Beyond the Ivory Tower

All I Really Need to Know I Learned ... in Graduate School?

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By Robin Wagner

In his best-selling book, Robert Fulghum advised readers to look no further than kindergarten for most of the important lessons they needed for life. But what about graduate school? The lessons it imparts for Ph.D.'s-turned-professors are obvious. But what about those Ph.D.'s who work outside the academy; what did they learn in graduate school that is relevant to a postacademic career?

It's not uncommon for engineering and science Ph.D.'s to find a nonacademic job that draws heavily on the specific or general content of their academic training. Andrew Bogan, a Ph.D. in biophysics, works as a biotech venture capitalist, evaluating new companies and new product ideas for their investment potential. Since most biotech companies are founded by Ph.D. scientists, Mr. Bogan explains, "The entrepreneurs really appreciate being able to speak at their own level without having to dumb down the science. Obviously, my Ph.D. doesn't make me an expert in every field, but I can learn enough to be conversant much more quickly than people in the finance community who lack technical training."

Eric Scharpf has a slightly different take on the value of his science and engineering background. A Ph.D. in chemical engineering, Mr. Scharpf worked in the private sector for 10 years after graduate school on engineering projects only tangentially related to his thesis. But some of the skills he learned during his academic training proved essential to his success: "The planning, project management, design, fabrication, and process-development skills from grad school came in quite handy."

Most Ph.D.'s enjoying postacademic careers speak less of specific content from their graduate education and more of the sophisticated intellectual skills they acquired during doctoral training. David Paul, a Ph.D. in political science who works as a writer and consultant, recalls, "I learned how to think critically and systematically about facts, and I learned something about how to distinguish facts from a lot of other things that are commonly passed off as facts: conjecture, opinion, preconception, common knowledge."

When I asked Ph.D.'s what they had learned in graduate school that they still used in their postacademic careers, critical-thinking skills was a frequent answer. Susan Basalla, a Ph.D. in English and one of the authors of "So What Are You Going to Do With That? A Guide to Career-Changing for M.A.'s and Ph.D.'s, likens her graduate education to "intellectual Green Beret" training: "You know those drills where they drop the person in the middle of the forest and they have to read the landscape to find their way out? That's what I learned to do with information -- I can sort through the chaos and pull out recognizable patterns that help me formulate a plan of action."

Ed Chan, a chemical engineer, agrees. The most relevant lesson he took away from graduate school was "learning to master the unknown quickly. In grad school, we came in clueless about our thesis. We graduated as the expert in the subject."

Even some aspects of academe that might have seemed at the time like a curse can turn out to be a blessing. Mr. Scharpf explains: "Probably the most valuable skill from grad school was the ability to manage my own situation. I had a very hands-off adviser who required me to take the major responsibility for the lab and equipment budgets as well as how I would be able to develop my interests into a viable thesis. This has been vital in my current roles as both a partner in a start-up firm and as a new resident of New Zealand after most of my previous life spent in the U.S."

And if academic politics vex you now as a graduate student, take heart that there are survival skills to be learned in the experience. Mr. Paul, the political-science Ph.D. who has worked independently as a writer and editorial consultant for two decades, points out the irony that despite his doctorate in political science, "one thing I did not learn -- and should have, because it was all around me -- was the art of maneuvering within the shark-infested waters of institutional politics." He advises graduate students to "pay close attention to what goes on in faculty circles; the politics within a university reflect similar circumstances in companies and organizations outside the university."

And for those of us who have gravitated toward academic administration, the content of our academic training has far less relevance than simply the years of experience in an academic institution. In my own situation, the nonstudent roles I played in graduate school -- teaching assistant, academic adviser, graduate-council representative, course coordinator, and resident tutor -- serve almost on a daily basis to inform my thinking and analysis of the business and policy issues I deal with as an administrator.

So, then, did we learn everything we needed to know in graduate school? The answer of course is no -- not everything. But we did learn plenty, and many of us mine our graduate experience every day for lessons valuable outside the ivory tower.