Hello everyone, I am in a crossroad-phase of my life and I wanted to share my thoughts with my fellow TrekBBSers. First of all, if I choose so, I can have a new job! Yay! Well, I don't have it yet, but I passed all relevant exams and interviews, had all the required medical tests done and now I am waiting for the official announcement. This job is with the Police Force where I will be working as a computer science special officer. I don't know all the details yet. I doubt it will be something highly challenging but it seems more interesting than other job alternatives right now. However, taking this job means turning my life upside down. I am close to getting my PhD in computer science and, up to now, I have been thinking about an academic career. Right now, there are very limitted career opportunities in my country. I don't really foresee any tenure track positions for my generation of people. While there are some research positions available here, to follow an academic career, I will have to relocate to some other country. While being willing to do it, I would prefer to build my life here, close to my family and friends. Now, this job offer comes along. I will still have to move and go to the capital. I do not expect to be as well-paid as an academic abroad, but I will have an average-paid job right now and not in 5 or 10 years. Also, since Master and PhD titles were asked for the job, I want to believe that it will be something more stimulating than a simple office job. I feel like the logical decision is to take the job, but I can't help feeling out of my waters. My PhD is going very well, I truly believe that I have the chance to persue a nice academic career. But this will come with the cost of moving from country to country for post-docs for years and most probably never returning home. If I take the job, I will have more free time for myself and better chances for having a family before my 40s. But I will also miss the travelling and the conferences and doing research. No matter what choice I make, I may regret it in a few years and there is no way to know it beforehand. This decision will define my career and I can't seem to find the way to decide. I imagine there are people here who have been in similar situations at some point of their life, so I wanted to share my concerns. Thank you for reading this far down!
Yeah, best of luck! I'm in a similar situation..today I'm actually going to a job interview myself and have all this nervous pent up energy right now about the drive. Although I've been driving for about five years now, I've never driven to the capital city by myself and am kinda scared of the traffic. :O But I have my Dad's GPS and it'll get me there safe and sound. I know where it is though so it shouldn't be a problem..I'm more worried about damn traffic. Anyway, wish me luck! The interview's @ 1pm today.
Computer science special officer? Oh bugger... I'd better start cleaning up my digital footprints. Seems this makes us natural enemies, luv'. Normally I would say congratulations, now I believe a "good luck" will suffice.
Location says Greece. If that's accurate, not sure if taking a government job in Athens is gonna be a great move long-term. Not to rain on the parade and all, but more as a 'who knows what will happen?' sorta thing. At some point, there's going to be drastic goverment job reform, and already tons of stories about people not getting paid, etc. Working abroad may not be the worst thing at this stage. Anyway, if I've misunderstood the situation, sorry, and the job itself sounds interesting. Hope it all works out.
Wicked problem. You can't solve this one rationally/algorithmically unfortunately, nor can anyone advise you with a method to help you solve it. A Baconian list of pros & cons will always stalemate because you lack sufficient data to measure and weigh them up. Neither can you safely simulate the outcome. The inconvenient but honest truth is that you need to go with your gut instinct about what kind of life you want and which (least-worst) set of risks you're prepared to accept, and roll the dice i.e go with a heuristic/fuzzy approach to solving the problem. Good luck!
Tough decision. Academia is certainly a somewhat insecure and unsteady field of occupation (although I was under the impression that it's much better when you're in sciences and computer science). Like Scout, I'm not sure, either, whether a police job is really such a safe thing like it used to be. We hear all these horror stories about public servants in Greece having cut their wages significantly or not being paid at all. Maybe that's affecting only some of the branches. Additionally, there's the prospect of Greece going bankrupt which doesn't look unlikely right now. Not a great time for us here in Europe. So, I'd err on the side of my passions but as Holdfast says it's really your decision and you should do what you think is best.
