[pjdesno]

I run into a fair number of good undergraduate students who are terrible phd students.

Same problem. They did well solving problems that someone already knows the answer to, applying concepts that were explained to them in class. Suddenly they face problems no one knows the answer to - otherwise we wouldn’t be trying to solve them. And they fall apart.

I think this is one part missing from the OP - some people just can’t seem to work without fairly rigid requirements. They do well in undergrad or a professional MS program, and there’s a place for them in a lot of big organizations, but there are a lot of jobs (phd student being one) for which they just aren’t a match.

[a_bonobo]

Funny enough, I was an academic for close to a decade before I resigned in disgust; and I feel like OP's article could be Work is not Academia. As an academic, all I needed to do is write papers and get grants, metrics that are easy to game and fairly clear to achieve.

Now in industry I had to learn the hard way that my fancy academic skills are mostly useless, and that my visibility within the organisation counts far more towards my career progression than my skills or what I actually contribute: co-workers who objectively produce trash but spend time selling it internally raise far faster through the ranks than me. My technical skills aren't that important, working towards visibility is. And OP's article is a great summary of that conundrum.

(I do not work in a US-style tech company, FWIW)