Session E43: How to Get a Job: Expanding Career Perspectives for Physicists

Beyond the Rose-Colored Binoculars: How to Launch a Successful Physics Career in the 21st Century

Physics degree holders are among the most employable in the world, often doing everything from managing a research lab at a multi-million dollar corporation, to developing solutions to global problems in their own small startups. Employers know that with a physics training, a potential hire has acquired a broad problem-solving skill set that translates to almost any environment, as well as an ability to be self-guided and -motivated so that they can learn whatever skills are needed to successfully achieve their goals. Therefore it's no surprise that the majority of physics graduates find employment in private sector, industrial settings. Yet at the same time, only about 25% of graduating PhDs will take a permanent faculty position--yet academic careers are usually the only track to which students are exposed while earning their degrees.

In this talk, I will explore less-familiar (but more common!) career paths for physics graduates, and provide resources to help faculty mentors give their students better information and training for a broader scope of career possibilities.   

A Physicist’s Engineering Career in a Federal Research Laboratory

How does a condensed matter physicist transform into a radar engineer in a federal laboratory, and why would he or she want to make such a career change? I will describe my decidedly non-ballistic career trajectory and discuss how I have leveraged a physics education as an engineer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a NASA-supported federal research center. I will also describe how federal laboratories offer an intermediate career path between academics and industry, and what tradeoffs one chooses by pursuing this path. Finally, I will share my perspective on critical non-physics skills, especially communication, project management, and discipline flexibility, that students should develop for success in any professional endeavor.   

Balance in research, teaching, service and life at a primarily undergraduate institution

As an undergraduate physics major I wanted to become a physics professor when I grew up where I would do pure physics research…oh, and teach a little too. Some postdocs later I reached my goal but with a slight caveat: I ended up a physics professor at a primarily undergraduate institution (PUI). A PUI is a 2-year or 4-year university or college generally without any Ph.D. granting graduate programs. Needless to say, PUIs are many and widely varied. They are perhaps better defined by what they are not—they are not so-called R1 (or Research 1) universities which commonly are large research universities with many Ph.D. granting graduate programs. It turns out that I am now doing very nearly what I originally hoped and imagined I would be doing those years ago as an undergraduate. In this talk I will describe the highs and lows of an academic position at a PUI, how it can be considered an attractive alternative to a position at an R1, and discuss the required balance of life, family, top-level research, teaching, and university/community service.   

What to do when you realize you may want to change careers: a practical guide to career planning for physicists

In this talk I will provide an overview of my own career path from particle physics PhD to insurance analytics executive, providing a view of how I approached my job search and how I have approached developing my career path. Practical advice on what to do, resources available to you, and other non-academic career paths of physicists will also be shared.   

The Journey of an Entrepreneurial Physicist

One never knows where the endeavors of science will lead, but it is always fascinating how adventures in the workings of nature can lead to diverse collaborations and travels that contradict the quiet lives of physicists. I will start off describing my entrepreneurial experience and how I believe there is a mind set that is necessary for future aspiring scientists to jump into the world of business. The world has changed quite dramatically with the globalization of economies and the skills to be successful as scientist and entrepreneur have changed requiring our scientific thinking to evolve to embrace the complexities of the world around us. There are numerous ways to describe my round about journey starting with my first start-up company and then leading to all sorts of “adventures” in the world of global business and what I see now is important for “success”.
  

Alternate Careers for Physicists: Science Policy and Government Relations

While science is an investigation of the world around us, scientists and the practice of scientific research exist within the world in combination with aspects of society. This means that scientists and scientific research are subject to federal policies and regulations that affect how science is done. Who decides or influences those policies? Who speaks up on our behalf? Who investigates policy issues from a scientific point of view? As scientists, we can lend our expertise and insight in order to ensure a fruitful future for science, whether it be an occasional policy action taken or a career in science policy and government relations. In this talk I’ll share the story of my transition from academia to a policy- and advocacy-focused career at the American Physical Society and what it means to be a physicist on the frontlines of government relations.