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I just want to add my $0.02 to respond to the low pay and low respect as a Software Developer/Engineer in the genomics. This is 100% true and also not true [bear with me]... you get it back in the back end. First the comp, most people think about the income they get as in levels.fyi TC. IMHO, The no. 1 value add is working for an academic center is the freedom in both time and spirit you get in pursuing your interest and the side ventures & hustles which eventually compounds. The hours are very reasonable in academia and in most places, you can take classes internally on campus or get reimbursed for it and get supportive managers who let you take time off from work to study. Or just great WLB to pursue something you really enjoy. And this compounds both spiritually and financially. Just a data point of one, I took an online data science degree whilst working like 15hrs/week and 25hrs on classes. From the classes, I got the bug to apply data science I learned on my degree and on the genomics analysis job to apply to the financial markets/automated trading. Now over the past 4 years, I've achieved CAGR of 35%, and sharpe of 2.5 where my options trading portfolio capital gains outsizes consistently my W-2 pay and keep me par on L5 of FAANG engineer. To give you an idea, my other co-workers have gone into side-hustles real estate (not sure about now) or running day-care to great success. Yes because you have that much free time. Now autonomy/academic stimulation, I would not give it up for the world even if I was doing it for free. Previously I was working for a "hot tech" company where I was bored out of my minds cranking CRUD widgets and re-learning JS frameworks every year and attending BS lunch n' learn work sessions of new crappy libraries with hipster names. In genomics, you get to apply traditional stat techniques (bioconductor), deep learning techniques (tensorflow, AlphaFold, GANs) and learn latest sequencing protocols (scRNASeq, ChIPSeq, CRISPR screenings) and learn the biology domain too (immunology, viral responses, cell regulatory networks, synthetic biology. It's like being on the front-seat to a movie cinema or basketball court where the scientific evolution is happening. You're learning something new everyday and you are at the center of it all as PIs, wet lab bench scientists all depend on you to perform the analysis and build the pipelines... and 8 years in, and I'm still excited with the only disappointment that I will never learn it all. Obv. a subjective data point of one, but I just want to add my data point just in case somebody out there on the fence. Yes sometimes you can truly have it all. |