News and Advice

I just finished quals...now what?

A third year PhD student asks—I just passed my quals and I don’t know what to do next; I feel like for so long I was working really hard just focused on my quals deadline, but now I feel like I’m doing nothing and I’m constantly worried I’m falling behind.

Will AI save me time preparing cover letters?

A postdoc asks—I'm getting ready to job search and realizing how much time preparing a separate cover letter for every position will take. I liked your advice on using AI in exploring careers, do you have any advice on how I could use ChatGPT to help with my applications?

Can I use AI to help me explore careers?

A PhD student asks—

I have 1 year left in my program—what do I do?

A 5th year PhD student asks—I have just about 1 year left in my PhD, and I’m realizing I need to start planning to finish things up, not just continue working kind of endlessly on my projects. Like so many things in grad school, nobody really teaches you how to do things; nobody teaches you how to…

Am I doing something wrong?

A postdoc asks—I've been searching for a job for almost a year without any luck. I know the job market is really bad, but I’m desperate to get out of my lab and get onto my real career. Do I just have to wait out the bad job market and hope to get lucky, or is there something else I should be doing?

How to prioritize a job search vs everything else

A 5th year PhD student asks—I know about all the things I need to do for my job search but realistically I don’t know when I’m going to do it. I think I can handle each part when I think about it in a vacuum, but in addition to my ongoing research, I have to start writing my dissertation, plus I’m…

I need to find a job in two months. Help!

A postdoc asks—I'm going to be finished at UCSF this summer (2 months from now), and I’m searching for an industry role. I know I probably should have started sooner, but I was busy with finishing my papers and some personal issues. What should I be doing with the time I have left? And how long…

Where do I start?

A fifth-year PhD student writes—I'm getting ready to job search, but I don’t really know where to start. I guess I'm just looking for some structure for the process.

How do I say, "I don't want to join your lab"?

A first-year PhD student asks—I'm finishing my last lab rotation and have decided which lab I want to join. How do I tell the other PIs I rotated with that I won’t be joining their labs? I don’t want to burn any bridges.

Networking feels gross...

A late-stage PhD student asks—In theory, I feel like the quality of my work should get me where I want to go. Networking has always felt gross, but I recognize that it is just valuable for people to know what I am capable of and to know I exist. How did you get over the gross feeling?