What to do after PhD? (Pt.1 - So exhausted )

I woke up with flu-ish and fever-ish. I did not really wake up, it was more that I could not get proper sleep. Woke up after 2-3 hour sleep and stayed awake. I will need to cancel the project meeting attendance, so let's just summon this blog from the death.

It is been 7 months since I graduated my PhD and I am still pondering about what am I going to do. I am doing my postdoc and I just had good deal regarding my contract. However, the urge to change course and move out of academia is getting stronger. So clearly, good contract is not the main or the only concern for me, but my core work in academia is the main deterrent to keep going. Just so you know, it is not because I saw this story in Nature and suddenly I feel like quitting academia. Things are not happening in vacuum, the timeline below may provide an easy visualization. 

Here are the details:

• Spring 2020. The first time I thought about quitting academia (and moving country -hopefully finding a place to call home though it is away from home-) was around 1.5 years into my PhD. It was at the beginning of pandemic, everything shut down, I haven't got anything published, and I felt constantly inadequate and like a failure. That sucked, big time. I talked to campus psychologist, he essentially asking me why I want to quit, he said that I might be able to manage my work and made it less stressful. He said that if I like doing the environmental impact thingy, try to change my workstyle, why thinking of quitting and doing the same work somewhere else. Ok, I though it makes sense.  Now, I see things differently, if I can do the parts that I like from  my job in academia somewhere else (industry, think tank, government, NGO, etc.) without having to do the things that I dislike, that what I have to do.    
• Winter 2021. I have got few works published, but no sense of accomplishment, still haunted by inadequacy and felt like there was nothing healthy about race in academia: publish or parish. That slogan is not something I want to live by, I don't want to be defined by it, but if you are academia, it is integral to you.   
• On-and-off in between. Some of my friends are probably sick of me saying, "I don't want to do this anymore," without putting a proper effort in consistently applying position outside academia. Throughout the time I just applied sporadically when I felt like to do it, mostly the easy apply on LinkedIn. Got plenty interviews here and there, but nothing succeeded (yet).
• Summer 2023-now. This is the worst time I supposed. What am I even doing? I dread every morning I wake up realizing that I have to do this work. I am still functioning well in doing all the tasks, projects, manuscripts submission, and shits. However, it feels absolutely nothing, it feels like ticking the boxes because I have to do all those tasks. I believe so many academics relate to this feeling, because academic burnout is not something unheard of.  

The fact that the thought popped for the first time early on, it has been repeating pattern, and now becomes a day-to-day are real telltale sign that I should do something about it. On top of it, dealing with very dark-harsh-winter and long-day-summer consume me a lot. The fact that I managed to get permanent contract but feel unhappy (I am grateful for this, I know getting permanent position in academia is awfully difficult) and more dreaded because I am freaking out as if my fate is being sealed to do this job are clear sign that permanent contract is not my biggest concern, it is about my work that I dread and don't want to deal with. I feel trapped. 

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Why should you do a PhD?

Let me start with the conclusion to make your life easier: No, you should not do a PhD. Why should you? Do something else. You have options, you are not missing anything by not doing a PhD.

I was on LinkedIn, as you do, and I came across this post about 10 reasons why one should do a PhD. Each point is objectively disputable. I was thinking of commenting directly on the post, but it's LinkedIn, so let's keep it cool, unlike Twitter, that's notoriously known as a war ground for any internet dispute 🤣. But I think there is no harm in writing my piece about the issue here on my blog because, seriously, things are not rainbow and butterfly, and it is the pursue of contributing to the body of science or knowledge is not that noble anyway.  

There is a watermark, you can check by yourself in case you're interested.

1. You will get exposure to a new country, culture, learning environment and so on. One just assumes that all PhD is done abroad. First, it is wrong. Second, you can go abroad as well for master's study (with a scholarship or without, it depends). One can also work in a multinational company or take on new activities in a new learning environment.   

2. It will grow your career, especially if you are into academics. Many industries still value hands-on corporate experience (unless you are doing very scientific R&D work) more than a PhD. If you aim for a professor position, sure, you should do PhD, it is the requirement, but the academic job is unbelievably competitive. How many PhD graduates end up having a permanent position at the university? The academic job market won't absorb the huge number of PhD graduates. The story about PhD oversupply is everywhere.

