Ideas for Ph.Ds. Breaking into the Job Market

Thanks to everyone who liked and shared my post on getting a job in IO/OD after obtaining a Master’s degree. I appreciate your responses. Jamie Burik, a Ph.D. student at Adler University, read the post and asked if I had “any free advice on a doctoral level IO ‘breaking into’ the industry? Will it be equally as hard for me to find work?”

Since I don’t have a Ph.D., I had to talk to some of the Ph.Ds. on my team to get their feedback. Special thanks to #AnnaOlverPhD, R Daniel "BUCK" Seward, JD, SHRM-SCP Karen Main , and Kimberly Morse, PhD, SHRM-CP , who contributed to the article by adding their experiences and insights. I hope the ideas expressed herein will help you get a better chance of standing out from the competition based on qualifications and capabilities vs. education.

Preconceptions: What I look for in a job candidate

Whether fair or not, good or bad, people have existing biases that shape their beliefs and, thus, their expectations and actions. I have five criteria (preconceptions) that I have used throughout my career to make hiring decisions. In order of preference, they are 1) intelligence and the ability to learn quickly, 2) expansive creativity and the ability to see things differently than others, 3) superior job-related skills and the ability to apply them in innovative ways, 4) likeability and positive personality that enables them to make friends and fit in with the team and organization, and 5) an appropriate level of experience, so they can start contributing quickly.

1.????Intelligence vs. Knowledge. As IO psych majors, you know the difference. Suffice it to say I look for ways job applicants have adroitly applied their knowledge rather than simply expressed it. So, suppose a candidate has written a thesis or dissertation. I will very likely read it to see how they applied their research and findings to life outside of academia. Without application, it’s irrelevant to me because it doesn’t help me.

Fast Learner. One key measure I use to assess new hires (not applicants) is how quickly they attain 100% productivity. By 100% productivity, I mean they can fulfill all the job duties listed in the job description. I will ask applicants to tell me about a new skill they acquired and 1) how long did it take to get good at it, and 2) what they did do to acquire mastery.

2.????Creativity. In my experience, true creativity resides in the minds of only a very, very few people. It is a valued characteristic. Most people bring standard solutions to problems. In many instances, those solutions have already been tried and failed. New ways of thinking, new paradigms, and new mindsets are needed. Here’s a little test of your creativity. Give yourself exactly one minute to write a list of how many uses for a paper clip you can think of. How did you do?

I’ve done this test with thousands of people over the years. Here’s what I found, seven to eight is average, above fifteen is pretty good. A truly creative person will come up with more than that. Now, look at your list. What’s your most creative use for a paper clip? Compare your answer to this: use a paper clip to create a video recording tape. Can you even imagine how that would be accomplished? Try this one, make an outrigger canoe. That’s creativity. I want those people working for me.

3.????Superior Skills. Everyone with a Ph.D. is likely to have good psychometric skills, they are excellent researchers, probably good writers, and excellent at adapting to feedback from others. In March 2001, the OD Network published a list of 141 OD competencies. Among them were things like marketing, determining appropriate interventions, building trusting relationships, designing change processes, contracting (with internal clients), developing a change communication plan, obtaining commitment and buy-in, creating an intervention effectiveness model, identifying informal power, preparing leadership for feedback, facilitating complex emotional reactions, facilitate participative decision-making, establish key performance measures, transfer skills to internal staff, institutionalize change, create a post-intervention plan, and over a hundred more. Can you do these things?

Given the technological advances that occurred in the ensuing 21 years, how many more competencies do you think have been added? What skills or competencies do you have that set you apart from others, regardless of one’s degree? How do they relate to the job, company, and industry you are applying to? Be able to articulate these competencies and their value add.

4.????Likeability and Positive Personality. What? Why are you mentioning likeability, Alan? Well, there are several reasons. To be a successful IO/OD consultant, you must be a people person. You should be comfortable leading groups ranging from five or six to possibly over 500 at a time. Many IO/OD types lean toward the extraversion side. Friendliness, persuasiveness, and agreeableness are essential traits. Why? Because once they’ve determined what to do, they’ve got to make it happen. They can’t do that by themselves. They need to generate support from throughout the organization, from top to bottom, from its extremities to its core. I’ve observed that people don’t cooperate very well with people they don’t like.

Ours is a profession of optimists and positive thinkers. We genuinely think we can make things better in an organization. No, let me rephrase that… We truly BELIEVE we can make positive changes in an organization. The changes may not be exactly what was intended. But if we do our jobs well, they come close and truly improve organizations, systems, processes, and people. What separates us from egotists is that we know we can’t do it ourselves. We need the help and support of others. That means we’ve got to be nice… and confident. We trust our processes and the abilities of the group. Therefore, we seek out the best in people, their strengths, capabilities, desires, hopes, and dreams, and help bring them to fruition in their companies. We don’t always succeed, but we always try.

Finally, the team and I will work and interact with this person every day. It helps a lot if they are nice, fun people.

5.????Appropriate Levels of Experience. Suppose someone is coming to me fresh out of college or graduate school. I don’t expect them to have very much direct or related experience. So, I don’t place as much emphasis on that as on other criteria.

