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The Pros of Doing a Post-Doc

In 2019, we started a conversation about doing a Post-Doc (or not). Life happens and so now I'm circling back to continue the conversation in 2020.

A post-doctoral fellowship, for nursing, is an additional two to three years of training after you finish your PhD. A post-doc can be a great opportunity to build additional skills and expand your network of mentors. For example, if you did a qualitative dissertation then building your quantitative skills as they relate to your dissertation work is a logical next step in developing your program of research.

A post-doc is also the perfect time to publish. Highly competitive candidates for faculty positions at top schools typically have between 5 and 10 publications resulting from their post-doc, sometimes more. To meet that goal, it is an ideal opportunity to go back to your papers that you wrote during your doctoral coursework and see which ones can be developed into papers.  Papers that demonstrate collaboration with your post-doc mentor are also important and you may be asked to take the lead on those.  And above all else, submit or publish at least one paper from your dissertation.

Networking is also a skill to develop during your post-doc. Rarely in your career will you have the time to develop your networks as you will during your post-doc. You want people to know your work and you want to know who are the good collaborators in your field.   It will help your program of research grow and flourish, even in times of tight funding.

Finally, your post-doc is the perfect time to do the pilot work that you need to put together larger grants. Small grant funding will help you have data for several years that will keep you in publications before your big grant comes. If you choose a faculty role, then as you take on teaching, having data to work with as you develop your classroom management skills--which can take time and often affect publication productivity for new faculty.

There are a lot of pros to doing a post-doc. The right opportunity will set you up to make your vision for research a reality.
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