[ginnungagap]

> The conventional wisdom was that if academia didn't work out it would be easy to jump into industry.

Thanks for your comment, this is definitely a widespread opinion in my department as well, but I've heard from many people who went into industry that it wasn't quite that easy. This is part of why I'm asking now that I have a long time to prepare

[returningfory2]

I remember when searching for jobs in the last year of my PhD I was confused about why it was going nowhere even though everyone had told me it would be easy. I then had this huge realization that the only people who had said it would be easy were still in academia and had never tried! And I also remembered that _I_ had sometimes told people that getting an industry job would be easy! I guess it's just a weird thing in math departments that this kind of idea gets thrown around without any kind of validation.

Good that you've realized this early though.

[red_trumpet]

Here is my theory: From the point of view of a math department, most people who did a PhD and don't end up in academia finally have a well-paid job somewhere in the industry. Whereas there are many stories of people who didn't make it to a permanent position in academia, even if they tried.

That doesn't mean that finding a job in the industry is easy, so taking time to prepare for it is certainly good!