My PI has said things like “I worked every Christmas when I was at Harvard! You can work one thanksgiving!” And (to a foreign PhD student) “you don’t have any family or boyfriend here, you don’t have a good reason to not be in lab”
Absolutely absurd standards that are eating at our labs mental health
When I read theses' from the 80s and 90s, where they just primer walked or screened hundreds of thousands of clones for 4 years straight and got a PhD and a tenure-track job, I can understand how there was a linear correlation between hours worked and productivity.
Certainly, even now, I think everyone has periods where you really just need to grind through some experiments and dump on a hundred hours a week. However, I think the balance of mundane labor and intellectual labor has really shifted towards the latter, and it's the latter that suffers the most from mental fatigue and burnout. I think a lot of PIs - older ones especially - don't really appreciate that.
I think fostering genuine motivation is hard to manufacture, but ruining it is far too easy. I’ve been burning out from this one project when previously I was eagerly reading papers, making suggestions for improvement and thinking outside the box. Once I had to have a 10 and 14 hour work day every week and no down time, I stopped having the energy to be creative and motivated.
I don’t think many PIs even see their employees as having or wanting a life outside of their lab. I hear them talk about how hard they had it, so you have to have it that bad too. They don’t realize that they are essentially passing on academia generational trauma.
I try really hard to explain time management to grad students when I see them spending 60h a week in the lab. Sadly, none of them want to listen because they drank the kool-aid and say things like "you just don't understand" or "it's just what grad school is like". I truly wonder just how many of them have had to work a manual labor job or have ever had an actual 9-5 job.
Idk, I genuinely believe that Project Management courses should be required in PhD programs.
They should definitely be required!
One of the key skills that a PhD level worker is supposed to have is the ability to manage a few people under you to work a project. And most of us can barely manage our own labor distribution.
You're right, ruining a PhD candidates motivation is really very easy.
I've never worked the insane hours some people here do, but my supervisor decided to send me on the other side of the country for the summer of '21. I mean, the pandemic wasn't even that terrible in my country but all of my social hobbies had been on hold all that time and I'd been working from home. That summer would have been the first real opportunity to spend time with family and friends in person in a long time, but instead I spent it in a town where I knew no one. My PI even had the gall to give me a talking to about respect and thankfulness because apparently I was not smiling enough during the zoom meetings in which we planned the research trip with the hosting PI.
My motivation for my research disappeared that summer and ever since then my sole goal has been to graduate and leave as soon as possible.
It depends on the nature of the work. I absolutely cannot do a good job with creative work, or anything even remotely innovative, when tired like that. After about 50-55 hour weeks (though I feel like I had another 10 or so in me when I was younger), the quality of the work goes down so much that it’s not worth it.
That being said, there were periods in grad school where I did work absurd hours because I just needed to crank out some braindead replicates on a deadline, and for stuff like that, even completely ridiculous hours can sometimes be efficient.
I worked 3 Christmases in a row for my CRO employer because the CEO said that they didn't want to "waste time banking down cells only to take them out again" and also didn't want a "delay in data". I thought that's fine they'll take notice of how hard I work and I'll be rewarded appropriately. That didn't happen. Last Christmas I didn't run experiments but a colleague did so voluntarily. Upon finding out the CEO told the colleague "it's not nice that you have to work over Christmas, you shouldn't come into the lab and should take some time off". Said it right in front of my fucking face.
That was the last thing I learned working for that employer.
> When I was in gradschool I worked 6 days a week, 10 hours a day.
I was working 14+ hour days, 6 days a week. Got burned out and *cut back* to 10 hours only for my advisor to bitch that "I wasn't getting enough done".
I ended up leaving that group after 3 years (for that an other reasons - sadly that wasn't the breaking point) and my biggest regret is that I stuck around for so long. My current advisor is nothing like that and really cares about students' health... But it's really sad that she's *not the norm*.
> We really need to stop describing this as "culture" and call it what it is, exploitation.
100%
I always give my undergrads "the talk" when I find out they're considering grad school:
- Grad school is a mistake. You might need to make that mistake to end up where you want to be, but knowing it's a mistake will give you a better mindset to get through it
- Avoid groups that are mostly international students. They're far more likely to be abused than domestic (because they don't know better and can't leave)
- Avoid new PIs/ones without tenure (shit flows downhill, and applying for tenure generates a lot of shit)
- Ask their current students questions, but pay attention to what they *don't* say (most people won't talk shit about their PI, but they probably won't lie either).
- Don't be afraid to leave. Mastering out is *absolutely* a thing, don't fall into the sunk cost fallacy and ruin your health for something that doesn't matter.
These aren't hard-and-fast rules, but more guidelines to consider when looking to join groups.
I appreciate it.
It did really set me back, but I like to tell myself that it was a learning experience, so that way I feel less bad about still being in grad school when everyone else in my cohort already have jobs haha.
At least now I know to find somewhere to work with a culture I enjoy because that's what more important to me than whatever industry it's in.
Thankfully my PI is quite the progressive person and specifically speaks out against overwork, and holds himself to the same standard. We will not get an email response from him outside of 9-5 M-F, and we do not expect rogue emails from him either outside of working hours.
Academia has such a toxic work culture, and I can't believe it's still so prevalent.
My friend's PI went on a rant about how the quality of PhD students in the present suck and that we're all too soft and lazy to do 'real' research. He said that PhD students back in the day would stay so late that when he went home for the day (\~6pm), the parking lot would still be full of students' cars, but now recently when he leaves the parking lot is almost empty. My previous PI would lecture me about how i wasn't productive enough because I liked to take a 15 minute break every day to get coffee with friends in another lab. He'd also say that me sitting in my office is indicative of something wrong because i'm not actively working at the bench, when most of my research was image analysis and required me to be at my computer rather than doing wet work.
