How should I write leaving a PhD program after 6 years on the CV?

Question

I started my PhD in engineering in 2018 right after finishing Master's. In my 3nd year, COVID happened and I couldn't continue my research for various reasons. I tried to switch topic, but after doing it for about a year I couldn't find the passion to continue doing research.

My family convinced me to try at it a bit longer and I did, but time passed by without significant progress. I decided to quit and am now looking for a job in an industry related to my field. (Officially, I am still in the program, but I don't have any desire to finish.)

My concern is how should I present this on my CV. As the normal duration for Ph.D. program is three years, and I extended it to 5-6 years without being able to get the degree.

Answer 1

I left PhD after 4 years. I have my PhD time under "experience" not under "education" and I have explicit "not completed" line to prevent any confusions. In my experience, no one will care if you finished your PhD or not if you have the necessary skills for industry. In fact lots of people in the industry do not have the highest opinion of academia and they totally understand why someone would leave.

Answer 2

PhD supervisor here. I'd suggest listing it for what it is—you have done a few years of research work and hopefully learned a bunch of useful stuff from them. The same as you would have gained by, say, working in a company R&D lab for that time.

It's sad when PhDs don't work out, but sometimes it happens and everyone knows that. There are lots of random factors—personalities, supervisors, topics, fundings, and life events, many of which are completely beyond your control. Can you change supervisor and/or topic to get to the finish line? Maybe talk to your supervisor and university to see if there are any options for you to go back and finish it later in your career? (E.g., Brian May from Queen did this!) Or sometimes if you take an industry R&D job you can carry on some of your research or something related and roll that into finishing a thesis. Talk to companies about those options?

If you just want a qualification now—do you have enough material to write up and submit something now, either as a PhD attempt or as a lesser degree like an MRes or MPhil perhaps? Did you publish anything during your research? If so—publications are generally more valuable than PhD degrees nowadays. When we hire for postdocs we are looking for publications rather than degrees.

Answer 3

I left my first PhD after 3 years (out of 5 years) in 2021 due to various reasons. My official designation at the time was "Junior Research Fellow" and this is how it reflects on my CV. I'm yet to be questioned on it - I'm still in academia though in another PhD program (finishing in one year).

Answer 4

First of all, let me congratulate you on making a decision and acting on it. It is a bold step to aboard any undertaking after such a long time.

From my experience of quitting a PhD mid-way, the only harm would be to not having learned from it. Compared to someone who always passed without a hassle, you know your limits -- and some companies find value in that.

How about presenting a CV where you also write the subjects of what you did when? That way, you can split your career steps within the PhD program visually into shorter sections.

Also, depending on what you did in parallel, you can list that with overlapping dates.

Prepare yourself to have one (not many) consistent explanation why a PhD didn't work out for you, when asked about it, or when you tell the story of your journey. I mean, if you get asked about it during a hiring process, you're already talking with people about what's important: you.

Don't try and hide the fact of coming out of a dead end! You never know, what background checks a company might run, what people they know in your surroundings, etc. And you'll probably tell your future colleagues about that time anyway. There is a lot of potentially non-repairable damage, if anybody later gets the feeling of a deceit during the hiring process.

Good luck!

Answer 5

Since you are still in the program, you can write that you are on a leave of absence, not completed, moved to 'candidate' (assuming you passed your exams already), etc. Speaking of that, does your university offer the option of a non-thesis terminal Master's with what you've done so far? That'd take care of the issue.

There's no shame in leaving a program if you've lost the motivation for it and don't see yourself restarting a new research topic. In fact, there's a lot to be said about someone with the wisdom to know when quitting and moving on is the best option. Your family might be disappointed because it's hard to explain how stressful grad school is to outsiders. But the people that matter, ie hiring managers, don't care. They care about your skills and experience.