Let’s say I have a job opening for someone who can perform a specific task or meet an immediate need. In my mind, skill is the most critical criterion. Not knowledge. Not experience. I need someone who can start doing the job – Tomorrow!

Becoming the Candidate of Choice

When analyzing a job posting, look first at the job’s objectives. What needs is this position filling? How does the job contribute to the organization’s bottom line or effectiveness? Why is that important to the organization and the hiring manager?

• Get out of your academic head and put on a business-thinking hat. If you can tell me how you will help me meet my objectives, I will listen intently. If you tell me about your coursework or dissertation, I will listen politely.
• Think about your qualifications. What have you done or what have you learned, in any capacity, that can help the organization and manager achieve their objectives? Be creative. Don’t limit yourself to your dissertation or experience.

Scrutinize the job duties. These are the bottom-line selection qualifications and criteria. If you can do all the tasks listed, people will be interested, especially those job duties listed first. If the job seems terrific, the next step is a personal competency assessment.

1. Open a spreadsheet. List all the position’s job duties in the first column.
2. Use these headers for the four adjacent columns: Requisite Knowledge, Requisite Skills, Work Characteristics (e.g., attentive to detail, collaborative, etc.), and Possible Related Experience.
3. Fill in the adjacent columns with your qualifications. You will quickly see whether you possess the required job competencies. If you do, you can go to the interview armed with that information and ready to offset minimal experience requirements.

Thoroughly research the company. You do this for two reasons; first, you want to carry on a knowledgeable conversation about the company, its growth, expansion plans, competitive position, new innovations, etc. Second, ?you need to decide if this is genuinely a good fit for you.

• Don’t rely on brand recognition or size. Yes, it’s nice to have a prominent, well-respected Fortune 100 company on your resume, but you could get lost in the maze of cubicles, stuck doing knot-sh*t work.
• What kind of employee development programs do they have? How fast are OD/IO people advancing? What are the career options? What kind of work are the OD/IO people doing? How important is it in the overall scheme of things (i.e., what kind of funding, staffing, and awareness is it given)?

Write and be prepared to tell a compelling story. Most cover letters are boring because they are written to impress. Instead, let your resume impress and your cover letter emote. People like a good story. There is evidence that when listening to an engaging story, listeners’ brain waves begin to sync with those of the storyteller. It produces serotonin and other chemical mood boosters in our brains.

A Dash of Reality

Multiple Perspectives

There are at least three perspectives involved in making a hiring decision, 1) yours, 2) the recruiters, and 3) the hiring managers. The other perspectives are the potential candidate’s coworkers, the hiring manager’s boss and peers, and the people who will work with the successful candidate. All matter.

• Your Perspective. Job candidates have many concerns. Primary among them are salary, title, and responsibilities.
• Salaries and Perceived Worth. Job candidates with a Ph.D. have an idea of their worth based on salary tables, their peers’ earnings, and what their professors tell them. If they are offered something below their perceived worth, they are disappointed.
• Titles. The people with doctorates I’ve spoken with believe they should be managers, directors, supervisors, or some sort of leadership role.
• Responsibilities. It’s been my experience that Ph.Ds. want meaningful responsibilities right from the start of their employment.
• The Recruiter’s Perspective. First, you are a resume and cover letter screened by an algorithm. Algorithms are not influenced by fancy layouts or nice pictures. They look for qualifications. If you pass that initial screening, you end up in a file folder on a recruiter’s computer. You are one of maybe hundreds in that folder. If you’re lucky, they printed your documents; if not, you are lost in a folder in the cloud. Recruiters are looking for qualifications that stand out from the ordinary and the masses.

If you can, find someone within the company to get your documents and a referral to the recruiter, preferably to the hiring manager.

• The Hiring Manager’s Perspective. Hiring managers are exceptionally busy people. They have a department to run, projects to lead, budgets to balance, HR issues to handle, reports to make, meetings to lead, events to attend, and lots and lots of work. When it comes to hiring, they are concerned about the following:
• Meeting a need (usually an immediate need). Hiring managers wouldn’t have received permission to hire someone if they couldn’t have demonstrated a need. Meeting that need is what separates you from your competitors. (You can learn that need by carefully analyzing the job description.)
• Budget. Every year managers complete a budget. It includes expenses to cover projects, adding technology, employee development, etc. Year-over-year budgets are usually limited to a percentage increase. Managers’ effectiveness is measured by the results they attain and their ability to stay within or below their budgets. Adding an additional person affects their budgets and how they are perceived by their bosses.
• Speed to full competency. Things happen very quickly in well-run organizations. Managers are also judged on how quickly they get things done. They want someone who can come in and start making a difference tomorrow!

Consider Rethinking Your Requirements

Salary Expectations. I asked one of my senior consultants what her starting salary expectations were right out of her Ph.D. program. She said $100,000+. That’s not unreasonable. But, maybe, not realistic for someone with no experience. It is difficult to get accurate, current salary data identifying the difference between someone with an MS and Ph.D. According to dated SIOP data, a practitioner with a doctorate earned, on average, between 47% and 37% more than someone with an MS. Based on that data, the difference was over $30K. The actual numbers don’t really matter. The point is that the salary expectations for someone with a Ph.D. are significantly higher than those for someone with an MS degree. Assuming that someone with an MS is qualified to do the job, which hire makes the most sense from a business perspective (profit and loss or ROI)?