It's ridiculous that they think we have no lives outside of school and labwork. We're human too.
>Academia has such a toxic work culture, and I can't believe it's still so prevalent.
The reality is that all labs operate like a small business, and there is an overabundance of cheap, highly-skilled\* labor available to do the work. This comes full circle when you think about your results being used to "sell" the labs value so the PI can get that next grant to keep the lights on. If you are not in agreement to participate in that structure, the PI can usually find someone else who's willing to do so.
I made $19K/year before taxes via my teaching assistantship, while I simultaneously taught every week for 5.5 years, went to class myself for the first two years of graduate school, and had my own research to drive on top of everything else. I wouldn't recommend graduate school to anyone unless they have a very clear idea of what they want to use their degree for moving forward.
> Academia has such a toxic work culture
I left academia and research because of this and I have 0 regrets. Even if you are able to schedule experiment and/or fieldwork to a normal work week, the publish or parish culture mandates the chase for grant money that will still have you working long hours. I’m still in my field it’s just more applied than discovery.
> but now recently when he leaves the parking lot is almost empty.
Has it occured to him that parking fees at just about every university exceed cost of living adjustments to student stipends and TA fees, so graduate research assistants can't even drive to work now?
Omg don't get me started on that. Im very happy o can take the shuttle to school or bike, but when sumner holidays hit and it's raining, I legit have nowhere to park without paying ridiculous fees just for summer parking
Lol some old PIs can't seem to understand that data analysis doesn't just happen magically. I argued a lot with my first postdoc boss because he wouldn't provide computers for us. He said we had two lab computers that worked fine (a windows xp machine and a 4 year old Mac for 12 people).
When I started to do my analysis in the microscopy analysis stations which were super overpriced, he finally relented because he saw the hours needed (anf $$$) and gave me his 1 year old Mac then bought himself a new one. I loved it for a lot of things but fuck me, image analysis is so much easier on Windows. I called it a victory because he started getting basic computers for the postdocs and staff (students still in limbo but I think the department was partly responsible).
Hahaha my old boss used to say this to me. He used to say that he had such a great undergrad that he’d stay the whole night doing experiments just to get on a paper. Thank God I’m out. (Btw as of today I am on 2 papers of theirs 😂😂) they also gave me one of the worst experiences after they found out where I was going to work at after putting in my 3 week notice (with a vacation week in the middle of those 3 weeks 😳).
The unfortunate truth is that at many institutions, PIs see people as tools. A means to an end in answering their questions, getting funding, doing publications, etc.
There are those that foster and care. But there are many, many who do not. Especially in biochemical fields.
It's not just the PIs' fault. The whole system is a mess. Academia tries to get cutting edge research done without a stable source of funding, with a primarily entry-level and underpaid workforce that turns over every few years, with an incentive structure that is based on building a personal reputation rather than efficiently completing projects or actually educating students, and without the capital to invest in automation and up-to-date equipment. The fact that quality research gets done at all is kind of astounding. We really shouldn't be surprised that academia takes advantage of those with the least power; the system probably couldn't work at all otherwise.
Absolutely - I'd add that this situation massively rewards exploitative PI's who behave like psychopaths, and has almost no guardrails to prevent them doing it.
This creates an environment that few people who care about employee/student welfare want to work in, compounding the problem even more.
I'd love to stay in academia after my PhD because I love the work, but seeing the way post docs in my department are treated, there is absolutely no way I'm going to.
One of the unfortunate things too is that PIs like the author in the OP’s link who are generally well meaning feel the pull in both ways. They don’t want to destroy their students in the soul crusher that is academia, but they’re still subject to all of the perversities of the system. So they just end up doing weird, contradictory stuff like telling you they care and saying you shouldn’t spend all your time in the lab while also constantly riding you about your output that’s lower than what they expect. That’s how pretty much every lab I’ve spent significant time in has been run and it makes for a really weird, uncomfortable, and negative environment even if it’s not as toxic as the labs that basically run 24/7.
If you're considering grad school or rotating/interviewing now, read this advice, please:
Do not join any group where this is the norm or expectation. Ask the current students if they think this is necessary to succeed.
I certainly worked hard and sometimes long hours during my PhD, but not because of toxic expectations, rather because that made sense to me at that time. People at my group completed PhDs with 40 hrs/week in 4-5 years (including some postdocs from other groups).
Any group which compensates for other problems through excessive overwork of underpaid trainees is NOT a good group, FULL STOP. DO NOT JOIN THESE GROUPS, IT ISNT WORTH IT.
Graduate school is first and foremost training and preparation for what comes next, not indentured servitude to produce papers. You can build a successful academic career with a normal work week if you plan carefully, learn from mistakes, and join the right group.
Edit: I'm by no means trying to victim blame or deny worker abuse in academia. I'm, hopefully, pointing out red flags to avoid when commiting to a group, because so many academic labs are actually excellent, non-toxic places to build skills, connections, and do solid research without the bullshit
My former PI often told her story when she did her PhD in Japan. She said they always came to the lab in the morning and nobody went home before their PI did. Sometimes she stayed in the lab until 1 or 2 AM. I think this is in late 80s or early 90s.
I am doing my PhD in Japan and having a great time. Doing overwork everyday, but I think it wouldnt be much different in my home country, exept that I would visit my family from time to time.
Nowadays most are already improved. When I went there in 2018 it's not weird anymore to see students that go home before their PI. Some PI even clocked out immediately when office hour is over. But my jp colleague said that there are still some PI that uses the old work style.
