Hi All,

Its been a rough couple of months since I finished my PhD. I had several rejections just hit me the week before Christmas. These were also places I passed several screening stages and interviews for, hence absolutely gutted.

I try to personalise my CV and cover letter for each and every application but this doesn't seem to be working. I get automated rejection emails a few days or weeks later. Try to follow up on feedback and in a few rare cases I have been told that I was just not experienced enough.

I can perhaps try applying everywhere with the same CV, but I don't think that would have a higher success rate...

I have so far been applying to jobs with some element of programming because I used that during my PhD. Also been applying for Data science jobs but was foolish enough to think I could get in without relevant experience just because I may have used some of the techniques during my PhD. Hence this stupidity caused me to miss the deadline this year for a lot of the Data science fellowship bootcamps which I believe is the standard track of entry.

I don't know.. these areas could just be hyper competitive areas to get into, hence I am seeking advice on where else I can try applying?

Based on the current time it is taking me to research a firm, personalise the CV and cover letter, submitting the application, and going through the screening rounds (if I don't get rejected immediately), I estimate I can focus all my time to apply to about 30 - 40 more places until March 2019, by which I will be 6 months unemployed if I don't get in anywhere.

After a certain point, I am worried that a several month long unemployment gap could deter employers from even considering me.

What options do I have to avoid such a scenario?

Thanks for reading and greatly appreciate any advice anyone may have.

Hi all, I'm about to finish my PhD in a scientific field in a few months time (if all goes well). I've recently submitted my thesis to get some feedback from my supervisor before I send it off to the examiners officially. Hence right now I'm just waiting...

However I am seriously worried about my career prospects after I finish in a few months. My time during my PhD was unfortunately not an enjoyable one. I did not receive any mentoring or any guidance from anyone unlike other people in my cohort did. Anyway, whats in the past is done, I am aiming to move on forward with my life. Because of my bad experience during my PhD I have been completely put off from doing a post doc, which was perhaps my original goal. I unfortunately don't think my supervisor will write a good recommendation letter either so I wouldn't be able to stay in academia even if I wanted to since most universities require academic references.

Anyway, I have been looking at jobs in industry and I honestly don't know where I'd fit in because no one has told me whether I'm good at this or that. I have some basic programming skills since I had to use it extensively during my research. But it is no where at the level of computer science graduates and software developers. I appear to be grossly under-qualified for most job descriptions I've looked at relating to entry level programming related jobs in data science, research etc. Since I'm now approaching 30, I'm probably too old to get into most entry level graduate jobs since those are mainly advertised to recent undergraduates who would most likely be 21 - 22 years of age...

Anyway I look forward to your comments and/or advice. Feel free to privately message me if you don't want to post anything publicly.

Hi all, I am in my final year and recently got offered a full PhD scholarship with an enhanced stipend at a prestigious university (Uni A) where the department is considered top in the country in the area of my PhD. Now I don't want to sound ungrateful here as many would consider me "lucky" to be even offered a place, however, I am having second thoughts because I didn't really like the supervisor and the topic of study when I was called to an interview, so I was quite surprised I even got made an offer.

The problem is that I got accepted in my current university (Uni B) which I am happy to stay for another 3 - 4 years as I liked the supervisor and topic there. But unfortunately have been put on an indefinite "waiting list" as I missed out on the funding this year due to my grades (they give priority to students with pristine academic records).

Also the university that made me the funded offer (Uni A) require me to accept within 3 days or the offer expires. So I'm in a bit of a difficult situation here deciding...

Should I really accept this offer from Uni A and slug through 3 - 4 years in a topic I'm not really interested in and force myself to like it? Or should I reject this offer and possibly run the risk of ending up with no PhD positions this year if funding from Uni B doesn't work out?

I would also like to note that I cannot afford to take year out, so I need to get a funded PhD, job or anything...

Would greatly appreciate any advice regarding my situation. Thank you.


P.S: I have also considered looking around for graduate level jobs, however have not seen any luck there so far as I got rejected from a dozen odd places I applied last summer/autumn...