What is it like doing a Ph.D.?

​It has been almost a year since I finished my Ph.D. degree. Nearly the same time, I have been receiving requests from acquaintances to convince them of the worth of getting a Ph.D. So, I thought of putting together this note for Ph.D. aspirants. Before, I give away all the wisdom in this long post, here is a disclaimer:

1. I am NOT trying to convince you or trying to sell you the idea of getting into a Ph.D. course. This writeup is just collective wisdom, which I feel is not available in public.
2. I am not the Devil’s advocate. I am just writing this as an aid for some fellow futures of their countries and reduce the confusion.
3. PLEASE understand, our perceptions in life are a function of our past experiences. For instance, if you had an unfortunate experience at an expensive restaurant and shared it with a friend that hasn’t been to one. I’m sure the conversation will soon transcend​​ into ‘…are you mad, why did you pay $200 for a bowl of soup, in the first place?’ This writeup is just my perception from my Ph.D. experience. I share here the wisdom I distilled from it.
4. If you would like to debate what your XX told your YY about ZZ degree at ABC university, please go to my Instagram and like my pictures, instead! Hey, I’m kidding that would be creepy, DON’T DO IT!.
5. If you feel this post helped you, don’t be greedy! Please share it with someone who needs to see this.

This writeup has three parts that would answer the questions posed to me since graduation in early September 2019. In chronology, the questions I try to answer are as follows:

1. What is it like doing a Ph.D.?
2. Whether I should do a Ph.D.?
3. Is a Ph.D. degree worth the time and effort?

I promise to give out the ideas as straight as possible without any glorification. Still, I will use some analogies that the reader, YOU, might have experienced, felt, or seen. So, let’s start with the first question:

What is it like doing a Ph.D.?

Let me first explain wherein the system of our planet lies the Doctorate – it lies somewhere in the middle. Middle of what, you say. Middle of two communities, one significantly larger in quantity the other significantly smaller and both are growing. Now that you have already figured that the smaller group is of Ph.D. holders, you also know that the act of getting labeled a Ph.D. happens in the middle. And the middle part is all together, a whole new world.

Now let’s talk about this new middle world to detail the answer to the first question. The new middle world works analogously to the functioning of Venturi. The two tapered ends have similar pressure conditions while there is a forced surge in the constricted space in the middle. Likewise, being in a Ph.D. course is like being in that conduit, where the velocity of the fluid is high, and the pressure is low compared to the entry and exit ends. Therefore, a Ph.D. is a process. However, here, the velocity signifies the pace at which your life moves, and the pressure is, of attachments with relationships and subjects. Both components though intangible yet, are a function of TIME. But if a Ph.D. is a process? What can it tell you about the ‘pace of life’?

Think of the high velocity in the venturi conduit and let me give you a list of the components you will experience in the conduit of a Ph.D. process. You will-

1. Learn and experience fascinating new things about the world, the people around you, and yourself!
2. Learn to answer your questions at the same time, find the right people who can explain the tough questions.
3. Know that you always have a more extensive knowledge carrying capacity than you believed you have.
4. Make new connections between isolated knowledge to produce new knowledge, mostly for yourself and a few times for several others.
5. Develop your path. Your life will move at the pace you plan to act and move!

Now let’s talk about ‘pressure.’ The pressure in a Ph.D. course reflects an individual’s capacity to CONTAIN & COMMAND his/her internal strength, desires, and urges. It is a system where external pressure is often negligible and does little to no change for the outcomes. Let me list these out for you, and this list will also compliment the five points I made earlier:

1. While in a Ph.D. course you will learn about ‘Plan of Action’ and by the end, it will be a big take away! However, most of this will depend on how you understand your reaction time. Remember that ‘faster is not always better.’
2. We all have heard the phrase ‘going inwards,’ trying to answer your questions without seeking external aid is one of the first steps of ‘going inwards’. Solving your problems is not always easy. Therefore, acknowledgment of the ones that can’t be solved independently is essential. This helps you find the right people and foster new relationships.
3. Your knowledge is a function of your network collective, meaning, your knowledge and experience will limit itself to the network and relationships you will have. The more you network in your area of work, the more knowledge you will create and exchange. However, networking has its pressures and stress, and specifically, introverts lose a lot in the race of network. Yes, I’m calling it a competition! Let me explain this in the next point.
4. When you network, you will realize that several networks and societies that work in isolation and your networking with them will bring good knowledge for you and them. However, networking is a race because we all are not trained to respond and act in the same way! (That is one big reason why interviews are part of standard intake procedure in offices, schools, and almost everywhere we work, and it is bound to stay so for a long time to come!). Networking works like multiple micro-interviews, and we find people whom we want to work with. But here is a catch, you don’t need to run the race you are not trained for. You need to find what you are good at and keep pushing yourself to the limits of it. For instance, if you know, you are good at writing and not good at making a first impression talking, this will make you sure that won’t break the ice for your meeting with a person whom you like, a prospective Ph.D. supervisor, or a company representative? Write a ‘first email’ to break the ice, share what you know, and ask what more you would like to know (Caution: Don’t send everything you want to do in your life in your first email, start slow and climb up the ladder.)
5. Steps do not govern success but an ‘Original Recipe’ – your recipe. Your’ plan of action’ will have all the points I tried to explain above. It is your responsibility to make your recipe work. Therefore, your life will always move at the pace you plan to act and move forward with it.

The lists above are not exhaustive but a write up of experiences. So here we end with the answer to question one. People in an advanced stage of life would have more things to add to the lists, and I request you please to do so! You may drop your ideas in the comments or try and write the ‘first email’ to me.

The first question was a long explanation, but I did it intentionally so that it helps you understand the description in the next two questions. Let’s go to the second question-

Whether I should do a Ph.D.?

Well, short answer- No one knows, only you can answer this question, and you must avoid asking this question to anyone! Well, asking it is not prohibited completely, but still, ask yourself first!

Let’s do a long answer now, we often ask, ‘do you think I should….’ type questions to people whom you feel know you to your core, and these set of people change as you age. Until early adulthood, these people are your parents, soon after it is your friends. When you reach a certain age and start to network, you will ask such questions to a lot of people you think you can align your thoughts with. However, somewhere in the process, you will find your guiding light – A mentor!

A mentor could be anyone from a mountain goat to a book. However, in most cases, a mentor is a human embodiment of ‘frugal innovation’ in Hindi, a Jugaad. A mentor is beyond strategic thought for your ‘plan of action’ in a Ph.D. course and your life. They learn from you to make you better. Sometimes they are younger than you when they find you, or you find them. But be assured that they will drop breadcrumbs for you in the vast unknown, and don’t worry, if you have the right mentor, they will know where to drop the breadcrumbs because they know where you will look for them. A mentor will ask you a lot of questions not to bother you, but to know you better, mentors are team players, and they love to remain so.

Basically, mentors are excellent listeners. They ask you questions to understand you better. When you answer the questions, they know the limits of your knowledge. It is here where mentors get to know how they can help you to go beyond your goals in life. Talk to them to know yourself better.

So, what do you need to ask yourself before you can answer a prospective mentor’s questions? Before you ask anyone – ‘Whether I should do a Ph.D.?’. You need to ask yourself this –  ‘Why do I want to do a Ph.D.?’. My unbiased advice would be, do not make a move until you have at least a sketchy answer to the question, it a simple ‘Start with WHY?’.

Once you have an answer to your ‘WHY?’, go out finding a mentor, talk to people, professors, prospective advisors about your ideas and things you want to do as a Ph.D. Candidate. Mind you, in this process, some of you will find people who can recommend you for your lifetime. All you need to ask yourself is ‘Why?’ and it will give you a direction of where to go next. All of this seems harsh, and it is, but it is one of the most critical steps to slingshot yourself into the Ph.D. process.

By the way, you can reach out to me if you need help here. I’ll be glad to help you ask the ‘why’. However, you need to develop your answer.

If there is the sun, sometimes there are eclipses too. If we talk too much of positives, where will the negatives go? They accumulate! Same as the fashion industry, a person may love to keep up with the latest fashion trend for their next talk as an environmentalist. Somehow, I’m sure they will have no idea what an effluent treatment plant does in a fashion factory.