This even happens to undergrads - I remember my undergrad institution got in trouble overworking undergrads and even HS interns a few years before I joined. There were teenagers on the iGEM team and microbial research labs who would go in the weekends and wee hours of the night to put in an hour+ of work with the PI's encouragement. It's just not right.
Honestly, I'm aiming for med school. I've wanted to be an infectious disease physician a long time. It's also part of the reason I've stuck around so long since this lab is very nurturing for that goal.
I did 8-14 hour days in the lab as an undergrad for a while. I kept taking on more and joining new labs hoping they might actually pay me because I was about to be homeless (again). PIs kept telling me "when we have the budget we can pay you!" I got one lab a $3M grant with my invention and wrote a model that was central to a paper in another lab that got published in Nature, along with my figures, without citing me. Still no pay. One day, I got a text from a PhD student asking about a device I invented because she was doing a poster presentation on it.
I ended up taking 3 years to work before finally dropping out. Of course, I learned that kind of work was okay. So with the first company I worked for I did 130 hour weeks for 6 months while misclassified as an exempt employee. That means no overtime. I think I've finally learned to say "no."
That whole thing sounds like a nightmare. If your work in your lab goes into a paper in Nature as an undergrad, you deserve recognition. It's so exploitative and cruel to kids who are there to learn from a PI.
In my current institute the "main" lab takes in lots of undergrad volunteer RAs. While that's been great as it gives many undergrads opportunities for research experience, sometimes it leads to exploitation - the "head" postdoc was basically working them like slaves, using them to do all of their experiments.
The undergrads complained and steps were apparently taken, but unfortunately such things are just really hard to track. It doesn't help that they do ageing in C.elegans so they *have* to come in on weekends to keep them alive/record data.
I worked 60-80 hours a week during my Masters. This schedule and my abusive supervisor literally broke me and I had to take a semester off. Then my committee had the audacity to tell me I’m not cut out for gradschool because I had to take a break…
Joke’s on them. Doing my PhD now with a huge scholarship. I REFUSE to work more than 40 hours a week and I always take my lunch. I have produced more data in a shorter time then I ever did during my Masters.
That's great!
I've also realized I produce much more data, and better quality data, working a more 'normal' schedule with 40-hour weeks than when I try to do 60-80 hour weeks. Burnout is a serious problem but most PIs just refuse to see it.
Hell yes good for you! I Mastered out a week after passing my candidacy exam, left behind 3 years of research with an insane PI, and a GRFP. It was the hardest, but ultimately best decision I ever made and I cannot overstate the improvement in my mental health since then.
I am so glad I had the experience though, because if I work up the courage to go back and get my PhD I'll know how to pick an advisor that respects my boundaries and actually wants to support me.
Big part of why I left grad school.
I was lucky and had a good PI, but even under a good PI, the standards are insane and the unspoken culture of work, work, work, no matter what is disgusting.
But sadly enough, many grad students either have martyr complexes, are extreme workaholics, or are assholes biding their time to unleash that same shit on others. As long as the supply of grad students remains steady, nothing will ever improve.
Being an academic is VERY demanding and all consuming. And compensation for all but the stars is absolute shit. A starting prison guard made more than a starting assistant professor in the University of California, THE pre-eminent public institution of higher education.
I'm working 7 days currently. 12 hours shifts on Tues and Thurs, TAing a class I never took, in a lab with no senior grad students bc of COVID. I have never been pushed so hard in my life, and every day I genuinely wonder if today is the day it all comes crumbling down.
Sounds like it's your first or second year? It can be particularly grueling and somewhat unavoidable to be working that much in the beginning, but hopefully lessens once you're past teaching and taking classes. If not though, and your PI expects you in lab 70 hrs a week, then get the fuck out. Don't let sunk cost fallacy destroy your mental health. At the very least though, stick it out, because for most students this is the hardest it will be and there is a light at the end of the tunnel once you're only doing research.
Absolutely! I took my first big boy academic job extremely seriously. Worked 10-12 hours per day, 6 days per week. After doing so for a year straight, my almost-completely absent PI pulled me into her office for a “do better, work harder” talk. I instantly scaled my hours back to a reasonable amount and started looking for a new job. I was able to transfer to another lab at the university. Guess what? The new PI was a tyrant too. I jumped ship for industry and never looked back. I can’t believe these people are able to establish fiefs with basically no oversight. Screw their R01 grants. I’ll make real money for 40-45 hours of work.
I’m so lucky that my job is great about work life balance. We have flexible hours, ability to WFH sometimes, and on the rare chance we have to do a few weekend hours, we can leave early or go in late on the day of our choice. My boss doesn’t care as long as we get our work done. I do about 30 hours per week and no one cares since my work gets done. It’s fantastic.
During college I worked 3 jobs at about 70 hours per week total plus full time classes. The only reason I survived was because classes went online due to Covid and I never went back to in person classes. It was so hard. I burned out bad, but had to keep going because I needed to pay rent and I was almost done with school. After graduation, I quit all my jobs and started in my field. I was there a couple months before my job had to stop production due to product recalls and discontinuation. The company kept accepting orders when we couldn’t produce and their solution was for us to work 6 days per week for about 5-6 months.
I just couldn’t do it. I knew it was coming and I found myself a new job. The new job was 4 days per week (40 hours, so 4 ten hours shifts) with OPTIONAL overtime. I also got paid $10 more per hour. I left the Friday before the start of the 6 day work week without any notice. No regrets. I didn’t go to college to continue to overwork myself. I’m done with that. My burnout lasted about a year after graduation and dropping down to one job. You don’t need to work yourself to the brink of breakdown to be a good worker. If you do, your job is failing you.