3. You will develop many technical skills in your domain study. That happens in the corporate world and other sectors as long as you are serious about what you are doing and willing to learn.

4. You will also develop many soft skills, such as communication. Sure, there are a lot of soft skills and transferrable skills that you can sharpen throughout your PhD, but then again, you can gain that skill somewhere else. The sad truth, you are so adept in many skills after you finish your PhD because you have to; you have no option. How nice it is to work a corporate job where the research is done by the R&D, the funding part is done by salespeople, communication is done by marketing people, and project management is done by the project manager. In academia, personnel should master all the skills, starting from their PhD. 

5. Your professional network will grow. Like you can't grow your network outside academia.

6. You will contribute to the body of knowledge in your field of study. Yup, agree with this. Although corporate with much money can do this as well, they can do it faster and not be bound to funding. But, yup, academia is really good at this. Although sadly, the argument is sometimes used to pressure people in the lower rank of academia to stay, do more, and take bad deals. "Don't quit academia. Look how much contribution you make," while living underwage, overworked, stressed and about to burst. 

7. At the end of your PhD, you will become more resilient. That will happen if your PhD is challenging (which is supposed to be like that), but it can often be traumatic.  Being yelled at by PI, lack of support, no funding, overworked, restless, alone in a foreign country. There are way too many stories about bad PhD experiences (even I heard it first hand from a few PhD candidates at my uni). 

8. PhD journey will make a problem solver out of you. See point 5. 

9. You will be paid to work on interesting things and learn. This is a general definition of 'employment.' Who says you can't be paid to do interesting things and learn when you work in companies, government, NGOs?  You can learn everywhere. Moreover, it is a very (western) European/Nordic standpoint where you assume the PhD is employment-based. It disregards the fact that many of PhD don't have funding and have to find (part-time) jobs outside uni just to make ends meet and are pressured to perform well and publish. 

10. You will get the title 'Dr' :). So what if you have Dr. Seriously, no one cares, especially in the more egalitarian countries where you are treated equally regardless of your job or education level. No one cares about the title; maybe you and your parents care. Oh, it's not always the case either because if you happen to have immigrant parents, they will be impressed if you are a medical doctor instead of a doctor of philosophy. 

The bottom line, doing PhD is hard. Overglorifying the impacts, contribution to knowledge, nobility, and idealism while brushing off the harsh reality about their struggle, mental health, finances, pressure to publish, the competitive publishing world, and uncertain academic jobs are just not right. I will not stop anyone from doing a PhD, but we should tell the story realistically. Don't sugarcoat or glisten the harsh reality experienced by many PhD out there. And for people at the uni, if you lose your talent, just accept. Good that they realize their worth and take on a better deal for them. 

And seriously, I can't say it enough, you are not missing anything by not doing PhD.

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Podcast: PodkeSekolah, buat yang mau lanjut sekolah!!!

Seperti yang udah gw bilang sebelumnya, gw akhirnya jump into bandwagon alias tuturut munding untuk bikin podkes. Btw, kenapa sih ada istilah tuturut munding? Itu istilah dari Bahasa Sunda yang artinya literally 'mengikuti kerbau.' Ngapain coba kita ngikutin kebau???? Anyway, podkes ini diinisiasi oleh Sakana a.k.a partner pas Wageningen challenge dulu. Setelah channel Youtube challenge kami mengalami kemunduran *kek pernah maju aja?*, akhirnya banting setir ke arah podcast. 

Dekil banget gw dulu, belum mengenal skinker dan ga mampu beli skinker.

Berhubung Sakana yang akan edit podkesnya, ya gw sih ikut-ikut aja, kan gw cuma modal congor sama otak yang isinya cuma dua sel...ehehehehehe. Di podkes ini kami membahas hal-hal yang berkenaan dengan sekolah di luar nagrek. Bukan yang elaborate-berat-fafiwuwasweswos, tapi lebih ke obrolan ringan berdasarkan pengalaman kami. Podkesnya bisa dicek di Youtube Kolomikan. Podkesnya juga nggak lama-lama, bukan yang bisa sampai 3 jam bak Andrew Huberman *ya hellowwww sadar diri bandingin diri sama Andrew Huberman* *btw, gw juga ga dengerin-dengerin amat podkesnya Huberman, panjang banget kek sambutan pejabat, males.*

Episode pertama soal besiswa yang kami pakai untuk kuliah S3, karena kuliah S3 sumbernya bisa dari mana-mana, ga melulu LPDP.

