Landing a Faculty Job in CS from Industry

A typical question that many PhD students, especially those close to graduation, will have is: should I go into industry or academia?

While this is definitely a choice that depends on lifestyle, career goals, personal motivation, and so on, it is also related to how easy or hard it is to transition from one to the other. A common belief in academia is that once you leave for industry, it becomes much harder to return. This makes the choice feel more like a long-term commitment. In contrast, switching between companies within industry (say, from Google to Apple) is rarely viewed as a major life decision. The tech industry has a culture of mobility, where changing jobs is relatively common and low risk. Because of this difference, choosing between academia and industry often carries more weight and requires more serious thought about long-term options. So, to make an informed decision, it’s important to understand the chances of transition between the two paths.

While apparently it is hard to find statistical evidence for this question, I want to share my two cents, particularly on the advantages and disadvantages of having industry experience, when compared to candidates coming directly from academic backgrounds, such as PhD students or postdocs.

A quick disclaimer: What I’m sharing here is based purely on my personal experience, along with some takeaways I’ve gathered from talking to others. This is by no means a universal guideline that applies to every situation. Also, my perspective comes specifically from working in an industry research lab, where we still publish regularly and stay closely connected to the academic community through conferences, talks, and collaborations with universities. Some of the observations may not directly apply to other types of industry roles, such as software engineer or working at a startup. For additional context, I have a PhD in computer science, and my work mainly focuses on the intersection of HCI, AI, and AR/VR. I mainly applied for faculty positions in computer science departments in the US.

With that in mind, here are some strengths and challenges I’ve experienced personally as an industry researcher considering a move to a faculty position:

Strengths

You may have some student mentoring experience

Many research labs in industry offer internship programs. These programs often give you the chance to mentor interns and work with them on research projects that aim to be published. In many cases, you can bring in strong PhD students from top universities to work full-time for three months or more on a project that matches your research interests.

If you have the chance to mentor students and publish papers with them, that’s a big plus for your faculty application which can help you stand out. While PhD students and postdocs may also mentor undergrads or junior students, the main advisor is usually still the PI, who is often listed as the last author in computer science field. But when you mentor interns in industry, you are more likely to be recognized as the primary mentor. This kind of experience can make a strong impression in your application materials.

You may have more independent research projects

One of the key qualities faculty search committees look for is independence, specifically whether you can define and lead your own research agenda. For PhD students or postdocs, it can be tricky to disentangle their research independence from their advisor’s influence, especially when the work closely follows an established agenda set by the advisor.

In an industry research lab, researchers often have the freedom to identify and lead their own projects (within limits, as these may still need to align with business goals). If your published work clearly demonstrates that you initiated and led the research, it can strongly support your case as an independent researcher.

You may have more experience in collaboration, especially across different roles

This is a benefit that may not be obvious on your resume and may not directly improve your chances of getting a faculty job, but it is something I feel I benefit a lot from the industry environment. In industry, you will have the chance to work on larger-scale, cross-functional projects that involve collaboration with people in different roles, such as engineers, product managers, designers, and other stakeholders.

This experience helps you develop strong communication and interpersonal skills. In many cases, you need to explain complex technical ideas to non-technical audiences, quickly grasp key takeaways from people in other domains, and align different perspectives and goals across teams to move a project forward. These are valuable skills that are not always emphasized during PhD training but are essential for a faculty role.

Of course, a direct benefit of all this experience is that you may have stronger connections in industry, especially with your former employer, which could potentially help your faculty career through funding opportunities, or internship positions for your students.

You may feel less pressure

One advantage that people may not immediately realize is that, as an industry researcher, you may have a greater margin for error compared to PhD students or postdocs. Transitioning from industry to academia can feel more like switching jobs between companies. This gives you the option to compare offers with your current position and only accept one if it truly feels like the right fit.

This difference can shift your mindset during interviews. For PhD students or postdocs, applying for faculty jobs may feel like a high-stakes, one-shot deal. As interviews progress, the pressure builds, especially if you feel like you must land an offer. In contrast, industry researchers already have a stable job¹ , so they can approach the process with more confidence. Industry position also gives you the flexibility to try the faculty job market across multiple years. You’re not forced to take the only offer you get if it doesn’t feel like a good match. The academic job market can be random, and sometimes the right opening just isn’t available in a given year. Being in industry gives you the patience, stability, and of course, financial security to try again.

¹ relatively stable job, as layoffs in industry are becoming more common these days.

Challenges

You have less support from your academic network

This, in my view, is the biggest challenge. Once you are in industry, you lose much of the continuous academic support you might have had as a PhD student or postdoc. Your former advisor can still help, but it’s hard to provide close, weekly guidance or keep you continuously updated on academic hiring trends. The same goes for peers. In academia, your peers are often in a similar stage and facing the same challenges, but in a company, it is rare to find colleagues who are also preparing for the faculty market. Even if they are, people in industry tend to keep such job searches private.

