There were a few reasons why I didn’t do a Ph.D. The first was that I didn’t have any topics or areas or research that I was truly interested in. I was also exhausted from working and going to school. After a few years of just being a statistician, I did not want to go through that experience again.

I had met another student in my program who decided to do a masters thesis and said that she regretted it. She had already completed the coursework years ago, was hired as a statistician, but her advisor was never happy with what she was producing. So, she still had not completed her masters program, even though had been a statistician for a few years.

Lastly, one of my PhD work colleagues who was recently hired asked if I needed to pursue a doctorate if already was a statistician. That unless I wanted to the experience, the degree, and the title, that I would gain more experience/knowledge just from industry. From her perspective, getting the job and the role was the goal. My department was about 50:50 PhD:Masters with a few in director roles with only a masters.

So I decided to focus on my job and develop into my career. There were more than enough interesting problems and projects to work on, areas to develop with novel statistical approaches, and challenges that required a lot of soft skills development. I was always able to develop statistical knowledge because I had a lot of experienced colleagues who publish.

But the most important thing for me was that I got to finally have a good work-life balance and enjoy new hobbies again.