Leaving academia is like this. It's very sticky and scary to leave. I remember how devastating it was for me. I think it's because there's a very strong sense of a missed dream, and that you can never return.
For me it was more of a 'good riddance' moment haha .
But I ded finish my PhD and a postdoc, so I didn't leave with a feeling of 'I have failed '
I remember though, that feeling when I was doing my PhD and I got the quits fever.
I think a lot of people struggle mentally when they quit in the middle mainly because of a sense of defeat.
To them I would say scree it. If you found out the stupid churn of the academia process is not for you, leave without remorse.
It's like game programming. It's fantasized during childhood, but once you get in and see the swamp it is, you realize it's either for you or it isn't no shame at all in leaving.
I did a PhD and postdoc too. My issue was how drawn out it was. I had a 3 year postdoc contract with great pay, so it seemed like a really bad idea to quit. Basically I spent 3 years wanting to quit but knowing I couldn't because it made no economic sense. Our group leader didn't care at all. He was totally fine with me sitting around earning money while doing everything.
I think I would have done far better if I were simply fired.
I feel the need to point out that it's not difficult for people whose identity is not centered around their jobs, since I see that disconnect in the comments. I found the author's take full of the pageantry that I often associate with people who make big deals out of fairly inconsequential things, but before I begrudge the author their take, I have to remember that my career is of relatively little importance to me.
Hypothetically, when you meet someone new, do you introduce yourself as your job? Is one of the first exchanges of self-identifying information what you do for a living? A lot of people do and while I do not understand it, I guess that is what their lives are. Tbh, I find it a bit sad. Generally, my career does not enter the conversation unless there is some relevant reason. I'd rather talk about my productive hobbies where I am making or building or learning a thing.
Breaking this down, when we use our jobs as our identity, I find it exceptionally difficult to pull the "why do you do it" out of that conversation, because a career is just a paycheck, in the end and involves very little personal enrichment. Of course, not everyone views careers that way and I'm not here to try to change minds, but shed light on why it might seem silly to many of us.
Perhaps we are not one of the lucky few with those unicorn jobs that both pay the bills, offer a bright future, and promote personal growth. They exist, I am sure, but they are the exception to the rule.
I think academia is one of those special places where a lot of people who enter it are altruistic and idealistic, and consider it a part of their identity to make a change in the world in a larger sense. You are literally taking a pay-cut, willingly, in order to make the world a better place. At least in theory. So, in that sense, academia is (or at least used to be) more akin to monasteries than corporations.
Not that other jobs aren't making a change in the world, but you know what I mean. It's one thing to be a knowingly replaceable cog in a team that tries to offer more effective ads, and it's quite another to singularly, completely in isolation, try to devote your life trying to invent the MRI, where if you fail the MRI may never come to exist. So yes, a lot of people in academia traditionally do ascribe a big part of their identity to their jobs, but I think this goes beyond the superficial sense you describe (i.e. I'm so boring and soulless that my work defines me).
Which is also why it's such a big deal when some academics are found to be 'cheating' the system (again, see monasteries). Traditionally, the whole edifice has been based on 'honor', but the tide seems to be changing; the rampant corporatisation of academia has been a very recent phenomenon, and now that the inevitable shills and snake-oil merchants have entered the game, we don't quite know how to handle them.
>You are literally taking a pay-cut, willingly, in order to make the world a better place
This is a pretty interesting take. I feel that it may be even a bit "western " if not 'American ' centric.
In my country Academia is perceived as a "ladder" in the socioeconomic level. It's one of few ways people coming from low class can actually climb their SE level. As such, there is a different kind of pressure one side, and on the other, a lot of people are 'living their best life' doing the academia dance.
In the 19th century you had the same job for life. If you were a
blacksmith you stayed a blacksmith and died a blacksmith in the
village where you were born. Your surname was synonymous with your
skill. Wheeler. Smith. Potter. Even in the mid 20th century people
worked for the same company for life. The "corporate" (body) world
meant something very different than today. The corporation took care
of you. It paid for your health and holidays. If you were unhappy in
work, it helped sort that out so you would stay. As late as the 1960s,
and still for some people who work in government, and still a culture
in Japan, you can get a "job for life".
"Career" means to move haphazardly. It replaced the more stable
notions of "vocation" and "calling". Today you might spend a year in
hospitality, a few years in sales, then do a diploma in programming,
move to California, get into media design, and then open a juice bar
on the beach... Everyone is at the mercy of ever swirling markets and
the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, layoffs and takeovers,
new trends. Who here didn't "get into AI" in the last 2 years?
In a way that's a richer better life. It's more challenging. It is
also shallower. There are less places to put down roots and grow
anything worthwhile. People with active minds and a lust for life
naturally outgrow scenes, groups and institutions. Moving on should be
an exciting joy. What I see of America and UK now (at least here on
HN) is that people are held in place by fear. We've regressed to 19th
century ideas about work and life, minus the positive 'belonging'.
