Physics and Astronomy Job Hunting Resources

Sections below:
Career References: General, Science
Job listings/pointers: Physics and Astronomy, overseas and (specifically) nonacademic
Job profile questions

General Career References

• No recommendations are given here for anyone in particular, but nowadays it is turning out to be very useful to speak with a career counselor, especially one who is familiar with science PhD's looking for jobs outside of standard academia. (These might be more easy to find in areas with many such people looking or many appropriate jobs, e.g. high tech or high density academic cities, such as silicon valley, Boston, etc...)
• Books Some favorite general books on choosing a career and getting a job once you've chosen
• General Job Search (see also more specialized below)
  • Jobhunt page General job web pages, some info on writing resumes too.
  • JobBank USA career information, includes job and resume database
  • Monster.com
  • JobNext Career Network
  • jobs.net
  • The Riley Guide
  • College Net college placement services, information on listed institutions.
  • Job Web
  • CareerMosaic
  • Proteus Job Database, mostly U.K.
  • CareerMart new, will probably build up.
  • Career Resource Net
• Non-academic fields career resources, Harvard also Academic and Non-academic Career Resources for Science PhD's Questions one should be prepared to answer for job interviews, M. Sies, U Maryland

Resources on Physics/Science Careers

Books
• The Professor is In (about getting a job in academia)
• Alternative Careers in Science, ed. Cynthia Robbins-Roth, 1998
• A PhD is Not Enough:A Guide to Survival in Science, Feibelman, Addison Wesley, 1993
• Tomorrow's Professor : Preparing for Academic Careers in Science, and Engineering, Richard M. Reis, 1997
• Rethinking science as a career: perceptions and realities in the physical sciences, S. Tobias, D. Chubin, K. Aylesworth, Tucson: Research Corp, 1995
• Employment Guide for Engineers and Scientists, 3rd. edition, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, US Activities, Washington, DC 1991
• Peterson's The Hidden Job Market, A job seeker's guide to America's 2,000 little known, fastest growing high-tech companies. Princeton: Peterson's Guides, 1993
• Scientific and Engineering Societies: Resources for Career Planning, V. W. Stern, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Washington, DC 1980
• To Boldly Go A Practical Career Guide for Scientists (if you wish to order this on the phone you can call 1-800-966-2481)
• Outside the Ivory Tower: A Guide for Academics Considering Alternative Careers, by Margaret Newhouse
• Career Renewal: Tools for Scientist and Technical Professionals, Stephen Rosen and Celia Paul, Academic Press (San Diego, CA, 1997)
• Landing your first job: a guide for physics students (2002, AIP)

Web Pages
• SCIENCE's next wave (sciencecareers.sciencemag.org)
• Jobs in Physics, Astronomy, and Other Fields career planning, job listings
• APS Career Employment Homepage also info on negotiating job offers
• UIUC job resource page maintained by Linda Lorenz--seems gone
• Careers in Physics , Harvard University
• Career Planning Center for Beginning Scientists and Engineers by National Academy of Sciences. Job listings and all sorts of information, can search for positions by key word(s).
• Ohio State Career Center for Physicists
• AGU Scientific Career Resources
• SPIRES HEPjobs database (mostly high energy)
• American Astronomical Society Career Services Listing
• PhDs.Org Science, Math, and Engineering Career Links
• Jobs in Physics, Astronomy and other fields, site at Sonoma State. Includes links to many companies which may have jobs as well.
• NatureJobs, Career center by Nature
• Illinois Physics Career Resources
• Best Online College Physics Career Guide

Web Sites with general physics job listings of potential interest

• American Institute of Physics Listings (note their extensive links to other career opportunities), updated frequently
• Chronicle of Higher Education positions Academe This Week - Job Openings in Academe. Note: this changes every week.
• American Astronomical Society, updated monthly
• also check out the AAS list of job listings
• On-Line Job Meta-List
• Physics Web Jobs, by the Institute of Physics, UK
• Positions in Universities, part of Career Resource net above
• Physics Jobs On-Line (TIPTOP)
• PhysicsJobs.com started Dec. 2001
• Robot Confmenu/Jobmenu, Physics Academic and Research positions
• PhysLINK.com online job service
• Science Job Market by the American Association of Physics Teachers. Searchable list, also has academic and non-academic job search engine list
• University of Illinois Physics jobs list
• AstroPlace Astronomy and Astrophysics job lists
• Germany based list, pointers to many lists, VERY good.
• Unofficial Rumor Mills:
  Particle Physics, Astronomy, Nuclear Physics, Experimental Particle Physics

  Some overseas job listings

• Robot Confmenu/Jobmenu, Physics Academic and Research positions
• Nature international science jobs
• New Scientist, jobs in Europe and Australia (requires registration)
• Times Higher Education Supplement, login page, has job listings, UK
• Physics World Jobs Online, by the Institute of Physics, UK (same as above)
• TELEJOB (Stellenbrse) Home Page Mostly Switzerland
• Germany based list, pointers to many lists (also listed above)
• SIRE Life Sciences helps people find jobs in Life Sciences, including physics PhDs.

Examples of possible careers, advice on switching from academia

• SCIENCE's next wave (also above, has both academic and non-academic info)
• How to Prepare to Find A Job in Industry advice--a talk given to a group of mathematicians, by Stanley J. Benkoski of Daniel H. Wagner Associates.
• Wall Street, Financial: for example see this information for physicists by N. Goldenfeld and J.P. Morgan recruiting
  training but with many general pointers as well.
• Data Analytics, see e.g. this fellowship by insightdatascience.com in Silicon valley for scientific PhD's.
• Advice on transitioning to data science from Insight Data
• Advice on how to transition to a job on Coding (Silicon Valley) by Ryan Scranton.
• More advice on becoming a data scientist, starting from an astronomy degree, by Jessica Kirkpatrick
  This can include software for physics education, for wall street, for other engineering projects, for consulting, for setting up Web pages. Some listings for jobs can be found, for example at the Monster Board , net-temps.com and at Helpwanted.com.
• Energy and environmental science and policy, a personal introduction by D. Kammen
• Radiology Medical physics
• Science Policy (RSC) job information
• Engineering-general, e.g. see Best Engineering Jobs.com
• Consulting, Strategy Analysts
  Middlebury page on consulting interviews, used to be a page on these by Cosentino but now there are books by him.
• Environmental non-profit listings from the Chronicle of Philanthropy (changes every week), many more resources for non-profit jobs out there
• Career opportunities in intellectual property law and also AAAS article on Careers in Patent Law and this intro page for people thinking about it as a career
• PhDs.org nonacademic jobs
• Public Policy
• Speech recognition engineering
• Science writing and editing
• Environmental Engineering
• Public Policy-security issues
• Neural nets

Job Profiles

• Some questions to ask about a job

Please send suggestions to Joanne Cohn , especially if you would like to give some summary of a career path, to put in the examples of possible careers section. (I am travelling a lot, so I might not get back to you for a little bit. Thanks. - Joanne)