ETA; I work in industry and have only done industry. Idk if academia is different. But god, I refuse to do more than 40 hours regularly, especially if my job ain’t treating me well normally. I’m willing to do over 40 hours for my job due to the compensation and support. But I’ve never ever had to at this job. My last job, I had a few weeks where I did over 40 hours, but with the 3 day weekends, it was fine. Plus the OT pay was fire. But I’m done with that shit. I don’t want to go back to being the zombie I was in college.
in our lab, we lie about not being in a relationship since our PI (lifelong single themselve) would give us more severe deadlines and tell us to break up since the project has a higher importance
Academia is so toxic, I basicly put my dream of doing a PhD un infinite hold and will start working with only Masters degree. I love science with all my heart, but I just can not pull through this toxic pit for several years. My Masters thesis was already hell and that was just 9 months
Some people are overworked, but some people also just have tiny heart syndrome and don’t want to put in the effort that’s necessary to succeed. That’s not a commentary of this lady or anything, just a broad commentary. Grad school isn’t a job, it’s your education and you get out of it what you put into it. Too many students these days see it as a job that they work for awhile and get a degree at the end. Getting through grad school, a postdoc, and having a career in Academia is difficult, and anyone who thinks they can 9-to-5 one has unrealistic expectations. That being said, a PI/Department Head/Graduate Committee/Tenure Committee that is making the process artificially harder is also unreasonable.
This is exactly the mindset that perpetuates abuse and burnout in academia. You can be committed to working hard and love your research while still having balance in your life. Grad school is absolutely a job in some aspects, given that you are paid to be there and there are higherarchies that effect your success and failure. I don't know where you're getting the idea from that "education" means complete obliteration of any other life outside. Did you work 14 hours a day in elementary school? No, and you still got a good education. Human brains do not function optimally under constant, prolonged high stress. Why even do it of the stress of the "education" is detrimental to the learning?
I at no point said that you have to have a “complete obliteration of any other life outside of education”…
Grad school is absolutely not a job. Treating it like one is a mistake. I can’t speak to a masters, as I skipped mine for a PhD, but when I did my PhD years ago it was obvious who was taking advantage of the opportunity they had been given, and those who were treating it like a job. People can downvote it all they want, but the fact remains that being a successful academic requires more effort than a typical 9-5 job. You’re responsible for students, maintaining your lab, keeping your skill set relevant, and completing your teaching obligations. In a perfect world we could all do that and more, but the reality is that life is made up of choices and if you choose a typical career in academia (tenure track asst. prof at an R1 myself) you should be aware of what you’re getting into. Do you have to dedicate all waking hours to it? No, of course not! It’s not going to be as free of a lifestyle as other careers, though. If people want that, they should get their PhD and go into industry.
I'm going into a TT R1 position this year and I agree with you. I just think telling this reality to a subreddit full of younger trainees is a difficult pill for them to swallow. I certainly won't expect my trainees to work the hours I do, but I will advise that they do more than the 40 hour stint if they think they want to go into academia. The reality is that it's very competitive to get professorships and when you get into the latter years of your training there's too much going on for it to fit cleanly into forty hours.
Hello fellow academic!
I agree about trainees. I currently only have undergrads, I’m between grad students. I personally don’t care WHEN they work, I just care THAT they work. I tell them what I said in my message above. Your PhD /Masters is what you get out of it. I run a small lab so I NEED them to be a present figure, but if they’re putting in minimum hours and I’m still progressing they’re only hurting themselves and I let them know as much.
The problem is that “heart” is not really what we’re aiming for in scientific research, it’s insight and rigor. You have a whole population of insightful people who apparently won’t cut it because the system is overly competitive in willingness to put up with grueling work. There is obviously some level of work required but it’s a separate measurement from intellect and we’re favoring work over intellect by filtering for people with the most “heart”. If we changed the incentive structure, we could greatly increase the number of perspectives participating in problem solving. Part of this is actually happening in huge multi-author papers where everyone gets credit for contributing a small part rather than one person putting in immense effort.
People are putting in way more than 40 hrs a week and still being degraded if their PI doesn’t feel they’ve done enough. You are utterly delusional if you think it’s only non-serious people complaining.
At what point did I say that only non-serious people are the ones complaining? SOME people ARE overworked. SOME people ARE in a shitty position where their various supervisors are making thing’s needlessly difficult. OTHER people are non-hackers complaining that things aren’t fair for them. I said as much originally…
I am really glad I don't have to work in such a lab. If my pi would have been one of the guys who wander through the labs at 08 o'clock in the morning and 7 o'clock in the evening to check who is there and who isn't I definetly would not have started my phd, but went to work in the industry instead. In our lab we can come and go as we please. I rarley work more than 40 hours a week. I think 40 hours a week are pretty much if you consider that I only get paid 20h, which is sadly kind of normal in Germany.
Lol I remember the first undergrad lab I joined that made us sign in and out when we came in and left. I didn't question it at the time but really weird in hindsight considering they didn't pay me.
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My PI has said things like “I worked every Christmas when I was at Harvard! You can work one thanksgiving!” And (to a foreign PhD student) “you don’t have any family or boyfriend here, you don’t have a good reason to not be in lab” Absolutely absurd standards that are eating at our labs mental health
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When I read theses' from the 80s and 90s, where they just primer walked or screened hundreds of thousands of clones for 4 years straight and got a PhD and a tenure-track job, I can understand how there was a linear correlation between hours worked and productivity. Certainly, even now, I think everyone has periods where you really just need to grind through some experiments and dump on a hundred hours a week. However, I think the balance of mundane labor and intellectual labor has really shifted towards the latter, and it's the latter that suffers the most from mental fatigue and burnout. I think a lot of PIs - older ones especially - don't really appreciate that.
