How Administrators can help Prepare Ph.D.s for Nonfaculty Careers

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Some institutions are experimenting with ways to prepare students for a range of career opportunities. As institutions build these programs, author L. Maren Wood asks that they keep two important points about the nonfaculty job market in mind:

  1. People find jobs through their networks. Over 70 percent of jobs are never posted. Submitting a résumé to an online job posting, without a contact at that organization, works less than 4 percent of the time.
  2. Employers hire based on a combination of skills, knowledge, and abilities. Candidates must clearly articulate in professional documents and in-person interviews how their background can benefit an organization.

Institutions should build programs to address these two points. Here are a few ideas on how that might happen.

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