What is the point to choose a carrier in Fundamental Scientific Research?

          Fundamental Scientific Research? Or Fundamental Financial Security? 

A tale

One day one person visited the sports store to buy a pair of trekking boots. After spending around a couple of hours he came out of the store with a T-shirt, a rucksack, a water-bottle, a pair of gloves and two thermal trousers and then he noticed he forgot to buy what he wanted to buy, the trekking boots. That guy purchased all those things, though those were not required for him. Then why did he purchase? Because those were offered to him with some special price with some special offers, and after listening those offers he forgot what is his actual wish or need. From the sales person’s point of view it was a perfect marketing and maybe he would get a salary hike from his boss. But, what it was from the customer’s point of view? Did any of you face the same situation?

What do  you want to say?

Let’s see when we face this kind of scenario. During choosing a specific stream to build our carrier, most of the time we are offered what we basically do not want. But at that young stage we and our parents re-think for multiple times, and become attracted to the future offer being provided to us and end up by choosing a stream for our career what we do not want, and after finishing the course we entered into profession and suddenly realize that the offer provided earlier is not that much attractive as we thought. Then here comes job pressure, hypertension, depression etc. We feels like stuck in our working environment, which results in poor performance and end up with a mess in our career.

The current scenario- Nobel Prize or Thesis Submission?

Now, most of the time selection of an academic carrier (not a corporate carrier) in the field of science is done by focusing a ‘Nobel Prize’. A young mind with blank enthusiasm and no experience cannot think less than that. Currently, in academia, after finishing a bachelor or a master degree when a person joins a PhD in a reputed institution, he or she is being called as ‘graduate student’. It is not easy to hear that term for a master’s degree awarded person when his or her engineer or MBA holder friend might be earning on a managerial position in a corporate sector.  Now a days, when academic competition increased several folds, PhD degree is considered as an entry point of academia. But, a full time PhD in fundamental science takes around four to six years in average worldwide, means the time he or she have already spent to acquire bachelor and master’s degrees. Now, during this time period a student passes through numerous experiences, some of them are good, some of them are bad. But what more or less similar for all is to face a huge work load and financial pressure. Finishing a good scientific project successfully that will make shine one’s future is not an easy task. Tremendous patience, concentration and labor are required for that. Therefore, many of the students realize they have put their foot in the wrong shoes. And throughout this process the major expectations or enthusiasm is used be diminished. Their focus comes down from ‘Nobel Prize’ to ‘thesis submission’. Even after that a huge uncertainty of the next phase of career makes them exhausted and disheartened towards scientific research. Now some of them join postdoc wherever they get, whatever the research topic is and some of them join industry, mostly in R&D section which make them feel alien in the new working environment.

Money or No Money? Tenacity – Is it needed to be a successful scientist?

Here is the term ‘tenacity’ comes. A few people become able to make success exactly what they wanted before joining the field of scientific research. It should be very much clear for the person who wants to build an academic carrier in the field of science. The academia is of course not a money making career like corporate, therefore, it is not a good idea at all to compare it with current corporate jobs in terms of earning. However, currently, all the tenured fellowship based academic jobs including postdoctoral fellowships and research associateships provide a reasonable remuneration to live a quality life to some extent, but of course money cannot be the motivation of an academic carrier in science, the key motivation should always be the research outcome which will be appreciated and honored throughout the world by the world-class academicians, and that will later help a researcher to secure a good academic position. The dilemma in between research-fame and financial prosperity takes an early carrier researcher mostly towards failure. Because, now a day securing a faculty position (permanent academic position) in the field of hardcore fundamental science (not considering the engineering field) in a reputed academic institution is super competitive throughout the world, and for making a true success in this field, getting a position in a quality research institution cannot be replaced by anything. Therefore, major pillar of a successful early carrier in academia is to having ‘tenacity’, ‘patience’, ‘capacity of continuous learning’ and above of all ‘love and addiction towards science’. Who has it, makes success in long term, who does not have it…you know.