Does it really have to be all that left and right? You're getting your PhD, right? Couldn't you peruse an academic career at a later point as well? I really don't know how that is in computer science (or in Greece, actually), but with those fields which are generally slow to begin with (literature, history) you can usually come back to it at any point you like. If not, basically what most others have already said. Make the decision which feels best and then, even if it shouldn't turn out to be the right one eventually, always know that you did what you thought was best.
Thanks for the input guys! I know that, at the end of the day, it is a gut instinct decision as you people said, it's just that I can't seem to make it yet. Yes, finding a good job in Greece is tough right now and, as I said in the first post, the money in academia abroad is better. However, even though it is not a financially good time in my country right now, I don't really like the prospect of never returning back and, if I pursue an academic career, it seems difficult to ever find a position at a Greek university. I am also considering what Me-Ike said. Trying the job out for a couple of years and try to keep myself in the academia game so that I can go back there again. I don't know if this can be done but I could try.
I have a lot of respect for Police IT tech's, despite the fact that i consider us natural enemies. They do a lot of good. And they're usually damn good at their jobs. Had a few run ins with them a while back. Now, I'm pretty damn good with a computer, but they were so far above me that it was frightening. I had keyloggers and malware for months afterwards. I still don't know how they traced me, but i gotta give it to them. They know what they're doing.
Tough decision. Good luck. It sounds like you're very concerned about leaving behind family and friends, so the police job might be a good idea in the short term. You can always change your mind later. And it will give you an opportunity to build up some savings.
^ Actually, I'm building up more savings now because I have a PhD scholarship that is higher than an average salary. It's a tough decision indeed. I can only hope that whatever I choose will work out fine in the future.
Who's saying you will never return to Greece? Unless you've broken some laws and are on the run so to speak return is always a possibility. Now with the current situation in Greece i don't believe you can afford to be picky about jobs.. if you really don't want to leave take the job.. it is a steady income and you will have safety (and who knows.. the job may turn out more interesting than you think and you may stay). The situation in Greece may (must) turn around at some point and while you're waiting you will gain work experience which is invaluable if you want to apply elsewhere. Now i live in Germany which has been stable and prospering (more or less) through the years but i come from ex-Yugoslavia and my parents live there again when both retired so i can say something on the matter there which is similar to Greece. My parents own a house and have had some young couples and families rent the appartment upstairs and most of them were well educated people. The situation in Serbia is still very hard even for academically educated people and most of those young people have left the country and none of them have ever regretted it. They sometimes make 5-10 times what they got in the old country and were able to build upon their degrees and advance their education which wasn't possible in their old country (or only for the very lucky few or those with connections). It is hard to leave your country of birth and your friends/family but in my experience, after i had to relocate due to attending university, you will find new friends and go on. So it's up to you.. future career prospects are way better if you leave Greece now but you have a ( currently) lucky draw to be offered a steady job in a catastrophic social and economic climate in your country.
I'm in the later stages of my life, and when I look back, I regret the times in my life when I gave up on a dream and chose a different path. It seems to me that you are both giving up a dream and the great adventure of working in a foreign land. In this modern era you can communicate with friends and family all over the globe. I would urge you to reconsider what you are doing.
That's one of the things that I think about. On the other hand, another big dream of mine is having a family, something that is much harder to do when in academia, in the sense that, during the first 4-5 years of your post-doc life, you have to move from country to country and keeping your publication record high. It's not easy taking a year off to have a child. There is just no way to put things on a scale and decide. I think, in the end, I'll make the decision on the fly, depending on what my instinct tells me the day they'll call me for the job. Until then, however, I like hearing people's opinions, thank you all for your input!
Hello everyone! I am resurrecting this thread from the dead to tell you that I decided to take the job! There are many cons and pros for both my options. I decided to take the job and see how things go. I'll try to keep the door of academia open for a couple of years, something that I believe is do-able in my case. In the end, I felt that I wanted to try a job which actually has working hours and your mind does not have to work until you sleep (as in the case of being in the academia). I like research but I want to try something different as well. If I don't like the job after a year or so, I'll work hard and find my way back. Thank you all for your comments! And wish me luck!