phd

17 November 2025

TFW when the biggest achievement of your life becomes your biggest curse

Conversations with recruiters usually tend to go more or less like this: “Are you looking for data scientists?” “Indeed we are! Do you have a degree in data science?” “I have an equivalent degree and over 8 years of experience in data science.” “So what kind of degree do you have?” “I have a PhD in English linguistics, but methodically I worked with data during that time.” [at this point the recruiter’s face usually assumes a puzzled look] “…That… doesn’t really sound like what we need… we’re not looking for humanities scholars.” “While linguistics is indeed often grouped among the […]

29 January 2023

My PhD experience and #LeavingAcademia

If you follow me on Instagram or LinkedIn, you might already know that, since last week, I am officially a doctor (PhD)! And with that, my academic career comes to a close after almost 12 years at university. A good opportunity to reminisce about my experience in academia, and my reasons to not stay there. Bachelor’s and Master’s I started studying in 2011, after previously having worked as a web developer. Why did I leave my career as a web developer in the first place? Well, I wanted a new challenge, and since back then I used my lunch breaks […]

1 September 2022

Dissertation defended!

Yesterday five years of hard work finally came to a conclusion in the defense of my dissertation. Being a PhD student was the most challenging thing I ever did in my professional/academic career – all the memes are true. While you’re doing it, you feel like you are climbing a never ending mountain that just keeps getting higher and higher. And when you finally think you reach the end (submitting the dissertation), there’s another mountain waiting for you (defending the dissertation), and then another small hill (publishing the dissertation). And only then it’s finally done. How do you even compress […]