Book Recommendations for Career Change

These books come up again and again among post-academics seeking a career change.

 



So What Are You Going to Do with That?: A Guide for MA's and PhD's Seeking Careers Outside the Academy Basalla & Debelius 2001

It's over a decade old and still the go-to guide for post-academics trying to figure out what else to do and how to sell themselves to new employers. The authors are post-academics and drew on hundreds of interviews for their advice. A must have.

 



What Color Is Your Parachute? A Practical Manual For Job-Hunters and Career-Changers Bolles 2013 (updated annually, which is awesome.)

Yes, you're going to feel like a total tool when you buy this, but trust us, this is the best career change manual you can get. Get the most recent version or last year's at discount (this is nice because it actually includes websites, social media stuff, etc, versus a 5 or 10 year old manual that's like "electronic mail, or 'e-mail,' is a new tool for jobseekers..."). If you're floundering in uncertainty about what to do next, this book is full of exercises that can help you learn about yourself, think of possible careers that will be fulfilling, and articulate your transferable skills. This will help you figure out what you might actually like and be good at, versus what sounds cool or neat or you think would be easy to tell people when you quit. Read about Lauren's experience with What Color? here (scroll about halfway down, past the crafty stuff, to get to the review). I decided to move away from freelancing as a post-ac career based on this book, which was wise. Jen, another post-acer who blogs with Lauren @ Mama Nervosa, also found What Color? valuable after she left a PhD program in Women's Studies. This  book will probably also confirm your decision to move away from work in academia. So we think it's completely necessary.

More books tba!

 

Link Roundup: Job Materials for Non-Academic Jobs

One of the most confusing parts of the transition out of academia is figuring out how to transform our academic CVs and letters -- and our academic work -- into marketable materials for "real world" jobs. Taking a 10 page CV and making it into a 2 page resume when most of your experience centers around writing center tutoring or lab work can be disheartening and confusing. These links help you make sense of what "real world" employers are looking for, and how to transfer your academic life into terms that make sense to those outside the ivory tower.

Khalil Shah via Compfight

FWIW, a career coach or service can be very helpful if you're really struggling. Julie Clarenbach and Jo Van Every are post-academics who work as career coaches for post-academics! They have a couple e-courses as well.

Versatile PhD is our #1 favorite go-to catch-all source for career issues after academia. There is far more knowledge and support there than we can offer here.

(Post)Gradland is an ex-academic who ended up on a job search committee for her web content company that hired a PhD for a non-academic position and had this to say about the materials they received:

Academics, especially those of us in the humanities, have a tendency to ramble. This does not go over well in the private sector. It’s likely that the person reviewing your resume is someone like me, who is not a professional resume-reviewer and has maybe 15-20 minutes a day to devote to reading resumes and cover letters. I received one application from someone who had excellent qualifications but had written a five-page cover letter, much of it containing irrelevant information. This immediately gave me a bad impression of the person–simply put, I don’t want to be working long hours with someone who takes forever to get to the point. Your cover letter shouldn’t be longer than a page.

 

This excellent post from Leaving Academia summarizes the many fears we face when we start to consider a non-academic job search, and offers a lot of practical wisdom as you make this transition. Here's a taste:

You also developed other practical and marketable skills in your academic life. For example, you didn’t only write a Master’s thesis, course papers, or a doctoral dissertation. You also managed large volumes of information, established a data-storage system (both electronic and hard copy), and edited manuscript copy. You were a creative thinker, you adapted and navigated your way around unanticipated barriers (of the intellectual variety), and saw projects through to completion. You worked independently but consulted others for their expertise. And don’t forget all those “soft skills” that a PhD helps you cultivate:

• you are a master/mistress of time management and meeting deadlines


• you have superior organizational skills


• you learn things quickly and grasp complex ideas easily


• you are disciplined, motivated, and a self-starter


• you enjoy a challenge

Once you learn how to articulate your transferable skills, you will be able to explain in a job interview how well your background – graduate school and all – prepared you for the line of work described in the job ad.

The long and short of all of these sites is that yes, you do have skills that are valuable. The trick will be articulating how your background in academia prepared you for the specific tasks and duties of the specific job you're looking at. Good luck! And check out our other articles about the career transition after academia.

 

Transferable Skills: What Did You Really Get Out of Grad School?

First, start with what you've got. You do indeed have skills that workplaces value.

 Mike Sansone via Compfight

I've written on this at my own post-ac blog, focusing on reading and writing in this post, and time and self-management. These are skills that I honed in grad school and now use in my post-ac job at an academic publisher. Here's an example:

I go through a similar process of research and thought as I would when writing a seminar paper. I spend time on the professor and school's web sites--gathering information about his/her research agenda, the school's student body, the kinds of works the professor has assigned in the past. Then, much as I looked for patterns of women painters in 19th c novels, I look for patterns that match our products to the professor's needs. Does this professor work in Gothic literature? Our new anthology has a cluster on "monsters." Working with the research I've done on a professor/insitution, and fitting the information to my "reading" of our sales call, I try to create an argument explaining why this professor must use this book.

Stay tuned for more  on this important topic!