Help me give career advice

October 16, 2006 1:16 PM

Writer, linguist, filmmaker, scientist? Help me give my friend advice about his career choice.

He's a talented guy, but he's had a hard time finding his path. He studied physics in college and is still interested in science, but lost patience with the specialization required of a professional scientist--he is a generalizer by nature.

After college he discovered he had a gift for languages and loves living in other countries--he lived in Costa Rica and China, teaching English. He doesn't especially like teaching English, but it was a good foot in the door for him. He does enjoy teaching, but "on his terms"--and he has even considered starting his own school.

He is a voracious reader, very tech savvy, and lately has been talking about grad school in library science. I have a feeling it's just so he can sort out all his books.

Does anything jump out at you as to what this guy should be doing? He's currently working at a government job that just pays the bills while he reads and writes, reads and writes, on his own time. Help me fill in the blank: "This guy is a born _____ "

(Or better, "We have been looking for a guy just like this to work in _____ .") :)

posted by mjklin to work & money (16 comments total)

I would suggest some sort of scientific outreach. Is he outgoing? A "people person"?
The other idea I have is scientific book editor. One of my friends does this and she loves it. (She was in the same Ph.D. program I was in but dropped out for various reasons.)
posted by nekton at 1:25 PM on October 16, 2006

The scientific book editor role sounds very interesting - how do you get into that line of work? (read: how did she?). :-)
posted by dance at 1:46 PM on October 16, 2006

I have a vaguely similar background, and these days I'm a very happy software industry analyst.
posted by rdc at 2:02 PM on October 16, 2006

If he already has a command of other languages, or is planning and is able to achieve it, and does have a talent and passion for that, and he likes writing, then... he could marry his scientific specialisation and language interests and become a highly specialised interpreter/translator. I have a bilingual friend with a PhD in Chemistry who did just that.

(You do need that extra talent and training for the specifics of that job too, though, not just a gift for languages in general.)
posted by pleeker at 2:44 PM on October 16, 2006

This background reminds me of people I know who work for the NSA. Other intelligence organizations less so, but he should look into that area.
posted by phrontist at 2:47 PM on October 16, 2006

Man, this sounds like me. I even worked in a library and considered a MLS. I'm at a "pays-the-bills" job at the moment, but my goal is to establish myself as a freelance journalist, particularly writing for magazines.

Consider the benefits: one gets paid to learn about fields of their own interest, interview prominent people in those fields, and to develop your thoughts on these ideas in the course of writing. As a generalist, your friend is lprobably ROS: No additional degree is required. Can work part-time.
adept at seeing the connections those working narrowly within a given field might miss. If you're persistant and/or lucky, one's writing on a subject might even influence public discourse. And isn't that akin to "teaching on one's own terms?"

Consider also that your friend wouldn't need to get a degree to pursue this, and could begin part-time while still working his current gig.
posted by action man bow-tie at 3:02 PM on October 16, 2006

If he's interested in library schience feel free to have him email me to talk about it some. There are some really interesting librarian jobs that do let you travel and do some of the things your friend is interested in. Being a generalist isn't a bad thing as long as you have the minimum discipline required to maintain a regular job and work with other people. I've advised a lot of people about future careers in librarianship and I'd be happy to talk to him. Email in profile, etc.
posted by jessamyn at 3:02 PM on October 16, 2006 [1 favorite]

There's a shortage of properly trained science teachers. Would he ever consider that?
posted by croutonsupafreak at 3:27 PM on October 16, 2006

Buy him "What Colour Is My Parachute"

It gives a very good method for narrowing down what jobs might be suitable for a person.
posted by Idiot Mittens at 3:53 PM on October 16, 2006

It's quite possible to have a non-specialist job in science also, but it certainly doesn't look that way from the beginning.

Getting a doctorate is all about developing an extremely tight focus on a very narrow subject. There's no way around this, and, for some, it's just a slog that has to be endured to get to the goal. Grad school teaches valuable skills, and is a transformative experience, yadda, yadda, but it can be very tedious at the same time. In some ways, that's the point: can he stick with a project to see it through?

Part of your friend's problem is that he may only be thinking of a scientific career as an academic one. There few non-specialists in academic science. The places to find them are elsewhere: government, industry, start-ups, NGOs.

The best generalist scientists have broader perspectives than the specialists. This puts them in the best positions to understand how to relate science to a social context. In effect, they end up making science policy, deciding how best to use science to advance an end, whether it be for the public good (governmental), for profit (business), or to promote a cause (advocacy).

There are as many jobs for a broadly-focused generalist scientist as can be imagined. Arguably, we, as a culture need a lot more. Many decisions are made without such a perspective, some of which can be enormously detremental. Here's a decent book on the alphas of the type: The Jasons

He'll have a much easier time finding a job as a generalist if he goes for a more applied field, but pure science types can become generalists too: Richard Feynman, James Lovelock and even Edward Teller are examples of such.
posted by bonehead at 3:54 PM on October 16, 2006

Maybe working for some kind of think tank on science policy issues?

The science journalist thing is a dream job, but, like any journalism and writing field, it depends heavily on having the right connections. That's why I gave up freelance journalism and went to science grad school.
posted by transona5 at 4:08 PM on October 16, 2006

Holy shit, this could be me, except with Former Soviet Union for South America. I'm still trying to figure it out, but my ideas seem to be converging on policy in some form, although the mechanics of that I'm still trying to figure out...
posted by claudius at 5:53 PM on October 16, 2006

That's quite a sentence there...
posted by claudius at 5:53 PM on October 16, 2006

The scientific book editor role sounds very interesting - how do you get into that line of work?

I am not sure how she found out about the job, but I believe it was through a friend.

Part of your friend's problem is that he may only be thinking of a scientific career as an academic one.

Indeed. Although I have a Ph.D. and put in my time being a specialist, I am now a generalist, to borrow bonehead's terminology. I work doing a mix of outreach, education, and research for a federal program (EPA) run by a state office (Coastal Zone Management) and hosted at a non-profit. I imagine that other agencies (federal and state) have similar branches.
posted by nekton at 6:17 PM on October 16, 2006

It would be lovely to get up to the Richard Feynman level of having a solid science background and yet being able to touch anything--bongo drums, art canvases, TV documentaries--and have them turn to gold, right? Unfortunately I don't think there's any clear path to that kind of gig.

I like Emerson's quote that "Lesser people make their living by what they do, greater people by what they are." But I'm sure you have to "do" a lot before you can start raking in those "are" bucks. Maybe the best thing for my buddy is just to do everything and see what sticks...
posted by mjklin at 10:43 PM on October 16, 2006

He should stop being so hesitant to specialize.

I used to flatter myself by thinking that I was a "generalist" too, but that was mostly just laziness and an unwillingness to commit. Now, the further along I get in life & professional endeavors, the more I find out that the only way to make meaningful generalizations is to study a certain thing very hard. You can never see the patterns if you don't understand the details.
posted by footnote at 8:43 AM on October 17, 2006