Di podkes ini, gw juga ngomongin huru-hara yang terjadi dengan PhD yang mana spv pertama (orang yang rekrut gw dan beberapa kolega lainnya) gw resign setelah 2 minggu gw nyampe sini. Sedikit cerita tentang dese sempet gw tulis di post sebelumnya. Pada saat itu masih awal 2019, sehingga Jajang belum resign. Siapa Jajang? Dengerin dong podkesnya *ciehhhhh*

Oke, gw ceritain aja. Jadi, spv_1 gw resign setelah 2 minggu gw sampe di Finland. Anak PhD yang direkrut bareng gw, G,  gercep cari spv baru namanya Jajang. Tahun 2020 Jajang resign dan G ditelantarkan untuk kedua kali. Twist-nya apa? Gw hampir jadi anak asuhnya Jajang juga. Karena G dapet Jajang duluan sebagai spv, dia meng-encourage untuk, 'Dahlah, lo sama Jajang aja, lo ga tau siapa-siapa juga kan di mari.' Gw ngobrol sama Jajang, dia setuju untuk jadi supervisor gw. Ketika gw daftar PhD dan ngisi form , di situ ada pertayaan apakah gw sudah pernah komunikasi denga profesor di uni yang dituju, kalau udah sengan siapa. Gw isilah nama Jajang di situ. Ketika gw dapet acceptance letter, Jajang 'cuma' jadi spv dua, dan gw dapet spv gw yang sekarang, PH,  sebagai pembimbing pertama. 

Pada saat itu gw bingung, gw ga kenal PH sama sekali. It turned out to be the best. Nggak kebayang kalau gw jadi anak buahnya Jajang. Gw bahkan ga tau gimana cara komunikasi sama Jajang karena gw ngerasa ada gap jauh banget. Pas awal, gw pernah nulis book chapter bareng dese, tentunya gw yang melakukan semua heavy lifting. Pas draftnya udah jadi gw kirim Jajang buat minta komen, komennya cuma, 'Good, kirim aja ke editor.' Gimana ceritanya kerjaan anak yang baru mulai PhD udah 'good' dan kaga ada feedback yang berarti?!?!?!? Hihhhhhhh.

Sedangkan sama PH, everything runs rather smoothly, semuanya click dari awal, kerjanya sat-set. The dynamic and the working style were established quickly from the very get-go. Satu lagi yang terkesan trivial tapi gw apresiasi adalah dia paham humor dan personaliti gw. Dia tahu tiap anak itu beda dan dia bisa cater sesuai dengan kemampuan dan personaliti kami. Gw ngerasa sebagai kolega yg equal tapi di sisi lain gw ngerasa aman dan nggak takut untuk keliatan blo'on di depan dese. Anyway, I was this close 🤏 to be Jajang's student, tapi kalau ga terjadi ya tetep aja nggak terjadi ygy. Happenstance pisan.   

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I am back (Pt. 2)

 

Males ga lo semua, setiap mulai ngeblog cuma bilang 'I am back', setelah itu ilang. Pas balik lagi cuma buat, 'I am back lagi.' Sekarang pengennya I am back yang haqiqi karena gw sudah santai (sementara doang sih keknya) soalnya yours truly udah defence dan defence-nya surprisingly menyenangkan. At one point I enjoyed it too much I almost had a blast. I started being myself and answering questions honestly (a.k.a. saying something schewpid). Soal sidang juga pengen gw ceritain karena gw udah dag-dig-dug dhuer Daia *referensi orang-orang yang kalau kelamaan duduk sakit punggung*, dan ternyata ga seserem yang gw bayangkan. Sidang S1 dan S2 gw malah lebih rusuh dan nyeremin jatuhnya. Gw juga pengen balik ngeblog karena sekarang sepertinya interaksi via internet udah didominasi dalam bentuk audio alias podkes atau audio & visual alias konten Youtube, TikTok, dll., walhasil ngeblog bisa lebih santai karena perhatian ke mari lebih sedikit. Ibarat gw upload gif gw lagi goyang gergaji di atas kompor di blog ini, kayanya ga akan ada yang sadar....muahahahahah.