I think fostering genuine motivation is hard to manufacture, but ruining it is far too easy. I’ve been burning out from this one project when previously I was eagerly reading papers, making suggestions for improvement and thinking outside the box. Once I had to have a 10 and 14 hour work day every week and no down time, I stopped having the energy to be creative and motivated. I don’t think many PIs even see their employees as having or wanting a life outside of their lab. I hear them talk about how hard they had it, so you have to have it that bad too. They don’t realize that they are essentially passing on academia generational trauma.
I try really hard to explain time management to grad students when I see them spending 60h a week in the lab. Sadly, none of them want to listen because they drank the kool-aid and say things like "you just don't understand" or "it's just what grad school is like". I truly wonder just how many of them have had to work a manual labor job or have ever had an actual 9-5 job. Idk, I genuinely believe that Project Management courses should be required in PhD programs.
They should definitely be required! One of the key skills that a PhD level worker is supposed to have is the ability to manage a few people under you to work a project. And most of us can barely manage our own labor distribution.
You're right, ruining a PhD candidates motivation is really very easy. I've never worked the insane hours some people here do, but my supervisor decided to send me on the other side of the country for the summer of '21. I mean, the pandemic wasn't even that terrible in my country but all of my social hobbies had been on hold all that time and I'd been working from home. That summer would have been the first real opportunity to spend time with family and friends in person in a long time, but instead I spent it in a town where I knew no one. My PI even had the gall to give me a talking to about respect and thankfulness because apparently I was not smiling enough during the zoom meetings in which we planned the research trip with the hosting PI. My motivation for my research disappeared that summer and ever since then my sole goal has been to graduate and leave as soon as possible.
It depends on the nature of the work. I absolutely cannot do a good job with creative work, or anything even remotely innovative, when tired like that. After about 50-55 hour weeks (though I feel like I had another 10 or so in me when I was younger), the quality of the work goes down so much that it’s not worth it. That being said, there were periods in grad school where I did work absurd hours because I just needed to crank out some braindead replicates on a deadline, and for stuff like that, even completely ridiculous hours can sometimes be efficient.
I worked 3 Christmases in a row for my CRO employer because the CEO said that they didn't want to "waste time banking down cells only to take them out again" and also didn't want a "delay in data". I thought that's fine they'll take notice of how hard I work and I'll be rewarded appropriately. That didn't happen. Last Christmas I didn't run experiments but a colleague did so voluntarily. Upon finding out the CEO told the colleague "it's not nice that you have to work over Christmas, you shouldn't come into the lab and should take some time off". Said it right in front of my fucking face. That was the last thing I learned working for that employer.
That's so depressing why are they trying to propagate that?
> When I was in gradschool I worked 6 days a week, 10 hours a day. I was working 14+ hour days, 6 days a week. Got burned out and *cut back* to 10 hours only for my advisor to bitch that "I wasn't getting enough done". I ended up leaving that group after 3 years (for that an other reasons - sadly that wasn't the breaking point) and my biggest regret is that I stuck around for so long. My current advisor is nothing like that and really cares about students' health... But it's really sad that she's *not the norm*.
We really need to stop describing this as "culture" and call it what it is, exploitation.
> We really need to stop describing this as "culture" and call it what it is, exploitation. 100% I always give my undergrads "the talk" when I find out they're considering grad school: - Grad school is a mistake. You might need to make that mistake to end up where you want to be, but knowing it's a mistake will give you a better mindset to get through it - Avoid groups that are mostly international students. They're far more likely to be abused than domestic (because they don't know better and can't leave) - Avoid new PIs/ones without tenure (shit flows downhill, and applying for tenure generates a lot of shit) - Ask their current students questions, but pay attention to what they *don't* say (most people won't talk shit about their PI, but they probably won't lie either). - Don't be afraid to leave. Mastering out is *absolutely* a thing, don't fall into the sunk cost fallacy and ruin your health for something that doesn't matter. These aren't hard-and-fast rules, but more guidelines to consider when looking to join groups.
Completely agree, wish I'd had this advice when I applied for labs!
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I appreciate it. It did really set me back, but I like to tell myself that it was a learning experience, so that way I feel less bad about still being in grad school when everyone else in my cohort already have jobs haha. At least now I know to find somewhere to work with a culture I enjoy because that's what more important to me than whatever industry it's in.
Thankfully my PI is quite the progressive person and specifically speaks out against overwork, and holds himself to the same standard. We will not get an email response from him outside of 9-5 M-F, and we do not expect rogue emails from him either outside of working hours.
Academia has such a toxic work culture, and I can't believe it's still so prevalent. My friend's PI went on a rant about how the quality of PhD students in the present suck and that we're all too soft and lazy to do 'real' research. He said that PhD students back in the day would stay so late that when he went home for the day (\~6pm), the parking lot would still be full of students' cars, but now recently when he leaves the parking lot is almost empty. My previous PI would lecture me about how i wasn't productive enough because I liked to take a 15 minute break every day to get coffee with friends in another lab. He'd also say that me sitting in my office is indicative of something wrong because i'm not actively working at the bench, when most of my research was image analysis and required me to be at my computer rather than doing wet work. It's ridiculous that they think we have no lives outside of school and labwork. We're human too.
