Lesson 1: Introduction to the Research Stage
This is the second stage in a PhD Career Transition. At the beginning of the Research Stage, you’ll consider a range of career options.
This course will help you carefully and strategically gather information about these various career fields so that you can evaluate these options and identify career fields that align with your values and interests, use your talents and skills, and require minimal retraining.
At the end of this stage of career transition, you’ll evaluate these options and choose one career pathway to focus on in the Implementation Stage of the job search.
Watch this video to learn more about the research stage and the steps PhDs take when making their career transition.
- Describe the goals of the Research Stage.
- Identify the steps PhDs take when making their career transition.
- Determine evaluation criteria for deciding what career you would like to try next.
What do you want to try next?
Our research shows that a successful job search is one that is laser-focused on landing an opportunity in one career field.
To make a successful career transition will require that you master the discourse of a career field, translate your academic work experience, build a new expertise in a professional career field, and build a community of practitioners who can help you unlock the hidden job market in their field.
Doing this for one career field will take a lot of effort. You cannot be all the things to all the people. A scattered, broad, job search will lead to frustration.
Worried that you’ll make the wrong decision? As you build your career, you’ll gather more information about yourself, the professional workforce, and the kinds of opportunities that are best suited for your talents, interests, and skills. You can change jobs, or careers, again.
You’re not choosing what you’ll do for the rest of your life. You’re simply choosing what you’d like to try next
In this 8-lesson course, we’ll help you evaluate possible careers that align with your skills, interests, and values. We’ll also help you recognize successful job search strategies.
In this course, you’ll learn how to:
- Translate your academic work experience into the language of non-academic employers
- Use LinkedIn to grow your network and research career options
- Write a general resume that highlights your transferable skills
- Determine which career you should try next
Each lesson is accompanied by guiding questions and exercises to help you apply what you’ve learned. We recommend that you download the form fillable PDF workbook and type out (or write out!) your answers as you work through the course.