What are the Options after PhD?

What are the options after PhD

Clearly, one of the main job opportunities after PhD is a faculty position in some University, College, or an Institute. This option, world over, is one of the most preferred options for people with PhD. One of the reasons for this is that in today's world, the best quality people require freedom in their work and have a strong desire to ``make a mark''. Both of these are well supported by research activities a faculty undertakes as part of his job - he has the freedom to select the problems he works on, and through his research he creates new knowledge which is published under his authorship. This is a very strong motivating factor and very good people across the world sacrifice other benefits for academic freedom and possibilities to create and innovate.

In faculty positions it should be mentioned that for Computer Science, as there is a shortage of qualified faculty in most good institutions, there are always openings in places like IITs/NITs/RECs/Central Universities, etc. In addition, now some private universities as well as institutions set up by overseas universities coming up which also are looking for qualified faculty (and these places are paying much more than Govt. scales - up to 3 times more!)

However, teaching is by no means the only option for a PhD. India today is fast becoming a center for global R&D. Due to the quality of its manpower, and the lower cost, many organizations have started setting up R&D centers in India. And these centers are looking for PhDs (and not finding them, as there are not enough getting produced!) Some example of these are IBM India Research Center in New Delhi, GE Research in Bangalore, Mentor Graphics in Hyderabad, Cadence, etc.

Besides these research centers, most of the big Indian IT companies have started high end technology development and consulting, and R&D centers or cells, in which they need PhDs. Almost all the IT majors - TCS, Infosys, Wipro, etc. employ a large number of PhDs (upward of about 50 each) and are always looking for more people to enhance their R&D activities. This activity will increase in these companies as these companies become larger. A few years back, we had done an informal survey on salaries with these companies and we were told that most of them will offer at least twice as much starting salary for a PhD as for a BE. Starting salaries for many of these positions are of the order of Rs 50,000 PM or more.

Besides these opportunities in India, people with PhDs are global citizens and move around quite a bit. Immediately after PhD, there are opportunities for post-doctoral work in US and Europe. While working as a researcher/faculty, there are opportunities for visiting faculty appointments or visiting researchers in US, Europe, Singapore, etc., where a faculty member from India can spend a year or two in overseas universities or research labs. Many faculty members from India avail of this from time to time.