From the Archive: original post from Jan, 2012

Many trainees find having a conversation with their PI scary. Discussing your career path and next steps? Even scarier! You may be unsure that you have enough data to actually say this is the year that you will move on.  If you are going to be a PI you may not be sure if will be able to take part of your project with you.  Perhaps you do not know what reaction you will get if you say you want to take a different career path than staying in academic research.  All of these factors can persuade you just to not have the conversation at all. 

Happy New Year!  It is time for the annual tradition of making New Year’s resolutions.  Often the theme of resolutions is to better oneself through eating better, exercising more or changing a habit that drives us crazy (this will be the year that I paste every gel into my notebook and stop using paper towels for my calculations!).  While healthy bodies and well organized notebooks are great things, we encourage you to resolve to prioritize advancing your career.  Do you need to make a decision about what to do after your training?  Do you need to network more and/or more efficiently?  Do you need to develop skills to make a successful transition to the next

It is the holiday season and we here at OITE are in a giving mood!  To show our appreciation to our readers, we have compiled some of the best job search advice we have been given.  We have wrapped them up neatly below and are regifting them to you!  Yes, we are proud regifters!  So, grab your holiday drink of choice (unless you are in the lab…no food or drink allowed), settle down in a cozy chair (or lab stool) and prepare to unwrap your gifts from us this holiday season!  Enjoy and see you in 2012!    

Your job search begins before you start looking for a job:

This is the seventh in a series of profiles about recent NIH postdocs who have found an array of jobs, from academia to industry to communications and beyond, in the U.S. and abroad. What do they do now, and how did they get there? What challenges did they face, and what advice do they have? Read on to find out.

Name: Mona Dvir-Ginzberg

Current position: Lecturer, Institute of Dental Science, Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Location: Israel

Time in current position: 2 years

One of the more intimidating parts of building your network is contacting people you have little or no connection to.  Before E-mail became the standard form of communication in science and business, this was even more daunting.  Making a “cold call” to a person you had never met was a scary prospect.  You never were certain how they would respond.  However, e-mail is a little less personal and thus, less of a risk.  Still, a poorly planned and constructed “cold e-mail” can get you nowhere, or worse, may actually work against you.  To make sure that your e-mail is well received and effective, follow these few tips:

As we continue to post success stories from NIH alumni in our “NIH Alumni: Where are they now?” series, readers of this blog have seen and will continue to see the term, “informational interview.”  While aptly named, many readers may be asking:  What is an informational interview?  How do I set one up?  What type of questions should I ask?  What, besides information, should I expect to get out of an informational interview?

This is the sixth in a series of profiles about recent NIH postdocs who have found an array of jobs, from academia to industry to communications and beyond, in the U.S. and abroad. What do they do now, and how did they get there? What challenges did they face, and what advice do they have? Read on to find out.

Name: Sandeep Dayal

Current position: Health science policy analyst, Office of Scientific Program and Policy Analysis, NIDDK

Location: Bethesda, MD

Time in current position: 1 year

Thanksgiving!  The time of year where many of us celebrate with a ridiculous amount of food, American Football on television, food, family, food, friends, and did we mention food?  Also, and perhaps more importantly, it is a time of year where we focus on those things in our lives for which we are thankful.  Here are OITE, we are reflecting on why we are thankful for our jobs and give you all a sense of why we do what we do.

Name: Elizabeth Rex

Current position: Research scientist at Johnson & Johnson

Location: San Diego, CA

Time in current position: 4 months

Postdoc: Molecular neuropharmacology of dopamine receptors with David Sibley at NINDS

My story: When I came to NINDS, I didn’t know what I was going to do [for a career]. I thought it would all be unveiled with time. Looking back, I should have had more “career intellect.”

“It’s not what you know, it’s who you know!”  The old adage, while certainly over simplified and perhaps a little cynical, is an important reminder that often the one break a person needs to get started in a career is a personal connection to that first opportunity.  In the age of online social networking, the connections we have are often impersonal and disingenuous.  A person who is merely a number in you connection list is not likely to prove to be reliable or effective in helping you advance your career.