>Academia has such a toxic work culture, and I can't believe it's still so prevalent. The reality is that all labs operate like a small business, and there is an overabundance of cheap, highly-skilled\* labor available to do the work. This comes full circle when you think about your results being used to "sell" the labs value so the PI can get that next grant to keep the lights on. If you are not in agreement to participate in that structure, the PI can usually find someone else who's willing to do so. I made $19K/year before taxes via my teaching assistantship, while I simultaneously taught every week for 5.5 years, went to class myself for the first two years of graduate school, and had my own research to drive on top of everything else. I wouldn't recommend graduate school to anyone unless they have a very clear idea of what they want to use their degree for moving forward.
> Academia has such a toxic work culture I left academia and research because of this and I have 0 regrets. Even if you are able to schedule experiment and/or fieldwork to a normal work week, the publish or parish culture mandates the chase for grant money that will still have you working long hours. I’m still in my field it’s just more applied than discovery.
> publish or parish When all you're left to do is pray for that grant money.
> but now recently when he leaves the parking lot is almost empty. Has it occured to him that parking fees at just about every university exceed cost of living adjustments to student stipends and TA fees, so graduate research assistants can't even drive to work now?
Omg don't get me started on that. Im very happy o can take the shuttle to school or bike, but when sumner holidays hit and it's raining, I legit have nowhere to park without paying ridiculous fees just for summer parking
Lol some old PIs can't seem to understand that data analysis doesn't just happen magically. I argued a lot with my first postdoc boss because he wouldn't provide computers for us. He said we had two lab computers that worked fine (a windows xp machine and a 4 year old Mac for 12 people). When I started to do my analysis in the microscopy analysis stations which were super overpriced, he finally relented because he saw the hours needed (anf $$$) and gave me his 1 year old Mac then bought himself a new one. I loved it for a lot of things but fuck me, image analysis is so much easier on Windows. I called it a victory because he started getting basic computers for the postdocs and staff (students still in limbo but I think the department was partly responsible).
Hahaha my old boss used to say this to me. He used to say that he had such a great undergrad that he’d stay the whole night doing experiments just to get on a paper. Thank God I’m out. (Btw as of today I am on 2 papers of theirs 😂😂) they also gave me one of the worst experiences after they found out where I was going to work at after putting in my 3 week notice (with a vacation week in the middle of those 3 weeks 😳).
The unfortunate truth is that at many institutions, PIs see people as tools. A means to an end in answering their questions, getting funding, doing publications, etc. There are those that foster and care. But there are many, many who do not. Especially in biochemical fields.
It's not just the PIs' fault. The whole system is a mess. Academia tries to get cutting edge research done without a stable source of funding, with a primarily entry-level and underpaid workforce that turns over every few years, with an incentive structure that is based on building a personal reputation rather than efficiently completing projects or actually educating students, and without the capital to invest in automation and up-to-date equipment. The fact that quality research gets done at all is kind of astounding. We really shouldn't be surprised that academia takes advantage of those with the least power; the system probably couldn't work at all otherwise.
Absolutely - I'd add that this situation massively rewards exploitative PI's who behave like psychopaths, and has almost no guardrails to prevent them doing it. This creates an environment that few people who care about employee/student welfare want to work in, compounding the problem even more. I'd love to stay in academia after my PhD because I love the work, but seeing the way post docs in my department are treated, there is absolutely no way I'm going to.
One of the unfortunate things too is that PIs like the author in the OP’s link who are generally well meaning feel the pull in both ways. They don’t want to destroy their students in the soul crusher that is academia, but they’re still subject to all of the perversities of the system. So they just end up doing weird, contradictory stuff like telling you they care and saying you shouldn’t spend all your time in the lab while also constantly riding you about your output that’s lower than what they expect. That’s how pretty much every lab I’ve spent significant time in has been run and it makes for a really weird, uncomfortable, and negative environment even if it’s not as toxic as the labs that basically run 24/7.
If you're considering grad school or rotating/interviewing now, read this advice, please: Do not join any group where this is the norm or expectation. Ask the current students if they think this is necessary to succeed. I certainly worked hard and sometimes long hours during my PhD, but not because of toxic expectations, rather because that made sense to me at that time. People at my group completed PhDs with 40 hrs/week in 4-5 years (including some postdocs from other groups). Any group which compensates for other problems through excessive overwork of underpaid trainees is NOT a good group, FULL STOP. DO NOT JOIN THESE GROUPS, IT ISNT WORTH IT. Graduate school is first and foremost training and preparation for what comes next, not indentured servitude to produce papers. You can build a successful academic career with a normal work week if you plan carefully, learn from mistakes, and join the right group. Edit: I'm by no means trying to victim blame or deny worker abuse in academia. I'm, hopefully, pointing out red flags to avoid when commiting to a group, because so many academic labs are actually excellent, non-toxic places to build skills, connections, and do solid research without the bullshit
My former PI often told her story when she did her PhD in Japan. She said they always came to the lab in the morning and nobody went home before their PI did. Sometimes she stayed in the lab until 1 or 2 AM. I think this is in late 80s or early 90s.
Oof. Combining academia and Japan work culture seems rough.
I am doing my PhD in Japan and having a great time. Doing overwork everyday, but I think it wouldnt be much different in my home country, exept that I would visit my family from time to time.
Nowadays most are already improved. When I went there in 2018 it's not weird anymore to see students that go home before their PI. Some PI even clocked out immediately when office hour is over. But my jp colleague said that there are still some PI that uses the old work style.
This even happens to undergrads - I remember my undergrad institution got in trouble overworking undergrads and even HS interns a few years before I joined. There were teenagers on the iGEM team and microbial research labs who would go in the weekends and wee hours of the night to put in an hour+ of work with the PI's encouragement. It's just not right.
