When to leave grad school off your resume (2012)

http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/2012/04/10/when-to-leave-grad-school-off-your-resume/

by jimsojim • 11 years ago

12 18 11 years ago

blog.penelopetrunk.com

I disagree with this blog post. I can't imagine any employer would look negatively at a graduate degree. Even if in an unrelated field, an argument can be made that a grad degree adds breadth of experience.

noelwelsh• 11 years ago

There are some people who feel strongly that graduate school is a waste of time, a moral failing, or worse. The author is clearly one of them. Fuck 'em.

More reasonably, nobody has the right to dictate to you how to spend your time, once you are an adult. If you want to study a subject in depth (and contrary to the author's assertion, there are some things that are virtually impossible to learn on your own) you have every right to do so. If an employer doesn't respect your education you almost certainly don't want to work with them.

smt88• 11 years ago

If you're able to make decisions without considering how they'll affect your income, you're enjoying a luxury that the vast majority of humans ever born cannot enjoy.

The liberal arts have always been a privilege of those who don't have to worry about where their food comes from or how they'll pay off a huge debt. I'm one of those privileged few, and it's endlessly enriching to have studied and understand various humanities and "impractical" fields of study, but I'm fully aware how lucky I am.

nobody has the right to dictate to you how to spend your time

That's true, but they have the right to decide how they perceive you and whether they want to pay you.

If an employer doesn't respect your education you almost certainly don't want to work with them.

That may be true, but (as I said above) most people can't make decisions this way. They're lucky to be covering their expenses with each paycheck, and they can't afford to be choosy about employers.

In some cases, their field is small enough or their resume is weak enough that they're desperate for any job at all. The employer has the power in most industries.

cmrx642• 11 years ago

This seems to be aimed more at humanities degrees than mathematics or computer science or other such technical degrees. I do still think applies in some cases to some jobs.

Edit: looking at another post, http://blog.penelopetrunk.com/2011/08/29/voices-of-the-defen..., it's obvious that she is only considering humanities degrees and ignoring STEM fields.

relkor2• 11 years ago

Fair enough. I am not sure myself what exactly people with a PhD in Literature or Social Justice go through to be anointed Dr.

chasing• 11 years ago

What the hell? If I'm hiring, I'd much rather see time in grad school listed rather than a gap. Getting a Master's or PhD takes time, focus, dedication, and intelligence. Those are all good things to show, even if the specific subject matter is different.

Also: I'm wholly of the opinion that people who have strong backgrounds in multiple subjects are deeper and more creative thinkers. (And just generally more interesting to have around.)

ghaff• 11 years ago

The author of this post seems to be laboring under the impression that everyone has a nice neat career trajectory in which everything fits neatly into place. And he doesn't like MBAs so he thinks people who have them ought to hide the fact even at the cost of having a gap on a resume.

Sure, don't emphasize irrelevant stuff but, in general, this seems like pretty silly advice.

cmrx642• 11 years ago

(The author uses "her" in her biography section)

relkor2• 11 years ago

I came away from the article feeling that the author missed the point of a PhD completely, at least for the hard sciences. When you complete a PhD, you have by definition extended the scope of human knowledge. You must conduct original research to get a PhD, its not just another couple of years of showing up to class. A PhD student will typically have 5-7 journal papers, a couple of conference presentations, perhaps a best paper, and an entire thesis by the time they get out.

That is a lot of proven work, ability, and expertise that very few other people on the planet have in your specific area.

gtf212• 11 years ago

This article can't be serious...

Grad school on your resume is a formal announcement of a mistake.

Studying something is a mistake if you don't dedicate the rest of your life to it, really?

She lives on a farm in Wisconsin and homeschools her sons

This tells you everything you need to know about the author.

glxc• 11 years ago

She lives on a farm in Wisconsin and homeschools her sons

More power to her, her professional success has allowed her to pursue her passion. I think the lesson then is that to pursue your passion you first need to earn it.

Grad school on your resume is a formal announcement of a mistake [if not working in the field]

Success is working forward, and not worrying about or admitting to mistakes

gtf212• 11 years ago

I was talking about the homeschooling ;)

munin• 11 years ago

4. A Ph.D on your resume often makes you look like a poor self-learner.

This doesn't make any sense because after writing a dissertation, you have by definition learned something that no one else knew, therefore, no one could have taught it to you. How does that make you a poor self learner?

deutronium• 11 years ago

What a terrible article, how would leaving a gap look remotely better.

realusername• 11 years ago

"Penelope Trunk [...] She lives on a farm in Wisconsin."

Culture plays a huge part on the perceived value of degrees. On my case I did not do a degree to learn things but mainly to have the right stamp at the right place. You can be sure people will have a look at this part of the CV even with 10 years of experience in the field. This article looks a bit too american-centric.

6d0debc071• 11 years ago

The piece given here is how she would look at a CV of that pattern - and as far as it goes that's fair enough. Personally if I see you with a four to eight year gap on your CV my first question, assuming I'm hiring for a significant role and your CV is strong in other respects, is going to be 'So, what did you do during those years?' I'm not just going to assume you were working small jobs to support yourself, I'm going to be thinking 'Were they working small jobs? If so why didn't anyone there hire them full time? Were they in prison? Were they a trouble employee?'

Certain parts of the recruitment and interviewing process are effectively black boxes. You can guess at things that HR/hiring managers want - experience and achievements related to the role they're looking to fill, relevant qualifications - and there are some cultural things, (you wouldn't put a picture of yourself on a CV in this country for instance,) but beyond that it's a very muddy game. There's limited advice on that front - though my personal take is that it would be a great shame not to be hired because you've not given the best account of yourself. Or, perhaps worse, to be hired because you've given someone the wrong impression of yourself (assuming you're not desperate for the money of course) and end up in a role that's going to make you miserable.

michael_h• 11 years ago

Ah, good old Penelope Trunk - a virtual emporium of poorly thought out notions, backed up by nothing, but presented with conviction. It has been a long while...

Need career advice? By all means, ask a person with no experience in your field!

chriswarbo• 11 years ago

So the author considers the opportunity to learn and conduct research full-time as a bad thing, because it's not "working" in the "adult world", yet considers travelling, sports training and dancing to be fine?

When to leave grad school off your resume (2012)

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