Responsibility and Job Title Expectations. Ph.Ds. expect or want to be placed in management or supervisory positions. In contrast, Master’s graduates are willing to make do with entry-level positions. Let’s do a case study. You have a woman with an MS who has been with you for four years, learning the ropes and building relationships, you like her, and she’s doing well. There’s an open management position. Do you promote a qualified person from within, or do you go outside and bring in a stranger? I know… it depends. I get it. But the decision to promote from within is often easier with less bureaucratic administrivia and morale-boosting for the team. Bringing in a stranger in a leadership role often causes worry and concern. Is this fair or right? It doesn’t matter. It happens.

Leveraging your Ph.D.

First and foremost, having a Ph.D. is impressive to those who don’t have one or aspire to one. It’s a very good thing. Even so, there there are potential drawbacks or perceptions to overcome. Here are a few things you can do to minimize the drawbacks and take advantage of your advanced degree.

1.????Overcome a Lack of Experience. Most hiring managers weigh the abovementioned four factors: Knowledge, Attitude, Skills, and Experience. If you completed the spreadsheet activity, you could see a listing of job-specific qualifications you possess and can bring up during interviews. Job-specific knowledge, attitudes, and skills have the potential to minimize experience qualification.

2.????Enhance Your Management and Leadership Skills. This is a crucial piece of advice. Work on developing your executive and management skills regardless of your educational level. Management and leadership skills are significant differentiators in qualifications. Build acumen in planning, project management, budgeting, strategizing, staffing, controlling costs, delegating, decision-making, resolving conflicts, motivating, engaging, etc. Enhance and demonstrate your capabilities by skills by joining a professional association and assuming these responsibilities as a volunteer. These core management skills make meaningful differences in your resume and professional standing. Do this while in grad school so you have relevant experience to showcase when you apply for a job.

3.????Expand your job and industry knowledge. Some recruiters try to pigeonhole you into your dissertation topic. Here’s how to avoid that. During your dissertation research, take time to expand your knowledge into closely related areas. Yes, I know time is money, and you want to complete your dissertation, but you also have to consider getting a job. Devote 10% to 20% of your research time to related topics. What topics? Go online and start reading business magazines, trade journals, and the business sections of local newspapers. That’s what CEOs read. Take verbal notes with your phone or computer (they’re faster).

4.????Eliminate Fears Regarding Being Overqualified. Accept that you probably are overqualified for most jobs and want more than the company may be willing to pay. Yes, you are a Ph.D., you are a Doctor, you could be a Professor. But simply put, if you don’t meet the knowledge, attitude, skills, or experience requirements, you aren’t a good fit for the job. You need to be able to articulate how the additional qualifications you possess are advantages by helping 1) the hiring manager by handling some of the tasks he or she has, freeing them up to do other things, 2) build the knowledge base of the department team, 3) help with teambuilding and competency building, and 4) possibly enhance the department’s credibility and brand.

5.????Jobs and Geography. Job availability is a function of geography, need, and the competitive marketplace. Look at maps showing job vacancies. You will see that some states, and the cities within them, have many more opportunities than others. If you want a job and live in one of those cities, great. If not, you may have to apply for jobs far away and relocate.

Also, be aware that the competition is much higher in some cities than in others. For example, the northeastern United States has thousands of large companies and outstanding universities supplying them with job candidates. In a city like New York, a Ph.D. may be a minimum requirement, not a nice-to-have. Competition for premium jobs is challenging in an environment like that.

6.????Look for Other Financial Rewards. Very tangible financial benefits can be found in career advancement opportunities, healthcare, life insurance benefits, bonus plans, vacation time, and relocation programs. It's not just about salary.

7.????Consider the company and the quality of work you will do: Is the company prestigious and will it look good on your resume? Is it close to your residence? Does the company pay for parking? What’s the commute like? What’s your workspace situation? Is there a company dining room? What kinds of projects will you work on? How can you apply your knowledge to existing projects? Whom will you work with (supervisors, peers, colleagues)? Many of these factors directly influence your quality of life as well as your quality of work. Some of these things outweigh salary.

8.????Rethink titles and responsibilities. Adding a new member to a team is unsettling. #ConnieGersick writes about “deep structure.” By that, she means that when things become deeply rooted, it’s difficult to change them. A team that’s been together a long time needs time to adjust to new members. This is where your “attitude” comes in. Let your title go. Focus on being accepted as one of the team. Accept what is assigned. Know that your responsibilities and credibility will grow in time. You come into the team with impressive credentials and want to demonstrate an equally impressive personality and people skills.

To answer Jamie’s question directly. Yes, it will be equally hard for a doctoral-level IO practitioner to break into the industry and find work. However, you have definite advantages. Hopefully, this piece will help you find and apply them.

I wish you the best.

Alan Landers, MHRD