One of the most notorious aspects of a career in academia is poor work-life balance. Working ‘round the clock has been reality for academics for a long time. Simultaneously, academics have the opportunity to enjoy a very flexible schedule.
Unfortunately, the flexible nature of much of academic work: writing manuscripts and grants, reading literature, analyzing data, and communicating with collaborators, all of which can typically be conducted on a laptop, tablet, or phone often leads to a sense of guilt. With relatively constant and easy access to work, why wouldn’t an individual take every chance to work more in order to get ahead of the competition? This guilt can lead to sacrificing time away from work, which is meant to energize and restore us, and lead to dissatisfaction or burnout.
As the career of an academic progresses, controlling work-life balance only becomes more difficult, and in some environments, unmanageable. A student pursuing a PhD, a postdoc, and a tenure-track professor are not only in different stages of their careers but different stages of their lives, all which present unique pressures and challenges. PhD students often have limited responsibilities outside of school in terms of families but may have outside commitments like clubs and networking events that will further their career. Beyond that, PhD students are at the beginning of a career in research and spend a lot of time doing things wrong, like anyone who is learning, and face “checkpoints” that feel arbitrary and unrelated to their main focus – their dissertation. Postdocs are likely starting or have recently started families, but face pressures to produce a lot of research in order to fill out their CV so they can bolster their lab and set up the next step in their career, whether it is inside or outside of academia. Professors are likely to have families outside of their job and must juggle research and institutional requirements that can easily become overwhelming, particularly when they are working to be approved for tenure. Academia requires that every moment of your life is planned, including the moments away from work. If an individual doesn’t have the resolve to hold a barrier between their at-home and at-work lives, academia will certainly find a way to take over.
As with all of our points so far, work-life balance is not a problem for every academic. However, it is a common problem both inside and outside of academia, and it is an important factor to consider when selecting a career. The demands of academia, which were described in our post on the culture of academia, make it difficult to dedicate time for ourselves or our families (check out Fiona’s post Haircut to get a glimpse). At every stage of an academic’s career, the obstacles to work-life balance are unique and can start to feel excessively demanding as they begin to pile up. Research conducted outside of academia, especially in an industrial setting, can be much easier to separate when it’s time to work and when it’s time to play. After earning a PhD or working as a postdoc, this aspect of work outside of academia can be unbearably attractive. With everything academia asks of you, the amount of discipline required to have a satisfactory work-life balance can be the last straw.
Join us next week where we’ll look into the unique plight of women and POC and why they might leave academia.
Two Women Scientists 
Pingback: Phatigured and Phleeing Academia: The Plight of Women and POC – Two Women Scientists
Pingback: PhDs: Phatigued and Phleeing Academia – Two Women Scientists
Pingback: If you give Lauren a PhD… – Two Women Scientists