Further, how the fashion industry is the most attractive yet responsible for one of the most severe types of pollution in our plant, you may have figured that I am now moving to the dark side of a Ph.D. process. But don’t worry, it is still an integral part. The dark side pretty much is an undiscussed, undebated area in research and academia. In the process of the Ph.D., as you evolve as a researcher, you will shed a lot of attachments.

Along with your sweat and tears, you will shed friendships, relationships, routines, habits, and people. In fact, lots of the last ones, people. But you will meet a lot of people, get into new routines and habits while adding more to your Facebook. Most of all, you will discover yourself and your inner circle of people.

On a phone call with one of my good friends, we discussed our experiences as Ph.D. candidates in different parts of the world. We also discussed how demanding it is and, of course, rant about it. However, over the long call, we concluded that ‘whether you can do a Ph.D. or not’ is a subject of three qualities you develop along the way:

1. Willingness to sustain through the process (remember the venturi conduit analogy),
2. Ability to push and ask yourself ‘why’(and find your mentor),
3. Capacity to bear the losses, along an unknown path (and find yourself).

These three qualities are interdependent and collectively support you in finding the answer to your question – ‘Why I want to do ABC in my life?’. In this case, ‘Why I want to do a Ph.D.?’ This brings me to the last question:

Is a Ph.D. degree worth the time and effort?

The answer to this question will always remain subjective and a function of how you weigh your efforts. If you weigh your efforts in terms of a higher salary or more perks, that is one way. If you consider a more extensive network and more knowledge at your disposal as gain brought together over time, that is another way, indeed. However, there is no one answer to this question. Several aspirants and their guardians ask me this question. And to my surprise, in most cases, this was the first question I got asked, even from total strangers when we met for the first time. Getting interviewed by an aspirant or their guardian is an exciting experience.

Listening to several, I have observed that the general perception about a Ph.D. is it serves as a golden pass to enter academia, become a professor. Then it is done, no further use. Little to nothing is known about the benefits and career options a Ph.D. graduate can look in to. Several of them are only open for candidates that have a Ph.D. However, almost all options are sensitive to the context your research is in and issues your Ph.D. work tries to solve. To give you a glimpse, I have tried to list a few options below:

1. Independent Consulting: This, you may start right away. However, it is aligned according to the scale of your network. In this case, you will be advising firms and organizations that are working on the issue you are studying.
2. Think-Tank Researcher: Researcher in an applied research organization. Usually, these organizations work on grassroots issues. Therefore, they are context-sensitive. For this to work in your favor, your Ph.D. should be directly related to what the organization deals with.
3. International Organizations like World Bank, ADB, OECD, and others hire a lot of Ph.D. graduates. This is one big reason why their reports look stellar and are pinpointed on one or a few issues.
4. The novelty of the research is of paramount importance in a Ph.D. Therefore, as a Ph.D. graduate, you get to know a lot about an issue, which a few have tried to solve, and only you have the solution. This may give you a significant opportunity to enter the world of start-ups.
5. Scientific writing. Write papers, articles, start blogs, write your own books on the topic of your choice.

Is there a Proven path?

Above, I have tried to put together a map in words. Still, it won’t change the universal truth that ‘Ph.D. is a degree that trains you to solve complex problems,’ both in your career and life. Looking at it, this way makes it sound worth the time and effort. However, all of this will remains subjective to your willingness, ability, and capacity, until you devise your way and would put it to use. Any which ways, your zeal will develop along with your interest in solving difficult problems.

Also, please know that a Ph.D. degree is only partly about the institute! It is more about your relationship with your research, yourself, and your supervisor. A good institute will always provide your better outlook on your research but it doesn’t mean you will always get the best mentors there. There are several things that I haven’t talked about and this post is a generalist explanation for understanding the challenge of a Ph.D. While you are in the venturi conduit of a Ph.D. process, your life will be fast and slow at the same time. At the end of it, the experience will depend on how much you can carry, contain, and give away at the other end.

Send your questions here:

This work is licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0