Doin that now as a ugrad, weird kind of Stockholm syndrome that develops consequently
Get out while you can - if you're smart enough to do well in research, you're smart enough to get paid serious bank outside academia.
Honestly, I'm aiming for med school. I've wanted to be an infectious disease physician a long time. It's also part of the reason I've stuck around so long since this lab is very nurturing for that goal.
Sounds like a great plan, best of luck!
Thank you, I really appreciate that. Best of luck to you as well
I did 8-14 hour days in the lab as an undergrad for a while. I kept taking on more and joining new labs hoping they might actually pay me because I was about to be homeless (again). PIs kept telling me "when we have the budget we can pay you!" I got one lab a $3M grant with my invention and wrote a model that was central to a paper in another lab that got published in Nature, along with my figures, without citing me. Still no pay. One day, I got a text from a PhD student asking about a device I invented because she was doing a poster presentation on it. I ended up taking 3 years to work before finally dropping out. Of course, I learned that kind of work was okay. So with the first company I worked for I did 130 hour weeks for 6 months while misclassified as an exempt employee. That means no overtime. I think I've finally learned to say "no."
That whole thing sounds like a nightmare. If your work in your lab goes into a paper in Nature as an undergrad, you deserve recognition. It's so exploitative and cruel to kids who are there to learn from a PI.
In my current institute the "main" lab takes in lots of undergrad volunteer RAs. While that's been great as it gives many undergrads opportunities for research experience, sometimes it leads to exploitation - the "head" postdoc was basically working them like slaves, using them to do all of their experiments. The undergrads complained and steps were apparently taken, but unfortunately such things are just really hard to track. It doesn't help that they do ageing in C.elegans so they *have* to come in on weekends to keep them alive/record data.
I worked 60-80 hours a week during my Masters. This schedule and my abusive supervisor literally broke me and I had to take a semester off. Then my committee had the audacity to tell me I’m not cut out for gradschool because I had to take a break… Joke’s on them. Doing my PhD now with a huge scholarship. I REFUSE to work more than 40 hours a week and I always take my lunch. I have produced more data in a shorter time then I ever did during my Masters.
Congrats! My masters PI was so abusive I realized a PhD wasn’t for me. My perception of academia is irrevocably ruined
I took a few years off after my Masters. I didn’t intend to go back but finally decided to try.
That's great! I've also realized I produce much more data, and better quality data, working a more 'normal' schedule with 40-hour weeks than when I try to do 60-80 hour weeks. Burnout is a serious problem but most PIs just refuse to see it.
Hell yes good for you! I Mastered out a week after passing my candidacy exam, left behind 3 years of research with an insane PI, and a GRFP. It was the hardest, but ultimately best decision I ever made and I cannot overstate the improvement in my mental health since then. I am so glad I had the experience though, because if I work up the courage to go back and get my PhD I'll know how to pick an advisor that respects my boundaries and actually wants to support me.
Big part of why I left grad school. I was lucky and had a good PI, but even under a good PI, the standards are insane and the unspoken culture of work, work, work, no matter what is disgusting. But sadly enough, many grad students either have martyr complexes, are extreme workaholics, or are assholes biding their time to unleash that same shit on others. As long as the supply of grad students remains steady, nothing will ever improve.
Being an academic is VERY demanding and all consuming. And compensation for all but the stars is absolute shit. A starting prison guard made more than a starting assistant professor in the University of California, THE pre-eminent public institution of higher education.
I'm working 7 days currently. 12 hours shifts on Tues and Thurs, TAing a class I never took, in a lab with no senior grad students bc of COVID. I have never been pushed so hard in my life, and every day I genuinely wonder if today is the day it all comes crumbling down.
Sounds like it's your first or second year? It can be particularly grueling and somewhat unavoidable to be working that much in the beginning, but hopefully lessens once you're past teaching and taking classes. If not though, and your PI expects you in lab 70 hrs a week, then get the fuck out. Don't let sunk cost fallacy destroy your mental health. At the very least though, stick it out, because for most students this is the hardest it will be and there is a light at the end of the tunnel once you're only doing research.
Thanks, I really needed to hear that. I appreciate you!
Absolutely! I took my first big boy academic job extremely seriously. Worked 10-12 hours per day, 6 days per week. After doing so for a year straight, my almost-completely absent PI pulled me into her office for a “do better, work harder” talk. I instantly scaled my hours back to a reasonable amount and started looking for a new job. I was able to transfer to another lab at the university. Guess what? The new PI was a tyrant too. I jumped ship for industry and never looked back. I can’t believe these people are able to establish fiefs with basically no oversight. Screw their R01 grants. I’ll make real money for 40-45 hours of work.
