Leaving Academia: How to Plan Your Escape
Are you thinking of pursuing a non-academic career but don’t know where to start? Leaving academia doesn’t have to be hard – here we provide some tips for how to pivot from an academic to a non-academic career.
Have you decided that maybe academia isn’t the best career path for you? You might have done a masters, PhD, or postdoc and decided that you don’t enjoy academic work, or you have realised that the limited job options make it an increasingly untenable career path. There are many reasons that people decide to pursue a non-academic career, and it is often a difficult decision to leave academia.
If you’ve spent most of your working (or studying) life in academia, then career options outside academia can be a bit of a mystery. Chances are, most of your mentors and senior colleagues have only worked in academia and have a limited perspective on the career opportunities for those who choose to leave. This makes leaving academia a challenge – what jobs are suitable for advanced degree holders? And more importantly, how do you get one? (Not to mention some of the unhelpful myths about leaving academia)
Unfortunately, there isn’t a one-size-fits all approach for leaving academia; your own path will depend on your current skills, your education, and your own preferences. Some people are lucky in that there is a clear path from their academic experience to a non-academic role. But for many others, it isn’t as straightforward.
In this blog post, we provide some general steps that you can follow whether you have decided to leave academia, are undecided about your future career, or want to pursue academia but would like to have a backup plan (it never hurts to start planning early!).
Step 1. Identify your key skills, motivations, and passions
“The first step to finding your new career path: identify what you’re passionate about, what motivates you, and what you’re good at.”
Academia requires you to use a wide range of skills: research, writing, teaching, among (many) others. In fact, when you consider all the tasks you do in academia, you might be surprised at how many different skills you use every day. You’ve probably figured out that you like doing certain tasks more than others, and that some of your skills are more well-developed. This is the first step to finding your new career path: identify what you’re passionate about, what motivates you, and what you’re good at. Do you love doing data analysis? Are you passionate about teaching and mentoring? Are you good at writing and communicating? There are so many things you do as an academic that you can use to transition into a new career.
Of course, most jobs will require you to have a range of skills, so you likely can’t just pick your favourite and only do that. It helps for you to understand the skills that you would like to use in your career, others that you are capable at and happy to use, and the ones that you are really not interested in doing (to help narrow your career options).
Step 2. Find careers where you can use these skills
This is quite often the hardest step – identifying jobs that fit your skills. There are so many different careers, including many that you might never even have heard of, which means finding one that aligns with your current skills can be a challenge.
Some career paths are more obvious than others: if you have experience with data analysis (particularly coding) there are a lot of data-related careers out there. Similarly, if you love teaching, then there is a range of education jobs that might suit you - whether its school teaching, tertiary education or other types of education and training. But for many others, the path is less clear.
If you can’t easily identify a potential career, then start researching – as an academic, you should be good at this! Look for others who have a similar education and skillset as you and find out what sorts of careers they have – social media (LinkedIn, Twitter - #altac is a good starting point) can be very helpful here. You could also find former students or postdocs of your current supervisor who have moved into non-academic careers – they are likely to have a similar skillset to you. Check job advertising platforms for roles that require skills that align with yours. Take advantage of your university’s career services. There are plenty of resources out there for you to make the most of.
“You don’t have to decide on a single career and commit to that – being flexible can lead to many unexpected opportunities”
If you find a career that seems right for you, reach out to people working in this field to find out more about it (particularly if they have also left academia). This might sound a bit intimidating (or terrifying – shout-out to all the introverts out there!) but people are often very happy to share their experience, just be respectful of their time and don’t ask to much of them. This can give you valuable insights into this career and help you decide if it is right for you, and the steps you will need to take to get into it.
Of course, you don’t have to decide on a single career and commit to that – being flexible can lead to many unexpected opportunities – but it’s helpful to have a general idea of the type of job or industry you would like to work in so you can move onto step 3.
Step 3. Start upskilling
By this step, you should have figured out what skills you have, what careers you can aim towards, and what skills and qualifications you need to achieve this - now you need to start working towards it. Although you develop many different skills during your academic experience, these will often not be enough on their own to land you a non-academic job.
The degree to which you will need to upskill will vary according to your own experience and the job which you want to move into. You might need to complete some formal qualifications, this may be an industry-specific certificate, vocational education and/or training, or even another degree (but this is not so common).
If you need to develop a particular skill, but don’t require a formal qualification, there are many ways to achieve this. There are online courses available on a wide range of topics – you can also choose one based on the price and time commitment required. You can also find out if your university offers any courses or training in the skills you need.
In some cases, you may already have developed the necessary skills through your academic experience, but translating academic achievements into skills that are recognised by employers can be challenging. You should find ways to demonstrate these skills that are clear for non-academics; basically, if you have a skill, you need to provide evidence. What this evidence looks like will be different for each skill and job: does the job require organisation skills? Then get involved in organisational activities: conference organisation committees, student/ECR committees, managing a lab among, many other things. Do you need to be a good communicator? Take opportunities to communicate your work in different formats to a wide audience: present at conferences, enter competitions like the Three Minute Thesis, get involved in social media communications or blogging. Check out our blog on Upskilling During Your Degree for more ideas.
