My biggest challenge when I started applying to non-academic jobs was how to translate my PhD skills. All the career coaches were saying to do this, but how to do it remained a frustration of mine for a long time!
Thanks to the School of Hard Knocks and Life Lessons, I learned how to translate those skills and it helped with landing roles outside academia…after over a year of applying.
The experience annoyed me so much, I decided in 2021 to share my lessons with anyone who would listen. And ever since then, a popular struggle I’ve heard from academics and PhDs is, “Everyone says to focus on your transferrable skills if I want to transition into industry, but I’m having a hard time figuring that out.”
Been there! I know the feeling.
I have walked hundreds of people through how to translate their skills, and it’s always thrilling when I receive messages later on that say, “I took your advice. It worked.”
Recently, I was thinking about how to build a tool around the advice I’ve been handing out to folks since 2021 and ultimately built PhDSkillsTranslator.com – an AI-powered tool to help you brainstorm and translate your academic experiences into resume bullet points and interview talking points.
I shared the tool on LinkedIn a few weeks ago and got a ton of feedback.
One of those pieces of feedback was to include a tool that allows people to analyze job descriptions so they can use that to improve their resumes. I’m happy to say, I’ve added that functionality since then.
When I used to do one-on-one coaching, I charged $497 for a 3-hour personalized career coaching session.
I’ve included most of what I would tell you in that session into the PhD Skills Translator.
You can try Translator for free for 3 days, no strings attached. If you need to use it for longer than that, you can upgrade to the $7 per month plan (the price of your morning coffee and doughnut) or get it for $69 for life.
If you’re struggling with telling your story to industry decision-makers and translating your PhD skills into industry needs or with knowing where to start, get the tool today.
Have a great week.
Gertrude Nonterah, Ph.D.