An update on PhDs and jobs

Hi folks,

Apologies for the rather long stretch since my last blog; as you know, much of the past couple of months has been spent going to interviews (for both PhD projects and interviews, and far more than I’m capable of recalling off the top of my head), usually with the same unwelcome outcome. However, I’m pleased to report that my long, exhaustive search for a PhD project for the next academic year is finally at an end, having accepted an offer from the group of James Dowden at the University of Nottingham. Indeed, towards the end of my search, I even had options (!) in terms of both institution and project; towards the end of March, I visited Simon Lewis at the University of Bath, and he also seemed keen to make me an offer. However, I decided to accept the Dowden offer for two main reasons:

1. Simon will only be starting his independent research career as of this September, and so is a bit of an unknown quantity in both academic and industry circles; James, on the other hand, has spent a few more years in academia and so has built up more of a reputation when it comes to his research.

2. I had a slight preference for the project on offer from James (as I think it struck a better balance between methodology development and natural product/total synthesis work; apologies to all my non-scientist readers for the all the jargon in that last sentence, but trust me, there really is no clearer way of saying it!)

Anyway, confidentiality issues prevent me from divulging precise details about the project, though I can show you the confirmation letters I received, both from the chemistry department itself and the central postgraduate admissions office (just to prove I’m not making it up, obviously!):

• Chemistry department:



• Postgraduate admissions office:



While the search for a PhD project for the next academic year has ultimately proven fruitful, the search to find work in the interim period has unfortunately been less of a success. Since my last blog, I had a telephone interview for a job in Groningen, Holland (though because the length of the contract would have resulted in a clash with the start of my PhD, nothing ultimately came of it) and a very drawn-out interview process for a job at Manchester Organics, based in the much-closer-to-home Frodsham in Cheshire. Having had a telephone pre-interview, I was subsequently invited not only to an interview in Frodsham but a follow-up “trial day” (i.e. working for a day in the labs; mind you, I spent most of the day stood around watching other people work, carrying out the occasional analytical test and setting up one set of apparatus for an experiment the following Monday, before being allowed to leave at 2.30pm.) Imagine my frustration, then, at being told I wasn’t going to be made an offer after having gone through all that (I did get a very nice lunch out of the trial day, though!)

All of this means, of course, that I’m still looking for gainful employment over the next three months, but thankfully with the PhD monkey off my back, I no longer feel the need to restrict my job search to chemistry-based jobs (although, obviously, that is still my preference) and can expand my search to any job which will keep me occupied for the next three months (with the Euros coming up, bar work looks like an increasingly enticing option!) If anyone has any offers of work or knows of any good search engines, by the way, feel free to let me know (either via the comments section or my e-mail address.)

Well, that’s all for the moment. I’m going to try and post a European leagues round-up, though probably one that’s less exhaustive (and exhausting) than my set of season previews, as well as a Euro 2008 preview, over the next couple of months (there may even be some output during the tournament itself, who knows?) In the meantime, all comments/suggestions are gratefully received by yours truly.

Later,
Liam

A quick update

Hello folks,

Well, a lot has happened in three months, and I suppose it’s incumbent on me to inform all of my loyal blog readers (hello to you both) of where I’m at career-wise. I’m going to get the bad news out of the way, first of all, by saying that my contract was not renewed at Evotec/Aptuit (I should perhaps clarify things a little here, by saying that I was working in the Chemical Development department, which was under Evotec’s control when I arrived but was sold off to Aptuit at the end of November.) The silver lining to this particular cloud was that the failure to renew my contract was not as a result of poor performance in the job (I would have been mortified if that was the case), but rather due to the lack of custom preparation work coming into Aptuit at the time and, in fairness, the warning signs (i.e. the number of people in the department who were sat on their arses all day, with nothing to do) had been there during the last month of my tenure. Also, in truth, my disappointment at not having my contract renewed had rather more to do with my frustration at having to resume the search for Chemistry work to keep me occupied until September (i.e. when I would be starting a PhD) rather than any feelings of warmth towards my previous employers (as I have made abundantly clear in the past.) The fact that I was told that Flexi-time actually meant nothing in the Development department, and that I would have to fit in with the 8am-4.30pm hours of the other employees (meaning 6.30am starts in the morning [shudders]) who, unlike me, had to fit work around family commitments, didn’t exactly engender goodwill between me and the rest of Development (nor did the relative isolation of the Development department and the absence of any kind of diversions in Didcot.)

OK, with that spleen having been sufficiently vented, onto rather more positive news, in the form of my PhD search for September/October 2008. Since my last work-related blog way back in October of last year, I have sent off a glut of online PhD application forms and, pleasingly, have also been invited to quite a few departments for interviews; the first of said interviews came about at the end of November in Bristol, since when I’ve taken in visits to Nottingham (in mid-December), Imperial (the 18th of this month), Manchester (the 23rd), Oxford (the 24th, though I was later informed that particular visit was merely an informal visit and that the real interviews, should I be invited to one, will be on the 13th of Feburary) and Cambridge (last Monday), with interviews at Edinburgh (6th of February) and Sheffield (some time in the near future, though I don’t yet know when, exactly) in the pipeline. In truth, I don’t think I’ll be going to Bristol, and not just because I had my scarf nicked while out for lunch; most people there just didn’t have projects I was interested in, and the one that did (Prof Varinder Aggarwal) seemed a rather intense, austere figure (rather like my final year project supervisor) who might be difficult to work for. Everywhere else I have visited, however, I have come across at least one or two people who have interesting projects and seem good people to work for; indeed, narrowing the list of potential supervisors down has been one of the biggest problems, with me thus far being only able to rule the odd few supervisors out, either due to them not having projects available (as in the cases of Steve Ley and Ian Paterson at Cambridge, as well as Jim Anderson at Nottingham, who had some rather appealing projects available when I first applied, but who filled up his allocation quickly) or due to them being awkward, argumentative dicks (as in the case of David Hodgson at Oxford and Alan Armstrong at Imperial; the Armstrong group also had the disadvantage of, according to one of the 1st year PhD students I spoke to, not being a particularly social group, as well as being located in another building on the campus and thus being isolated from the rest of the Chemistry department there.) I will let you know the outcomes of all those interviews as soon as I hear any news, as well as keeping you informed of how the upcoming interviews went; judging by the research pages of Profs Coldham and Harrity, as well as Dr Jones (no, not that Dr Jones), I have particularly high hopes for the Sheffield visit. Just to round off this particular blog, I have also applied for a number of Chemistry jobs to keep me occupied in the interim period (the application that has progressed the furthest so far is for a job in Groningen in Holland); as ever I’ll let you know how those applications go.

Later,
Liam