Changing Career Intentions Away from Academia

Abstract

Here you meet eleven individuals who changed their career intentions away from research-teaching positions during or after their PhDs, prompted by personal or structural reasons or a combination of the two. Personal reasons included academic partners’ career goals, parenting, nearness to family, and illness. Structural reasons often related to disenchantment with academic life, the years required before possibly getting a research-teaching position, and/or a sense that they were not competitive enough to obtain such positions. The stories are clustered: first, the five social scientists who have already made the shift to new careers and then, the four scientists who are still in the process. You may value reading these stories if you have any doubts about remaining in the academy.