jjfroehlich Career Development
Purpose
Turn scientist career questions into concrete decisions, document edits, interview preparation, and next actions.
Use this skill when
- The user is choosing an advisor, PhD program, postdoc lab, faculty path, industry role, or other career option.
- The user provides a CV, resume, cover letter, recommendation-letter scaffold, recommender evidence packet, application package, job ad, interview plan, offer, or outreach draft.
- The user asks how to translate scientific training for a non-academic reader.
- The user needs scientist-specific career guidance rather than generic job-search advice.
Do not use this skill when
- The main task is manuscript, grant, poster, or figure feedback.
- The user is asking how to manage a lab member rather than make their own career decision.
- The request is a broad sociology-of-academia discussion without a decision, artifact, or next action.
- The user needs legal, visa, medical, or mental-health advice beyond practical career framing and referral to appropriate support.
Core workflow
- Identify the user's stage, target role, decision, reader, artifact type, deadline, and hard constraints.
- Route to the narrowest relevant playbook before giving advice.
- Convert claims about fit, readiness, promise, or risk into evidence the reader or decision maker can verify.
- Separate document strategy from relationship, safety, negotiation, or career-path strategy.
- Name tradeoffs and uncertainty explicitly when evidence is incomplete.
- End with concrete edits, questions to ask, screening criteria, or a short action plan.
Output formats
- Advisor or lab evaluation matrix.
- Application-materials critique.
- CV/resume or cover-letter revision plan.
- Career-path comparison table.
- Interview preparation plan.
- Offer or startup negotiation checklist.
- Recommendation-letter scaffold or recommender evidence packet.
Reference routing
references/advisor-choice.md: Use for advisor, mentor, lab-environment, power, and safety evaluations.references/phd-applications.md: Use for PhD program selection, prospective-advisor questions, funding, rotations, and milestones.references/postdoc-applications.md: Use for postdoc search, lab comparison, project ownership, independence, and career launch.references/faculty-search.md: Use for faculty application packages, job-market strategy, startup negotiation, and independent-lab readiness.references/cv-resume.md: Use for academic CVs, industry resumes, document genre choice, and bullet translation.references/cover-letters.md: Use for job, internship, postdoc, faculty, and first-contact letters.references/interviews.md: Use for scientific job, industry, postdoc, and faculty interview preparation.references/recommendation-letters.md: Use when the user was asked to draft a recommendation scaffold or needs a recommender evidence packet.references/career-transitions.md: Use for academia/industry comparisons, leaving-path decisions, networking, and role exploration.checklists/advisor-evaluation-checklist.md: Use for a fast advisor, mentor, or lab evidence matrix.checklists/postdoc-choice-checklist.md: Use for postdoc offer and lab comparison.checklists/faculty-search-checklist.md: Use for faculty-search readiness and package audits.checklists/application-review-checklist.md: Use for CV, resume, cover-letter, and packet review triage.examples/career-material-examples.md: Use when the user needs a concrete table or rewrite pattern.examples/advisor-question-bank.md: Use when preparing advisor, trainee, or alumni questions.
Quick checklist
- What decision or reader is this answer serving?
- What evidence would change the outcome?
- Which constraints are hard, negotiable, or unknown?
- Which playbook applies, and which near-miss playbook should stay out?
- What is the next concrete action the user can take?
Common pitfalls
- Giving generic encouragement instead of stage-specific career advice.
- Treating prestige, publication venue, salary, or job title as the whole decision.
- Rewriting documents without naming the reader's decision criteria.
- Ignoring power asymmetry, retaliation risk, funding, visa, health, or family constraints.
- Copying source fragments, bibliographic details, raw URLs, or provenance into the answer.
- Writing final recommender judgment, comparative rank, or private recommender voice when the user should only supply evidence.
Quality bar
- Advice is specific to the user's stage, target role, artifact, and constraints.
- Claims are tied to evidence, observable signals, or clear assumptions.
- The answer uses the right playbook and avoids over-triggering on nearby writing, grant, or lab-management tasks.
- The output leaves the user with edits, questions, criteria, or a practical next-step plan.