I work as a postdoc, but how did I come to this? How does one become a postdoc? Here is the second part of the answer to this question; please, see the first part here: How does one become a postdoc? My story (part 1). Towards the end of the PhD, everyone starts thinking of “what’s next”. There are different paths one can take after adding a Dr to their title. In computer science, you are often asked whether you want to stay in academia or switch to industry…
I am a postdoc in human-computer interaction and digital health, but how did I come to this? How does one become a postdoc?
Short answer: "You get your PhD and stay to work in academia," but here is my long(er) answer. I share it to show that a path leading to academic research in human-computer interaction (HCI) can be very different, and mine wasn’t straight and smooth.
Since March 2020, I started thinking of what happens after my current postdoc position at Trinity College Dublin. I want to share my search experience and reasoning to reveal what happens before social media messages, starting with "I am happy to announce that I join...". For me, it was a long and tiring process, complicated by the pandemic and almost an existential crisis and re-evaluation of life priorities that it caused.
My work in computer science research is closely related to social factors and, ultimately, people. All my research projects involve participants and stakeholders to learn their experiences and views on various technology and health-related topics and issues. A big part of my academic work is being involved in a variety of activities designed to engage the wider community and broaden participation. These activities also contribute to "Education and Public Engagement (EPE)", which includes many and varied ways university staff and students engage with others outside the institution. While I am used to some EPE activities, I am still learning to use other ways and channels, like radio.
The recent shift of academic (and not only) life into digital space due to lockdown and social distancing removed lots of important things from us, such as meeting colleagues face-to-face and going on conferences, but also made participation easier in some way. One of the drawbacks of that is the fear of missing out, as there is a large number of interesting online events on the topics of digital health, security and privacy, and human-computer interaction that seem to happen almost every day.
Two weeks ago, I had an excellent opportunity to talk about my computer science career with young people from Kazakhstan interested in IT. I have shared my educational experience and the path that led me to my academic position. Talking about it and answering the questions, I have realised that it's not always clear what IT researchers do and how our work in Academia is different from the work in IT companies. I decided to write about it, but then I had an even better idea. As my experience can be biased and non-generalisable, I decided to run a little survey among my friends and colleagues who have both: academic and industrial experience in computer science. Next, I describe the main points that came up from our reflections.
