SIGMOD 2013NEW RESEARCHER

SYMPOSIUM

Martin TheobaldUniversity of Antwerp,

Belgium

DISCLAIMER

The views and opinions in this presentation

are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the actual policies of any of the entities mentioned

therein

OUTLINE

Some Class Photos Research in Europe vs. U.S. Do’s & Dont’s

MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE A N N O 2 0 0 3

MAX PLANCK INSTITUTEANNO 2005

STANFORD INFOLABANNO 2007

MAX PLANCK INSTITUTEA N N O 2 0 0 9

UNIVERSITY OF ANTWERPA N N O 2 0 1 3

RESEARCH IN EUROPE

Research mostly in public universities/institutes and only in a few big companies. (IBM, SAP, Yahoo!,…)

European funding (EU STREP/FET, ERC)• Very generous and prestigious, but hard to get.

Few companies (Google) competitive to EU funding.

Gap between south/north & west/center/east.• Center/north doing much better than south.

RESEARCH IN THE U.S.

Most research takes place in private/state universities and in company labs. (IBM, MSR, Oracle, Google, Yahoo!, …)

Much stronger startup culture than in Europe.

Funding from both public agencies (NSF, NASA, DARPA) and industry, business angels, etc.

RESEARCH IN GERMANY

Germany provides excellent funding options for temporary research positions.

• “Excellence Initiatives” at various universities.• Research institutes & societies: Max Planck,

Fraunhofer, Helmholtz, Leibniz, …• 1.5B EUR annual budget of the Max Planck Society

(~170 institutes) vs. 4.4B USD at Stanford University.• 6-year rule for public employers applies as well.

RESEARCH IN GERMANY

Permanent academic positions ( professorships) are very rare.

• 1-2 university openings per year in Databases & Information-Systems or Applied Informatics. (10-20 competitors with at least equally strong C.V.’s)• Very few new professorships are being created.

• Academic job market might improve in 10 years.

SOME STATS

Germany has one of the lowest birth rates in the world.

By 2030, more than 50% of the German population will be above 50.

Only 28% of young people study (compared to 39% in OECD).

Source: Wikipedia, Population Reference Bureau 2009

TENURE IN GERMANY

Germany is one of the few European countries that (still) has no tenure-track system.

• People do post-docs and habilitations (PD), which means a temporary position (and title for teaching).• Few Junior professorships (W1), which are usually not

tenured and have no option to “upgrade”.• You will have to move more often after your Ph.D.

than before. 6 years to obtain tenure is usually tight.

RESEARCH IN BELGIUM

Europe is much more heterogeneous than the U.S. 33 countries, 270 administrative regions, 23 languages. I’m currently learning Dutch

Source: Wikipedia

RESEARCH IN BELGIUM

6 Flemish universities for higher education (at ~6.5 Million inhabitants)

• Antwerp• Brussels (2x)• Gent• Hasselt• Leuven

Funding primarily at university-level and by the Flemish research foundation (FWO).

TENURE IN BELGIUM 4 levels of university professorships, all of which are principally tenured.

• Docent• Hoofddocent• Hoogleraar• Gewoon Hoogleraar

New 6-year tenure-track system. Hiring based on your level of experience. You can upgrade (i.e., apply for promotion) at your home university.

DO’S: PH.D. STUDENTS

Focus on your (given) research topic but also grasp beyond your own nose. Convince your supervisor to let you work on real-world problems, which may also be of interest for your potential future employers.• Big Data, MapReduce, Web stuff, …

DO’S: POST-DOCS If you are aiming for an academic position:

• Focus on research, but also try to get involved in teaching and supervision (Ba/Ma, Ph.D.) as early as possible.

• Establish your own research topic and try to gradually “decouple” from your advisor.

If you are aiming for industry:• Hey, why are you doing a post-doc? You could

probably earn much more money somewhere else.

DO’S: TENURE-TRACK PEOPLE

Minimize the amount of teaching you need to do yourself. Find a trade-off between depth and usability of your research. (No point in doing research on a topic that is already handled by Google at 100,000 times the scale.) Watch out for funding options and write proposals (Europe), or try to convince industry partners (U.S.) whenever possible.

LAST BUT NOT LEAST The earlier you know what you want, the better.

Don’t focus on a too broad or too narrow research topic, but establish your own profile. Interact with other researchers/industry as much as possible. Stay flexible and always have a backup in mind.