I have seen how valuable it is to have a group of peers in the same situation. It offers not only practical help, but also emotional support. The faculty job market is tough, and any encouragement you receive can make a big difference in maintaining energy and focus for the next interview. In industry, you lose much of this community and the daily reinforcement it provides.

One very concrete example is polishing your job talk, which is arguably the most important part of the interview. In academia, you can present your talk to your lab, your department, or even at other universities to get feedback. In industry, you will likely have to find your own way to practice it. This is not to say you cannot succeed without this feedback, but it is a real disadvantage to lack the suggestions that come from people who know the norms and have extensive experience. Industry researchers need to be proactive, reaching out to friends, university collaborators, or even people outside their field to rehearse and get feedback. I once did this with friends whose backgrounds were entirely different from mine, and their perspectives still gave me critical suggestions I would never have thought of.

You may need to keep the search confidential

Just as you would not publicly announce a job search from Google to Meta, moving from industry to academia is not something people usually would advertise openly. Yet, in academia, visibility matters. Faculty openings at top universities can attract hundreds of applicants, and your materials may be overlooked if you don’t find ways to stand out.

PhD students and postdocs often post on social media, present at workshops or conferences, and use their networks to signal they are on the job market. This kind of visibility can help draw attention to your application. Industry researchers can still do this, but often must proceed more carefully to avoid conflicts or misunderstandings with their current employer.

You may have less time to prepare job materials

This is another huge disadvantage. The amount of time, energy, and effort required for the academic job market is tremendous, and the process stretches over many months. Here is a quick glimpse of the workload and timeline:

Usually, around October or November, you’ll need to start preparing your application materials, such as your CV and research statements. Don’t underestimate how long this process can take. It’s often helpful to first review all the job postings, analyze hiring trends, and identify common ground between your research and the positions available before writing your materials. Most CS departments have deadlines in November or December, so I kept a spreadsheet to track each deadline and the status of my applications. At the same time, I would email professors I knew in those departments to let them know I was applying. While this doesn’t guarantee an interview, it often helps ensure your materials get a closer look.

The workload increases dramatically once you start receiving your first phone interviews, usually around mid-December. At that point, I had to carefully check who are the search committee members, revisit their job postings, and rehearse my research pitch. Meanwhile, preparing the job talk becomes the most important and time-consuming task. I revised mine multiple times, practiced both alone and with different audiences, and iterated based on feedback. Later, once on-site interviews began, each visit consumed about three full days including travel.

Honestly, preparing for the academic job market feels like taking on a second full-time job. If you are in industry, be prepared to juggle both, unless you can take some time off. By contrast, PhD students and postdocs usually have more flexibility; their advisors understand the demands of the market and are often supportive of the process.

You may find it harder to build a consistent research portfolio

One of the main things a faculty search committee looks for is a clear research vision, demonstrated through your past publications and crystallized in your job talk. This requires you to show consistency: your research should form a coherent direction that is neither too broad (e.g., simply “reinforcement learning”) nor too narrow (e.g., one specific method solving a niche problem).

For PhD students and postdocs, this consistency often emerges naturally from the dissertation or extensions of it. In industry, however, you may face more constraints on the problems you can work on. Of course, this varies by lab, some industry research groups allow more freedom, others are tightly aligned with company priorities. But the bottom line is that industry research often has to connect to the company’s overall vision.

As a result, connecting your industry work back to your PhD research may require careful thought and planning. You may need to position your contributions as part of a broader academic narrative, or, if you have been in industry long enough, build a portfolio based entirely on your industry research. Either way, it takes extra effort to shape your story into the kind of consistent research vision that faculty committees are looking for.

So… if you want to go to academia eventually, would it be better to go to industry first, or apply from PhD/Postdoc?

From my personal experience, I would say, if your goal is to land a faculty job, the optimal and most straightforward way is still to go on the job market while you are finishing your PhD, or do a postdoc to polish your resume. An industry background can certainly add some diversity to your experience and help you stand out in certain ways, but the disadvantages often are too difficult to offset.

However, if I were asked to choose again, I would still go to industry right after my PhD, even though I know I probably want to go back to academia eventually. I believe one of the biggest advantages of industry is, quite simply, that you get the new experience. While PhD students can get a taste of industry through internships, I have to say the experience of being a full-time industry researcher is quite different. For me personally, I’ve always enjoyed exploring new things and experiencing different types of work and life. It’s only after being in different environments for a while that you start to notice some sort of preference. Regardless, getting different experiences is always exciting for me, whether or not it benefits your long-term goals.