I wanted to share a dialog that I
was able to have with Prof. Gordon Shockley regarding his career, how he got
there, and his advice to me as I endeavor to become a professor. From what I
was able to understand becoming a professor was a natural evolution for him he
started as and undergrad and then went on to receive an MBA with a nonprofit
concentration. After working in the for profit sector he was afforded the
opportunity to enter a doctoral program. He seemed to have chosen this career
for the level of satisfaction it brought him. I have to agree that academia
does bring a high level of satisfaction to my life as opposed to my career in
telecom.
Over the time that I’ve known
Prof. Shockley his advice to me has always been to focus on the stage of the
game that I’m in and no worry so much about what is to come. Honestly, as life
has happened and I’ve moved into my senior year I realized that his point was
all too true. I found that I needed to focus back on being a student and
complete the tasks at hand especially considering how much busier my life got
working full time for the university. The other advice he gave me was that
although I need to have a discipline that my research focuses on I shouldn’t
worry too much about that early on because I will have time in grad school to
figure it out.
The reason why I am interested in
becoming a professor specifically in social entrepreneurship is because of the
amount of satisfaction I get from working in an institute of higher education
that is research driven. I’ve had opportunities to teach classes, write a
publication, engage in research, and much more. I’m hooked! It provides me a
level of work life balance that I’ve never had and I am grateful for the
opportunities I have been given. As a result this is something I hope to give
forward in the future.
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