Women in Physics: Career Guidance for PhDs

[Locrian]

Also for example I am friends with several biology and chemistry post-docs who have had a very hard time finding work over the past 10 years,

Those aren't "professional careers" (see your quote).

 

[elkement]

Hi 123PleasentSt,

Any women out there with a PhD in physics?

I am and I had finally decided against an academic career and turned to IT. Now I run a small company together with my husband whom I met during my undergraduate studies (we also worked towards our PhDs at the same university institute).

Our decision was based on the uncertainty of concatenated postdoc contracts and working in different countries.

There is one caveat I want to mention: In addition to artists already mentioned in the thread more and more classical corporate jobs are turned to 'global working nomad jobs'. At least in IT it is not uncommon now to be employed by a large corporation, but nonetheless being 'based' in your 'home office' or travel the globe all the time.
Some time ago IBM has e.g. publicly announced they consider to lay off the majority of their global services staff and hire them again as self-employed contractors.

Of course this is paid much better that postdocing or creative jobs, but I feel that corporations try to utilize all the benefits of the global competition among potential contractors.

I do not feel that this is 'women's problem', as I see an increasing number of young male colleagues who opt for paternity leave, 'follow their wife', and rather ask an employer for flexible work options than for classical career opportunities. But this might be a European thing.

 

[ParticleGrl]

I do not feel that this is 'women's problem', as I see an increasing number of young male colleagues who opt for paternity leave, 'follow their wife', and rather ask an employer for flexible work options than for classical career opportunities. But this might be a European thing.

Almost certainly a Europe thing, in the US there is no protected maternity leave, let alone paternity leave! The problem in a lot of US postdocs is without protected maternity leave, if you have a difficult pregnancy you can miss too much work- even if you go back to work immediately after giving birth.

 

[George Jones]

Almost certainly a Europe thing, in the US there is no protected maternity leave, let alone paternity leave! The problem in a lot of US postdocs is without protected maternity leave, if you have a difficult pregnancy you can miss too much work- even if you go back to work immediately after giving birth.

Maternity leave, at least, seems to be is more of a non-US thing than a Europe thing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parental_leave

In Canada, we get a year of combined parental leave.

 

[123PleasentSt]

Thanks elkement. I've never really heard of any men personally who asked their work a few days off for a baby, but at the same time I don't have any older friends who have completed college and starting families. So I couldn't comment if it's really a Euro thing or not. But it's an interesting thought of not only a woman with a PhD in physics, but also from overseas. Thank you again
As for IT... ah man... my family is big in it. My mother has been in IT for almost 20 years. my grandfather has been in for even longer than that. I think since the 70's. Nobody in my family has had to travel, but they LOVE working from home! Haha.. I've never worked for IT, but I've heard the ups and downs of being a contractor. I think my mom prefers to be a contractor because she's never asked her current employer to make her into an official staff member, yet they've been renewing her contract for years. I know gpa does because he went out of his way to make his own company so he can contract HIMSELF lol. I think it's a personal preference whether someone wants to be a contractor or a full staff member.

 

[123PleasentSt]

George Jones, thanks for the link. I thought the maternal leave issue was quite common, but now I know it's my country vs. the rest of the world.
Wow.

 

[Zarqon]

I've never really heard of any men personally who asked their work a few days off for a baby,

Just a small offtopic note first. In Sweden where I live, many men (in fact almost everyone of my male friends) take paternity leave. This is because out of the total pool of p/maternity days, some number of days can only be used by the father, so they might as well be take them, it's free time off so to speak.

More on topic, I agree that one of the major roadblocks for more women in physics is making the funding systems more forgiving to time off, but it's most likely not the whole story. One can just looked at the differences between science fields, for example between chemistry and physics, where the female ratio is different, but where the funding style is somewhat similar. The different ratios there probably have a lot to do with the fact that men and women simply have different interests (on average). With this in mind, for the women who are interested in physics, it should not (and probably is not) harder to do physics than any other science.

 

[123PleasentSt]

Thanks Zarqon. I'm wondering if it's better to be a working woman anywhere else than my own country, just by the leave differences alone. I can't say whether if different fields of science are harder on women, but I agree it shouldn't if the women have a true passion in their work...kids or not. I mean, having kids is going to make everything harder, but I can't see why a specific field over another for women if they added kids in.

 

[123PleasentSt]

For the non-US members who have already applied, is finding the right time to have kids a problem for women (or men)? Is egg freezing a hot topic in your countries? What do you think Is the average age that people start families?

 

[Locrian]

Thanks Zarqon. I'm wondering if it's better to be a working woman anywhere else than my own country, just by the leave differences alone.

To be a working woman? Doubt it.

To raise a family? Maybe in the very early years. There’s a lot more to being a parent than maternity/paternity leave. There are countries out there that make starting a family easier, but their young adult unemployment rates are much higher. Of course, that unemployment is demographically concentrated.

