aspect. You write so that other people can read your mental outpourings. If they cannot do so, you would have been able to spare yourself much work by not writing. In the universities, the idea frequently prevails, unfortunately, that researchers must demonstrate their brilliance, and that goal is achieved through writing complicated texts. This, however, is a fallacy. Explaining complicated things with simple words is clearly a greater art and considerably more difficult. A completely different danger is to forget to publish because of all of the research. A person who enjoys performing research often finds that writing a paper is a horrible experience. Consider how many interesting experiments can be done during the time wasted on writing. If you are one of these people, look for a boss who sees that you bring your work to a conclusion and then publish. It is unpleasant to be under pressure, but it is even more unpleasant to have no publications to show. If the publications are lacking, your only prospect in the search for a new place of work is to have the support of your boss. Take this into consideration the next time you start procrastinating in writing a paper. Establish a defined, final deadline. You will never be able to conduct all of the experiments that are necessary to produce an absolutely bulletproof paper. It is sufficient that the experiments were accomplished cleanly, that the results are reproducible, and that the story you want to tell is to some extent complete and coherent. The more your discovery corresponds to the mainstream, the fewer experiments you must provide to establish your evidence. Only those who want to sell a theory that goes against all of the currently valid doctrines must collect sufficient ammunition, and they will
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11 Career Planning · 229 probably fail due to technical, publication-related reasons. Because such revolutionary ideas are rare, you normally need to pay attention only to the fact that your paper has been written well. Not every detail has to be demonstrated experimentally. Instead, plan a paper, in which you can argue that it has functioned for others and that it will therefore be the case for you. Publications (and careers) can also be planned. Decisiveness is the right choice for a future boss or laboratory. • Look for a laboratory with the proper critical mass. Three-man laboratories are comfortable but relatively unproductive. Successful laboratories have a specialist for every important technique, so that an exciting project can be carried out with a minimum delay in time until everything is finally ready for publication. • Look for a laboratory that has recently published something that is current or even pioneering. In the coming years, the laboratory will be a source of well-placed publications, because the topic incites interest, and every detail of the paper will be exalted. • The combination of a laboratory with a proper critical mass and with current topics is a guarantee for success. The work is performed in an assembly-line style, in which each member always performs the same thing—the cloner does the cloning, which the expresser carefully expresses— and the boss sees to it that each member of the group receives one first-author publication and a heap of second- and third-author listings in fairly well-known journals. • It is best if the boss belongs to the right group. Usually, these people do not represent the embodiment of sympathy, but they know what they want—to increase their fame—and if an experimenter follows their rules and is consequently useful to them, he or she will be considered positively in exchange. The best positions in life are always distributed among friends and protégés, a procedure known as networking. Free yourself from the prejudice that such an exchange is morally reprehensible; otherwise, only others will profit from it. If you find that the previous passage is not particularly to your taste, consider the fact that it also functions without a university! In the universities associated with this field, a certain amount of arrogance frequently develops, an attitude that is similarly popular among teachers. The individuals with the true ideals of the trade work at the universities while the others follow the orders of filthy lucre mongers. The company representatives who pay a visit to these laboratories frequently handle these simple candidates for a degree quite condescendingly. You may therefore be happy to forget that the driving motivation at the university is rarely scientific curiosity. The research is left to the lower associates, especially the post-doctorates, and tactic, calculation, and professional relationships are more decisive for the progress than any pioneering knowledge. The one-sidedness of the work is usually at least as great as that in the industry, because a researcher frequently cannot perform only one specialty; an electrophysiologist is and remains primarily an electrophysiologist but must also commit himself or herself to a particular field of research if he or she wants to become known. It is therefore not unusual that a renowned or wellknown researcher has spent 20 years studying the function of a small subunit in the ribosome of some specific fungus. Between the 30th and the 40th year of life, the masters undergo a rapid crisis of conscience, because they finally understand the rules in this phase of the game and ultimately reject them. Meanwhile, their careers are in a rut, the scarcity of money causes increasing pressure, and the situation appears to be hopeless. Do not allow it to go this far. Listen to your conscience sooner. Are you truly driven by scientific curiosity, by the delight in detail, by the feeling that you must find the answer to a problem? Are you convinced that your work is important for you and for the world? Are you certain that you will not stray from the path on your way to discovering this knowledge, but rather that your understanding of the world is continuously becoming larger? Is this feeling strong enough to compensate for the frustrations and the small salary? So strong that it will urge you onward even if you one day have to spend more time at your desk and in meetings than at the laboratory bench? Do you believe in what
