Adjusting to a 9-5 Work Routine after your PhD.
Adjusting to a 9-5 work routine after your PhD takes a bit of time. After one week into a new job, you may have clearer work boundaries, a better work-life balance, more thinking space and more social interactions.
Throughout your PhD it’s likely that the work hours have been extremely scatty, unstructured, and possibly excessive. It’s very common for PhD students to not work a typical 9-5 work schedule and it’s extremely difficult to exercise good time management skills whilst completing your PhD. This process doesn’t necessarily set you up for success when you transition into your first role outside of academia. It’s important to understand why and so this article provides some key takeaways which are likely to be relevant to you in your first role outside of academia.
The most notable difference you’re likely to experience once you’re in a structured 9-5 is the clear boundaries that have been imposed on when you should and shouldn’t be at your desk. This makes it a lot easier to know when to stop working, or when to go for lunch. This will depend on your employer, but generally speaking most organisations are respectful of a healthy work-life balance. Even if they weren’t, we are likely to be aware of the proposed work structure (even if it isn’t 9-5) in the role we’re applying for. Having this mutual understanding helps reduce the guilt if you decide to only do work between 9-5. Usually in academia this isn’t the case. There’s a hidden expectation that you’d work outside the typical 9-5 routine and this can be a dangerous game to play. Because this isn’t defined or expected for PhD students, it makes it hard to enforce this – especially when someone (typically your supervisor) is asking you to complete something at weird hours.
Even if you’ve been able to discipline yourself throughout your PhD, and deliberately structure your PhD to mimic a 9-5 – it doesn’t quite feel the same. Often, you’d have to justify why you want your PhD to mimic a 9-5, whereas in industry or in the working world this is the norm, so you (or someone else) is going to have to justify why you shouldn’t be working a 9-5. So, first thoughts, 9-5 is good – it takes the edge off. Anxiety and guilt related to work hours outside the 9-5 are diminished.
The second thing you’re likely to experience is how much easier it is to compartmentalise your work and my actual life. Work exists within the 9-5 routine, and after that you’re free to do what you want. This is likely due to you being an employee of a bigger mission that sits in a team, as opposed to someone who’s doing their own research, it’s a lot easier to leave my work duties at the office and not think about them after 5pm hits. This enables you to look forward to work, have energy to work well, but also leaves fuel in the tank for you to work on other projects or aspirations for yourself. Some of this might dissipate over time as the first week of a new job is usually not as intense – but this feeling is likely to continue as it’s very different to doing a PhD.
The 9-5 schedule also means what you do in my free time is equally important. Usually, being a PhD student is all you know and it takes up the majority of your identity – which is why we’ve discussed “leaving academia mindset” elsewhere. This means that even outside the 9-5 routine, you’ll be thinking about your next project, your next paper, or some other abstract concept that is vital to your PhD. Now this has been removed, you’ll have more time and energy to focus on things that contribute to your own personal development and personality. Whether that be reading books, investing time to learn a hobby or new skill, or even spend more time looking after your health and fitness.
Because of your change in routine and structure you’re also likely to have a shift in what you want to do with your free time. If we continue with idea of reading more as an example, it might be that you didn’t actually read much outside of your research hours. A main reason for this could be because you spent the majority of your PhD hours reading complex scientific papers or proof reading your own writing. From this perspective, your ‘reading battery’ may be depleted day in day out. It makes it challenging to read in your own time, as a hobby outside the routine of research. After changing careers, you’ll have a drastic shift in working hours.
In turn, this might allow you to find more mental head space and motivation to pick up new things, like reading outside of work. This may not necessarily link to the 9-5 working life per se, but what you’re doing in your 9-5 routine could have a knock-on effect on your interests and hobbies – for the better. At the very least, you’re likely to have more time to pursue your interests – which is great!
The last point to keep in mind when adjusting to a 9-5 is how exhausting social interacts are - particularly in the beginning of a new role outside of academia. In the early stages you’re likely to be meeting a lot of new people, introducing yourself, and remembering names of more people you’ve interacted with in a long time. In some instances, this could be 50% of your working day or more. This can come as a shock or surprise to a lot of academics - for most of us we spend the vast majority of our research hours alone and in solitude. PhD’s in particularly are known for being quite lonely and siloed. There can certainly be an adjustment period if you’re not used to interacting with people on a daily basis. Overtime, this will become the norm and you will learn to adapt, build your social skills further, and eventually enjoy the interactions.
Because of this adjustment period it’s quite common to find that your social skills are extremely rusty. It can take a while to find a groove again on how you interact with people, whilst also still being professional, productive, and building a strong personal brand. We recommend leaning into this process and making the most of it. It’s easy to find this uncomfortable at first, but you can begin to say bye to those lonely days of research or the days where you just wanted to turn around at your desk and speak to someone.
These are some initial things to expect and keep an eye on as you transition out of academia. Of course, depending on the type of job you get in industry will dramatically influence this experience – you might not even be working a typical 9-5 in industry! But if there’s anything that remains consistent, is that there is an adjustment period you can’t quite ignore. It’s important to allow some time to settle in and adapt to this as you change your working set-up. If you find yourself in a similar situation, remember that it’s normal and as time goes by, you’ll learn to adjust. If you don’t, then it might be a sign that your new job isn’t for you and there is something else out there. Always remember that you have an enormity of transferable skills so you will always have options. Either way, it’s all useful feedback to learn what it is you want to do with your career!