In any case, there are opportunities for the best of both worlds, both in the US and abroad. Lots of US companies have maternity and paternity leave. The one I work at now has both, and the majority of other companies I could work at have at least maternity leave as well.

There’s been threads similar to these before, with similar posters. I think the concerns about having a scientific career conflict with starting a family are valid, but I worry that generalizing the crappy treatment workers get in the sciences to the rest of the economy could lead to poor decision making.

 

[123PleasentSt]

Lots of US companies have maternity and paternity leave. The one I work at now has both, and the majority of other companies I could work at have at least maternity leave as well.
UK
[/QUOTE]

But is the leave paid?

 

[Locrian]

Yes.

 

[123PleasentSt]

Yes.

Awesome.

 

[Rika]

For the non-US members who have already applied, is finding the right time to have kids a problem for women (or men)? Is egg freezing a hot topic in your countries? What do you think Is the average age that people start families?

In my country people starts families around being 30-35 years old. Egg freezing is non existent topic.

 

[Locrian]

Yes.

Sorry, this wasn't correct for all the companies I had in mind. A better response would have been "mostly". It didn't change my point of view much, but I don't like being wrong and making generalizations is a great way to be just that.

I'm not a woman, so you didn't ask my opinion, but I have a terrible habit of giving it anyways. Here's how I see things, given what you've said in this thread:

If you leave physics,

1) On the one hand, you may increase your chance of being a parent, which is for many (but not all) a truly amazing part of the human experience.

2) But on the other, you'll miss out on working for poverty level wages for 5 - 7 years getting your PhD and then near poverty level wages for 4 - 6 years in your postdoc before you maybe get your first full time job in physics that follows you home every night. Then you work brutal hours for a few years while you scramble for a tenure track job. And maybe you even get one!

Leaving physics: a win/win!

Full disclosure: I stopped at a Masters for exactly these kinds of reasons and am now a father with a job outside the field. I'm biased, and proud of it. Hopefully someone equally biased another direction will post as well.

 

[123PleasentSt]

Thanks for your advice, LocrIan. Obviously a PhD wasn't meant for you but congratulations on being a father. It is also stressed that the people who want to go into that stuff better have a serious passion for their work and tongue-In-cheek knowledge of what they want to put themselves through, in order to make the years of poverty worth it to them. We probably know some people who had extreme passion, determination, and dedication that were not willing to leave their interests because they were not makIng the money they would have lIke to make fast enough. If my uncle did do that, he wouldn't be a doctor today... he was seriously poor for a long time ... Different strokes. But I definitely agree on point 1... some people are not meant (and shouldn't) have and raise children. But there are people with their phd degrees and living happy careers as physicists, right ? And making a decent salary for themselves. So I guess it's the mind of the individual (with some luck on hand).
I'm not really sure if anyone is going to vehemently argue against you on your self-proclaImed extremely biased opinion, because you made a notice that your mind is already made up about this.

 

[Locrian]

When I've run the numbers, the net present value of becoming a doctor (in the US) is very good. Much higher than physics.

The whole long poor road to getting a great job with a good paycheck doesn't seem to bother many people. But the long poor road to starting over seems to bother a lot of people.

 

[123PleasentSt]

You're right about the doctor, but I also was not implying at all that a physics degree has similar weight to a medical phd. I'm not sure if you knew where I was trying to go with that, but I think we can safely assume that everyone knows the general salary of a doctor - quite comfortable . I was trying to exemplify that people take poor roads anyways to get a great job. ObvIously, not everyone can get their dream job and true that people tend to be or sound bitter about it. But people still seem to eventually manage and find happiness sometime after being coerced to start over.

 

[ParticleGrl]

My sincere advice is as early as feasible, start thinking about what exactly you want. Is having a spouse and a family something you want? Or is career more important? Do you want to pick the city you live in? Do you want stability? How much more important is scientific/research work than engineering work?

Revisit these questions as you get older, and use them to guide your career choice. And seek mentors to have these sorts of discussions with face-to-face.

 

[123PleasentSt]

Thank you again ParticleGrl :), you have been some good help.

 

[elkement]

The most important lesson I learned was probably how much more it matters to me 'how I work' in contrast to 'the subject' I work on. Sounds trivial, but it took me many years to find out. Actually, I became aware of this when I turned down an offer to enter academia again after having spent years in IT already.
I second ParticleGrl - I would try to talk to mentors face-to-face, avoiding to learn anything on your own the hard way.

Once I thought I need to work in R&D / academia to 'do real physics', but later I discovered that I need to work as independently as possible. This ruled out both academia and being employed at (or being a long-term full-time contractor at) large corporations.
Now I am trying to combine both in a sense as a self-employed consulting engineer and it's important to me to share the consultancy business with my husband.

As Locrian, I am totally biased and this my personal preference only.