Part of my career coaching practice is working with students at various graduate schools (getting MBAs or other advanced professional degrees). Many of the students I see want to use their graduate programs to change careers. Yes, the graduate studies will give you technical knowledge and academic project experience in a new field. Your classmates and professors will be a new network. Your graduate degree will confer a level of achievement in your new field. However, there are other ways to get the technical knowledge, project experience and network, as well as other ways of signaling to your new industry that you are actively a part of that field. Grad school is disruptive to your career, and there are downsides to attending. Here are four reasons why you should not go to grad school to change careers (and what to do instead):
Financial Burden
I know so many aspiring career changers who settle for a less-than-ideal job because they choose (and understandably so) the security of an immediate paycheck over the risk of holding out to find something better. This risk is compounded with grad school, when you’re thousands of dollars, if not six figures, in debt from the tuition, fees, supplies and your reduced (if not eliminated) work schedule. The costs of graduate school are significant. With student loan payments looming, are you really going to take your time to look for your ideal job? With the financial investment you just made, will you be more or less likely to consider alternative options, such as roles that pay less upfront but have more upside or industries that generally pay less but offer you more fulfillment?
Instead, consider a shorter certification program, ongoing courses or specialized conferences. Start with a part-time schedule so you can confirm that the degree is what you think it will be before committing to the full program. Or download the reading list from one (or all) of the classes, and go the self-study route. Finally, check your assumptions about whether you actually need the degree in your new career, or just the knowledge. There are certain careers where a graduate degree is absolutely required – doctor, lawyer, clinical social worker. But for many careers, even where graduate degrees are typical, there is no hard-and-fast rule.
Opportunity Cost
The actual money you pay towards the grad degree isn’t the only cost. There is also the cost of time spent on completing the degree and the time spent not working. Even if you go part-time, you might otherwise have worked some evenings or weekends, and knowing that you can’t, you might have taken yourself out of the running for bigger projects or clients. If you go full-time, you step out of the workforce for years. This time has an opportunity cost – what else could you have been doing?
Before you decide on grad school, set aside the hours you would have spent attending class and doing homework, and dedicate these to your career change. Plow through the niche blogs, industry publications, and technical reading relevant to your new career. Apprentice with someone in the new career – do research for them, run errands, help organize their office, learn by watching. Get active in professional associations to start building a network in your new career. Even if you still decide to go to grad school, you’ll be much better positioned in your new career and be more competitive for graduate internships and research assistantships.
Theory Over Practice
Opportunity cost is particularly high when you trade professional work for academia because employers favor work experience over classroom time. Grad school is theoretical; what you do on the job is practical. When I recruited graduate students, I didn’t just consider their degree – I prioritized those with related work experience. My hiring groups wanted people who had a track record for applying the theoretical knowledge into real-world environments. This put career changers, whose undergraduate career was in an unrelated field and therefore only had theoretical knowledge of their new career, at a disadvantage.
Even if your current job is very different from your target career, you might be able to work on a cross-functional project that gives you some experience in your new field. Apprenticing or starting a business on the side is another way to learn while you get hands-on practical experience. Volunteer at the specialized conferences or with the professional associations in your new field to give you a portfolio of work in the new career.
Turning Back The Clock
One overlooked downside of graduate school is how much it turns back the clock on your career and minimizes your body of work before attending. If you have six years of experience pre-grad school and your classmate has three years but you start the same Associate program that all recent Masters grads are hired into, then you’ve essentially reset and turned back the clock. (You are now a recent grad, as much as the other less experienced person is.) You have eliminated three years of your experience. Careers are a marathon, not a sprint, so it could be well worth it to do that if it puts you on your preferred track long-term. But this reset issue compounds the further out you are in your career before grad school. What if you had 10 years of experience? Would you still be OK starting over with someone who has five years or three years?
The alternative to turning back the clock is continuing to build your body of work on your own timetable. So you move into your new career via your own learning, networking and experience you cultivate and are able to position the years of other experience you have as a value-added benefit and not something that is lumped together as experience in-between your degrees.
There are many good reasons to go to grad school. Using grad school to support your career change could be one of them, but it does come with costs. Know what you’re getting into, and decide with full information if grad school is the best option for you.
