Doctoral Colloquium in Bommerholz

For the second time we organize a doctoral seminar for PhD students in CS from Bochum, Dortmund, Duisburg und Essen. The main purpose is to provide networking opportunities beyond the own subject area and to highlight to options for life after the PhD.

This year we had 4 invited speakers highlighting opportunities in academia, industry, and in SMEs:

• Prof. Dr.-Ing. Christian Bauckhage, Fraunhofer-Institut für Intelligente Analyse- und Informationssysteme, Sankt Augustin: "Von einem der auszog, Wissenschaftler zu werden"
• Henning Dettleff, Bundesvereinigung der Deutschen Arbeitgeberverbände, Berlin: "Beschäftigungschancen von Promovierten in der Industrie"
• Dr. Matthias Häsel, Senior Product Manager, XING AG: "Perspektiven und Karrierewege in der Internetökonomie"
• Dr. Wiltrud Christine Radau, Deutscher Hochschulverband: "Karrierewege in der Wissenschaft"

The main take away message is be open with regard to career choices (bottom line: good students will be good and happy whatever they do after their PhD ;-). However if you are sure that you want to be in the management of a large enterprise than go for a top management consultancy job after your PhD and if you are sure academia in Germany is your only choice than go to one of the top Universities in the US as postdoc. This does not guarantee anything but puts you in the best position…

In the evening the tasks for the teams was to think 100 years ahead! This was inspired by the book "the world in 100 years" [2] and by a talk from Friedemann Mattern [2].

One essential reference on doing a PhD is [3] :-)

[1] Arthur Brehmer (Herausgeber). Die Welt in 100 Jahren: Mit einer einführenden Essay "Zukunft von gestern" von Georg Ruppelt. Reprint der Auflage von 1910. (2010). ISBN-10: 3487083043.

[2] Friedemann Matter. Die Welt in 100 Jahren - Rückblick auf eine vergangene Zukunft. Kolloquium an der TU Darmstadt. 2006.

[3] PhD Comics. http://www.phdcomics.com