Ngomong-ngomng podkes, yours truly juga jump into bandwagon dan punya podkes ala-ala yang isinya ngomongin soal sekolah di luar nagrek, nanti gw akan ceritain juga di blog. Tayangnya ga teratur tergantung editor, gw mah cuma modal congor dan otak yang isinya dua sel. Link podkes yang diupload via Youtube tersebut udah gw wartakan ke emak gw, dia dengerin. Beberapa hari kemudian dia bilang, 'Udah dapet untung belum,' dan gw jawab, 'Untung apaan?' Emak gw lanjut, 'Untung dari podkes di Youtube kayak Atta Halilintar.'

Aq:

Podkes gw hanya butiran deborah gimana ceritanya disamain sama Atta.

Soal per-PhD-an ini kalau mau diceritain bisa banyak, mulai dari pusing ga publish-publish, omongan reviewer yang keji, aku yang lucky dapet spv yang baik, dari draft disertasi kelar sampai akhirnya sidang lama banget dan pake drama sama pre-eximiner segala, covid changes shits forever, dll, dll. Okelah, sekarang segini dulu aja, gw akan kembali lagi, janji.

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Superspreader di Pesawat

 Hello!!! 

Another same old thing: new year, new me!

Ok, skip dulu pertaunbaruan yang mana setiap taun selalu mikir, 'Gw bakal ngeblog lagi nih,' dan ga pernah terjadi. Mana pula tren masa kini adalah podkes atau konten di Youtube, I can't compete *padahal dari dulu juga ga bisa compte* 

Gw baru liat berita tentang covid dan jadi pengen cerita tentang percovidan gw. Kenapa? Karena berita yang gw liat isinya mengenai testing wastewater dari pesawat (limbah cair WC) yang sampelnya mengandung covid. Wow, sangat relate dengan gw yang tampaknya jadi superspreader sudah bergejala covid pas di pesawat.

Gw kena covid di Indonesia pas mudik 2022, hakul yakin dapetnya dari Jogja. Short story shorter, dua hari setelah dari Jogja, gw kudu balik ke Finland. Gw terbang pake via Qatar *go judge me* *oh, ga bisa, soalnya kerap naik Qatar atau maskapai TimTeng yha?*, di tengah perjalanan, gw kayak ngerasa dingin gitu, yang mana membingungkan karena lo akan bertanya-tanya, 'Ini gw dingin karena sakit apa karena AC pesawat sih?' Setelah sampai di Helsinki dan pake home test, ternyata gw covid. Wakwaw, apakah gw menjadi superpsreader ketika di pesawat? Bgztnya lagi, gw ga ngerasa beersalah-bersalah amat, kecuali sama orang-orang yang duduk di deket gw ketika di pesawat. Meski gw dan orang di sekitar gw pada saat itu maskeran semua, tetep aja kami buka masker ketika makan. Untuk penumpang lainnya, gw cuma mikir kalau mayoritas dari mereka udah pada vaksin dan (hampir) selalu maskeran. Kalau ada whities bandel yang kena karena dia ga mau pake masker meski udah jelas aturan dari maskapai pada saat itu mewajibkan pake masker, yaudahlahya.

Karena gw late to the party, gw kayaknya kebagian omicron yang gejalanya ga begitu berat tapi lebih gampang nyebar. Walhasil gw demam-demam entang, pusing-pusing dikit, hidung meler-mampet. Biarpun gejala bak butiran debu, kayaknya covid ini bikin sel otak gw RIP dan cuma sisa dua. Planga-plongo ngang-ngong kalau diajak ngomong. Omongan orang cuma kayak tiupan angin, lewat doang dan ga ada yang nyangkut. Sekitar lima hari, hasil tes gw udah negatif. Meski demikian, gw jadi bloon untuk beberapa bulan setelah covid. Sekarang sih pengen bilang kalau gw udah ga bloon lagi, but I let the others judge.

Udah sih gitu doang. Ga ada cerita dramatis soal covid (eh, apa justru dramatis karena gw allegedly jadi superspreader di pesawat?) ataupun ketika vaksin. Pas vaksin, ga ada reaksi yang bikin gw sakit, tapi tetep aja setiap vaksin gw libur kerja di hari tersebut, ehe, karena orang-orang sekitar gw pada sakit ketika vaksin. Ya gw ikutan libur aja dah.

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