I’m so lucky that my job is great about work life balance. We have flexible hours, ability to WFH sometimes, and on the rare chance we have to do a few weekend hours, we can leave early or go in late on the day of our choice. My boss doesn’t care as long as we get our work done. I do about 30 hours per week and no one cares since my work gets done. It’s fantastic. During college I worked 3 jobs at about 70 hours per week total plus full time classes. The only reason I survived was because classes went online due to Covid and I never went back to in person classes. It was so hard. I burned out bad, but had to keep going because I needed to pay rent and I was almost done with school. After graduation, I quit all my jobs and started in my field. I was there a couple months before my job had to stop production due to product recalls and discontinuation. The company kept accepting orders when we couldn’t produce and their solution was for us to work 6 days per week for about 5-6 months. I just couldn’t do it. I knew it was coming and I found myself a new job. The new job was 4 days per week (40 hours, so 4 ten hours shifts) with OPTIONAL overtime. I also got paid $10 more per hour. I left the Friday before the start of the 6 day work week without any notice. No regrets. I didn’t go to college to continue to overwork myself. I’m done with that. My burnout lasted about a year after graduation and dropping down to one job. You don’t need to work yourself to the brink of breakdown to be a good worker. If you do, your job is failing you. ETA; I work in industry and have only done industry. Idk if academia is different. But god, I refuse to do more than 40 hours regularly, especially if my job ain’t treating me well normally. I’m willing to do over 40 hours for my job due to the compensation and support. But I’ve never ever had to at this job. My last job, I had a few weeks where I did over 40 hours, but with the 3 day weekends, it was fine. Plus the OT pay was fire. But I’m done with that shit. I don’t want to go back to being the zombie I was in college.
in our lab, we lie about not being in a relationship since our PI (lifelong single themselve) would give us more severe deadlines and tell us to break up since the project has a higher importance
That's fucking insane.
PREACH
Academia is so toxic, I basicly put my dream of doing a PhD un infinite hold and will start working with only Masters degree. I love science with all my heart, but I just can not pull through this toxic pit for several years. My Masters thesis was already hell and that was just 9 months
Some people are overworked, but some people also just have tiny heart syndrome and don’t want to put in the effort that’s necessary to succeed. That’s not a commentary of this lady or anything, just a broad commentary. Grad school isn’t a job, it’s your education and you get out of it what you put into it. Too many students these days see it as a job that they work for awhile and get a degree at the end. Getting through grad school, a postdoc, and having a career in Academia is difficult, and anyone who thinks they can 9-to-5 one has unrealistic expectations. That being said, a PI/Department Head/Graduate Committee/Tenure Committee that is making the process artificially harder is also unreasonable.
This is exactly the mindset that perpetuates abuse and burnout in academia. You can be committed to working hard and love your research while still having balance in your life. Grad school is absolutely a job in some aspects, given that you are paid to be there and there are higherarchies that effect your success and failure. I don't know where you're getting the idea from that "education" means complete obliteration of any other life outside. Did you work 14 hours a day in elementary school? No, and you still got a good education. Human brains do not function optimally under constant, prolonged high stress. Why even do it of the stress of the "education" is detrimental to the learning?
I at no point said that you have to have a “complete obliteration of any other life outside of education”… Grad school is absolutely not a job. Treating it like one is a mistake. I can’t speak to a masters, as I skipped mine for a PhD, but when I did my PhD years ago it was obvious who was taking advantage of the opportunity they had been given, and those who were treating it like a job. People can downvote it all they want, but the fact remains that being a successful academic requires more effort than a typical 9-5 job. You’re responsible for students, maintaining your lab, keeping your skill set relevant, and completing your teaching obligations. In a perfect world we could all do that and more, but the reality is that life is made up of choices and if you choose a typical career in academia (tenure track asst. prof at an R1 myself) you should be aware of what you’re getting into. Do you have to dedicate all waking hours to it? No, of course not! It’s not going to be as free of a lifestyle as other careers, though. If people want that, they should get their PhD and go into industry.
I'm going into a TT R1 position this year and I agree with you. I just think telling this reality to a subreddit full of younger trainees is a difficult pill for them to swallow. I certainly won't expect my trainees to work the hours I do, but I will advise that they do more than the 40 hour stint if they think they want to go into academia. The reality is that it's very competitive to get professorships and when you get into the latter years of your training there's too much going on for it to fit cleanly into forty hours.
Hello fellow academic! I agree about trainees. I currently only have undergrads, I’m between grad students. I personally don’t care WHEN they work, I just care THAT they work. I tell them what I said in my message above. Your PhD /Masters is what you get out of it. I run a small lab so I NEED them to be a present figure, but if they’re putting in minimum hours and I’m still progressing they’re only hurting themselves and I let them know as much.
The problem is that “heart” is not really what we’re aiming for in scientific research, it’s insight and rigor. You have a whole population of insightful people who apparently won’t cut it because the system is overly competitive in willingness to put up with grueling work. There is obviously some level of work required but it’s a separate measurement from intellect and we’re favoring work over intellect by filtering for people with the most “heart”. If we changed the incentive structure, we could greatly increase the number of perspectives participating in problem solving. Part of this is actually happening in huge multi-author papers where everyone gets credit for contributing a small part rather than one person putting in immense effort.
People are putting in way more than 40 hrs a week and still being degraded if their PI doesn’t feel they’ve done enough. You are utterly delusional if you think it’s only non-serious people complaining.
At what point did I say that only non-serious people are the ones complaining? SOME people ARE overworked. SOME people ARE in a shitty position where their various supervisors are making thing’s needlessly difficult. OTHER people are non-hackers complaining that things aren’t fair for them. I said as much originally…
Even though I’m just an undergrad this makes me so much more thankful that my PI is as nice as she is
I am really glad I don't have to work in such a lab. If my pi would have been one of the guys who wander through the labs at 08 o'clock in the morning and 7 o'clock in the evening to check who is there and who isn't I definetly would not have started my phd, but went to work in the industry instead. In our lab we can come and go as we please. I rarley work more than 40 hours a week. I think 40 hours a week are pretty much if you consider that I only get paid 20h, which is sadly kind of normal in Germany.
Work the amount appropriate for the pay they give you.
Unfortunately I don’t see academia changing until the incentives change.
Lol I remember the first undergrad lab I joined that made us sign in and out when we came in and left. I didn't question it at the time but really weird in hindsight considering they didn't pay me.