Review of the first year of my working life.
In this post, I review the first year of my working life.
It has been a year since I received my Ph.D. I am now working as a Data Scientist. Data science is quite different from my degree, but I enjoy this job.
I think that I adapted to the job relatively smoothly because I was part of my company as an intern when I was a Ph.D. student. However, working as a full-time employee is completely different from working as an intern, at least for me. It has good and bad parts for my life.
The good parts are
- It allows me to take time to learn skills for the job, even if they are not related to my research.
- My income has significantly increased compared to my Ph.D. student days.
I felt guilty about learning skills unrelated to my field, like software engineering or machine learning, during my Ph.D. program. Then, it was just for a change of pace, even though I would be working in a company after graduation. Now, I make an effort to learn these skills as much as possible, and I feel my improvement; my code from two months ago seems bullshit now.
This job has significantly improved my lifestyle options. After renting an apartment and starting to live with my partner, we decided to get married this year. These are serious decisions for me, and they are supported by my working salary.
The bad part is that I have less time to think about mathematics. It is a really sad thing. Data Science requires some mathematical understanding, so sometimes I use mathematics in my work. However, the time to study or learn mathematics I am interested in is reduced. Transitioning to a new field is challenging, but I plan to focus more on mathematics next year.
I was very satisfied this year and remain enthusiastic about my life. :) I am passionate about my life.