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230 · 11 Career Planning you are doing? If so, you are in the right place in university research. The world needs you, and it needs you there. Have you instead experienced some doubt while reading the previous paragraph? Are you willing to work on every topic as long as the surroundings are suitable? Are you where you currently work because it is a mandatory step in your career, and you see no real alternative? Are you currently active in being conferred your doctor’s degree because you will otherwise have no prospect of obtaining a job? Are you happy with your job because you can maintain that feeling of freedom you had enjoyed so much during your studies for a couple of years longer? If so, you have got the wrong idea. Enjoy your time but begin to prepare for your arrival in a new harbor. The world outside of the university is large and that outside of research is even larger. Assume for the fun of it that you have no conception of how many possibilities there are for you. If you have come to favor these thoughts, progress with your search. Ask around, be a little inquisitive, and follow a new direction. Do not ask the people associated with you in your area of the university; if they knew what there was in the outside world, they would long since have disappeared. Make yourself a new circle of friends outside of the university, and talk with these people to find out what kind of wisdom they have to offer. Go through your city with your eyes wide open and make your thoughts about what you see. Run through a park. The plants were planted by gardeners, but who did the planning? Who worries about the questions dealing with nature in such a city? There is a fountain around the corner. Where does the water come from? Where does it go afterward? Who takes care of this? Does the water flow directly from the waterworks to the sewage treatment plant, or is the water recycled? How is the water quality maintained? Could it be performed microbiologically? Is not all of this microbiology? Do they need people with my expertise? On the street, there is a carton full of plastic chips, as used in the delivery of machines. These are now also available from natural materials, environmentally friendly and decomposing. Where are they produced? What kind of staff members does their manufacture require? Could I work for such a company? With a little practice, you will come to the most original of questions, and some of them will stimulate your thoughts. You must invest some time, inform yourself, make inquiries of the responsible individuals, and initiate more actions. Do not do this with the goal of being offered a job at the first door where you knock, because that will certainly not be the case. However, in the course of time, you will get a clearer picture of what you find to be interesting and what you do not. The more precisely that you know what you want, the sooner you will get it. In this way, you will come into contact with the most varied of individuals and learn how you can best “sell” yourself. An important difference between working in the university and industry is that you primarily appear at the university as a petitioner (Please, please may I perform my dissertation under your auspices?), whereas you become more interesting for industry when you have some additional value to offer. In your exploratory travels, you will recognize which of these are more or less attractive in regard to your abilities. You naturally have a considerable amount of specialist knowledge, but that will probably be of only moderate interest. During your studies, you have also acquired other qualities, such as analytic thinking and the ability to acquire knowledge on your own. Such capabilities are more interesting over the long term, because they can be made use of in varied situations. You also have inherent qualities, such as your perseverance at work and perhaps your flare for creativity, which makes you a good problem solver. Learn to recognize which of your capabilities will be interesting to others, and attempt to expand on these. Do not forget that the goal is not to find a secure job that is as well paid as possible. This attitude is quite common, although it is more suitable for the born loser. A winner has a product—his or her good performance and impressive capabilities—and consequently expects to receive services in return, such as good pay, a pleasant working environment, an exciting task, or interesting possibilities for further developments. The job should not be an ejector seat, but a reliable position up to early retirement cannot be the goal of anyone who wants to develop himself or herself. Who wants to perform the same work for years on end? A perspective of 3 to 5 years is generally adequate, because it is impossible to plan beyond that.
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11 Career Planning · 231 Free yourself from the concept that the employees are the victims and the employer is the perpetrator. A good enterprise needs good staff members and must consider their needs and wishes to keep them, or the staff members will travel on, and the organization will go from a good enterprise to a bad one. This principle presupposes that the staff members (and therefore you) will travel onward if they consider that they have been handled poorly, instead of only lamenting and remaining in the position where they have been. You will primarily have to lament and persevere if you have not provided yourself with an alternative in time. Do not concentrate only on your specialty, even if it appears to be very attractive temporarily. Create a broad, solid basis, and obtain an overview of other fields. In this way, opportunities will arise that you cannot currently envision. More knowledge is helpful; attain knowledge in medicine, in engineering, in geology, or in any other area that interests you. Knowledge in the field of economics is always helpful, because you will most likely be confronted with the world of money at some later time. The world of money is subject to its own laws, although it has an advantage in that it has been created by men and women and is consequently relatively simple. Economics is not particularly complex. In contrast to the way in which the economists view themselves, economics is not really a science, but rather an attempt to understand why people do what they do, with the futile hope of trying to extrapolate what people will do tomorrow, although they did something completely different yesterday. Common sense and some diligence are sufficient to get a grasp of this field, which is why there are quite a number of natural scientists found in the field of economy, but extremely few economists found in the field of the natural sciences. In the field of economics, there are many interesting opportunities at all price levels to obtain further education, from the lectures offered by the faculties of universities involved with economics to programs leading to a master’s degree in business administration (MBA) from a renowned private school. The most expensive path is not necessarily the best; if you do not want to become a chairman of the board for the Nestle company, you do not have to obtain a Harvard degree. Remember, a straight line is always the shortest path between two points, but not always the fastest! I offer a final tip. If you find yourself in one of these low points, do not forget that the world is also full of individuals like you. You may be told that only the best have a chance, but that is not correct. Whatever clever people concoct on this planet, they must undertake its transformation with the aid of all individuals. You must find a place where associates are glad to see you and be able to live in peace with yourself and with others. And that is definitely not an impossible situation!
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