Comment by Fomite | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Fomite | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

This. Having worked in a lab with a strong staff science presence, I know their value and what they bring to the table. I'd absolutely love one.

In the meantime, I'm shaking the couch cushions to be able to support more than one student.

You want 3X what a grad student makes makes? That makes you almost as expensive as me, and I'm the PI. I don't say that out of arrogance - I say that because that means I now have to pay for both of us while you go do science. In a grant, you're actually more expensive, because some of my salary is covered by the state/teaching/etc. while you're a pure soft money hire.

That's also ~45% of a non-modular NIH R01's yearly budget once you include benefits. Which means I'd be frantically writing grants with ~10% pay lines (being optimistic - the effective pay line for a PI under 40 is laughable) just to keep your paycheck coming. Because I can't fund you via a training grant, or an RA/TA line.

Keeping you employed for three years would consume my entire startup package. No travel, no data acquisition, no lab equipment...just you.

I'd like to be able to do all that. I'd also like a unicorn.

The reason this was easily possible in my case is because of the peculiarities of bioinformatics. Namely, equipment costs are low, so there is more money for staff per grant dollar.

We also have had much more luck with center and collaborative grants than R01-style individual grants. On collaborative grants, our sections are almost always the highest scored, on top of the fact that the pay lines are inherently higher. On individual grants, it is hit-or-miss to say the least, because reviewers seem to think, somewhat rightly, "why do you need $1M to play on computers?".

People come to us and say, "hey, I want to put you in as a small section for $75K, $100K, or whatever". Over the course of time it has meant we have a diverse and relatively stable revenue stream and low overhead, and there is less risk (because less time spent) on each individual grant. Although amusingly, my PI is still associate despite pulling in way more money overall than many fulls, because of this idea that only PI grants count for promotion.

> I say that because that means I now have to pay for both of us while you go do science.

Yeah, although I said in my OP that "I just want to do science", in reality I write parts of grants, mostly the technical parts, all the time, and I go to grant strategy meetings, where I feel my input is valued as I can often give a better idea of what's feasible than the PIs can. I guess more precisely, I don't want the responsibility and pressure of being in charge of the whole package, and I don't like dealing with all the paperwork. So in our case the funding is a team effort as well.

> way things like training grants are structured

I have been with him since grad school. In the early days, the way we got around this was titling me as a postdoc and paying me like a staff scientist, which was fine by me.

> The reason this was easily possible in my case is because of the peculiarities of bioinformatics. Namely, equipment costs are low, so there is more money for staff per grant dollar.

Ironically, I'm in just such a field as well. But that also causes another bit of pressure, because it does mean that I could stop sooner and go back to science if I wanted to fund less people. Covering myself and a grad student can be done with a few bits and pieces of funding. As I noted in the back of napkin calculation, a staff scientist vastly increases the amount of money I need to find.

> Yeah, although I said in my OP that "I just want to do science", in reality I write parts of grants, mostly the technical parts, all the time, and I go to grant strategy meetings, where I feel my input is valued as I can often give a better idea of what's feasible than the PIs can. I guess more precisely, I don't want the responsibility and pressure of being in charge of the whole package, and I don't like dealing with all the paperwork. So in our case the funding is a team effort as well.

In fairness, I reacted to this because I have met some people who meant it seriously - they want to be left alone in a lab to answer their questions while someone else keeps the lights on. And well...yeah...you just described the perfect job.

> I have been with him since grad school. In the early days, the way we got around this was titling me as a postdoc and paying me like a staff scientist, which was fine by me.

And this hasn't backfired by having one of his "postdocs" not progressing very fast?

> they want to be left alone in a lab to answer their questions while someone else keeps the lights on. And well...yeah...you just described the perfect job.

Well, that IS what I want, probably what everyone wants. I don't like writing grants, as I said, but I am in touch with reality and consider it an important part of my value proposition. Plus, I like my PI and consider him my friend. It's not nice to leave all the shit work for your friend.

EDIT: In many ways, I have tried to alter my behavior to prevent exactly the kinds of problem you are talking about. I absolutely want my PI to feel like my presence is a net benefit. If a staff scientist didn't understand these realities, they could easily be both naive and unhelpful.

> And this hasn't backfired by having one of his "postdocs" not progressing very fast?

Interesting point, one I hadn't considered. We are a pretty small lab, 4 grad students, 1 postdoc, occasional summer/rotation/temp postdocs or students, and me. In the past we had 2 postdocs.

The 1 postdoc who is in the lab now is a statistician who has zero interest in his career or ever being a PI. He is extremely valuable but I don't get the impression he feels held back. He is a "give me a job and I'll do it" type.

For informatics, I believe the productivity multiplier for skill is higher than in wet lab. Thus, it is not only easier but potentially better to have a small lab with high skill than the converse. So we have little interest in rapid growth.

I, too, wanted a Unicorn Job of this sort: http://pgbovine.net/unicorn-jobs.htm

After some trial and error bouncing around in industry/postdoc/etc., I've found that being a PI in a field where I have to raise relatively small amounts of money (compared to Big Science labs) to be the best balance for me at this point. I agree with Fomite that unless I magically get amazing at grant-writing, there's no way that I could afford to sustain full-time staff ... I don't envision myself going down this path since I want to minimize time spent writing grants and maximize my research/teaching/service time.

The thing that distinguishes my situation from the type of "unicorn job" you are talking about is that I have some realism, and I compromise.

Clearly it is ridiculous to expect I can do what I want 100% of the time without any of the responsibility that normally goes with being a PI. Instead, I accept a middle ground of autonomy and responsibility between postdoc/student and PI.

Your article largely seems to be about why employers won't sponsor pure unicorn jobs. Quite true. That's why I have to continually make it clear what value I provide to the bottom line. But I have still done better than the 10-30% you talk about. It's probably 50-70%.

I have found that science and life in general can be quite flexible if you know what you want and take concrete, realistic steps to make it happen.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com