What I think people sometimes "grieve" is the sunk-cost spiritual
investment in what they thought an institution represented. Or they
found themselves in an career that is in decline. or in institutions
that have decayed - and it's painful to move on. Those reasons may be
emotionally noble; loyalty, fidelity to values etc. You can let go of
values and of a dream. Or you can take them with you, by realising
that they never belonged to any "institution" in the first
place. They're yours.
Academia is definitely that place in 2024. The reality of academic
life is the antithesis of human values we traditionally associate it
with. If the institutions we inhabit are inflexible, ineffectual, and
less than our ambitions then it's time to move on. The problem is not
so much that people identify with what they "do", but where and with
whom they do it. It's a strong and valuable kind of person who keeps
their calling/purpose separate from their employment identity.
IMHO, this is one of the most "wise" replies on this thread. I personally experienced that "reality of academic life", with my own (now abandoned) Ph.D journey.
It's worth calling out how recent (and US-centric) it is, to strongly invest one's work with one's entire reason for being. Derek Thompson termed it "workism":
I appreciate the extra nuance you added, about the "where and with whom they do it". I can personally attest to the importance of work colleagues and environment, over the work itself. The former can make up for the latter, but rarely (if ever) the other way around.
Having an institution/career represent your passions, ambitions and most importantly your community is an immense luxury.
For the rest of us, it definitely makes more sense to put roots down in one place, build up community, indulge in the local arts scene etc -> exactly the kind of stuff that modern life is not aligned with. You cannot be moving around every few years and expect any sort of community.
I agree for most jobs, but academia is different. It's so wildly different to other careers, that it does feel more like a calling, and is far easier to identify with. Especially if you are a first generation academic, you are doing something considered wildly more prestigious than anything anyone before you has done.
That is, I think it's relatively easy to dismiss your career as not that important if you have a normal job. But I think it's inherently much harder if you are an academic for many reasons.
You can't really be an academic whose identity is not centered around their job. This is because it virtually never makes sense to pursue an academic career as a means to other ends (given that pay and conditions tend to be quite bad).
Another anecdata point... For me leaving academia was a big challenge - I'd have to find a job, pass interviews, move home, etc, etc. Scary stuff! But as soon as I had actually done this, my new career path in industry went smoothly, and my first year in industry massively improved my personal confidence. As an academic I was surrounded by other academics, but in industry I was forced to interact and communicate with a more diverse group of people, and I quickly found that it wasn't as scary as I had thought. E.g. doing product demos to senior people, supporting our marketing people by building prototypes, etc.
Amazingly, the company I moved to had much better tooling for the type of software research research I was recruited for than I had had access to at Uni. I built something (as part of a supportive team that understood software dev) in about six months, that I had struggled (and failed) to build in academia over a couple of years.
At some level in industry you have at least the potential to have the paradox of choice. Of course, some people are perfectly happy and successful with roles that are essentially the same in the fundamentals from one company to the next. But others largely reinvent themselves with each new role both between different companies and even within the same one. That really isn't an option in academia.
Not OP, but in general to be hirable in academia you need to demonstrate a constant flow of papers and grant proposals.
Being 'out of the game' for a couple of years means you have not published or applied to grants within that time. At best, you might be looking at restarting at the bottom of the ladder until you've reasonably caught up in numbers to climb back up again.
And it's not even just a case of "computer says no" because of automated metrics. In the UK at least, government initiatives like the REF mean that the university will actively avoid hiring you because by definition you would be costing the university money. (and conversely, you have an advantage for being hired if you demonstrate the right REFfable metrics, even if you weren't the most suitable candidate at the interview, because this automatically brings a university money that is directly linked to your recent REF outputs).
I don't know what the situation is like in the US, but I'm fairly sure similar exercises exist with effectively the same effect.
Academia tends to have fairly linear career paths. You do a doctorate, then maybe do a post-doc, then become a lecturer / assistant professor, etc. If you don't follow the path you end up without the track record (publications, funding, etc.) you need for promotion and will be passed over for other candidates who look more likely to succeed. There are many more applicants than positions in most fields.
If you're not on this career path, there is basically no alternative in most institutions. You can be an adjunct, or lab assistant, or other low-level employee forever but this will lead nowhere. This is particularly a problem in the US, where the tenure track system gives you seven years of grind to achieve tenure, and if you fail your academic career is basically over.
(Things are changing. Some institutions have, for example, teaching track positions.)
Academia is a guild. There are far more people who want the job that can get it, and has very strong employment protections for members. They don't welcome outsiders anyhere except the bottom of ladder.
Well, for one, people usually leave for systematic issues with academia that won't just magically be fixed over time.
Second, it's very difficult to get back in anyway, you will have a publication gap and with the extreme increase in publish and perish it's hard to imagine it being a good choice. Here in Germany, getting any permanent academic position is a pipe dream even for the extremely motivated. This ties back into the first point.
