Life Advice, Personal Perspective, Creativity, Innovation

It is common for causal observers to see a big breakthrough, amazing creative achievement, or other big professional accomplishment from another and think to themselves "wow, that person must be super talented" or "they are so lucky!". And while talent and luck play a part in "success", what often gets less attention is the amount of work that goes into an "overnight success". 

Complex and ambitious achievements usually take even more time and effort to come to fruition. A particularly interesting set of stories comes from the Walt Disney Company's Pixar division (before they become part of Disney) and Disney's venerable Imagineering unit. 

Perhaps the name most synonymous with "magic" is Disney. The Walt Disney Company is dedicated to making magical experiences for its customers via its movies, shows, and, perhaps most prominently, its theme parks. The first park at Walt Disney World in Florida was literally named the Magic Kingdom when it opened in 1971. And having been to the park as a child, I can attest that it is, indeed, a magical place. Disney Parks are full of state-of-the-art attractions that can leave you speechless and wondering how they accomplished such feats.

If you are interested in learning more about what goes into creating the many fabulous rides and experiences at the Disney Parks, I highly recommend the Behind the Attraction series on the Disney+ streaming service. What struck me the most profoundly when watching episodes of this series was how much planning and work goes into creating (and updating) a Disney attraction. In essence, magical experiences come from hard work and planning, sometimes taking years to reach a final product. 

Often, the Disney "Imagineers" must invent new technology to bring a ride to life. For example, the Indiana Jones Adventure ride at Disneyland in California relied on an entirely new ride vehicle invented by the Imagineers to simulate the motion of an off-road jeep. In fact, the Imagineering team at Disney holds over 500 patents for new technologies they have developed to create the unique rides and attractions at the parks. 

Experiential and Emotional Impact Through Technology & Innovation

At Disney they firmly believe that the story and experience should drive the design and execution of all they do and that they can iron out technical details to bring an idea to life. Disney rarely sacrifices practicality for the sake of creative quality and experiential impact on their customers. ​

Disney's Pixar Animations Studios (which was an independent company from 1986 until 2006 when it was acquired by the Walt Disney Company) perhaps best illustrates how dedication and commitment to one's craft combined with a passion for creating memorable experiences can produce amazing results. 

Pixar invented new computer animated techniques and approaches beginning with its founding but its journey from start-up to box office hit maker took time. In some ways the technology had to catch up with the company's ambitions and its employees had to become more familiar and confident in the use of said technology. Pixar initially struggled with a business case focusing mostly on producing animated commercials in the 1980s and early 1990s to pay the bills. In 1991 the company numbered 42 employees (nearly the same size it was at its founding) as it removed hardware and software sales from its operations to focus on the core creative business. In that same year, Pixar signed an agreement with Disney to develop at least one computer-animated movie that Disney would market and distribute. That movie become Toy Story, which was released in November 1995 to critical acclaim and sensational audience reviewers on its way to ​earning nearly $400 million at the global box office (~$823 million in 2024 dollars). ​

This began a 20 YEAR run of amazing box office success for Pixar films with every movie they release from Toy Story 2 in 1999 to Inside Out in 2015 earning at least $500 million at the global box office with 2003's Finding Nemo hitting the $900+ million level and Toy Story 3 released in 2010 crossing $1 BILLION in ticket receipts (~$1.43 Billion in 2024 dollars). But if you watch the documentary The Pixar Story, you will realize that story is core to all they do. During its run of successful films from the mid-nineties to the 2010s, Pixar continued to push the envelope in what could be computer animated to drive new and novel story ideas from thousands of animated ants in A Bug's Life to life-like fur for Monsters Inc to water environments in Finding Nemo and human characters (with muscles) in The Incredibles. Technical innovation was core to making these stories come to life and making audiences feel connected to the worlds depicted in these films. 

Pixar's success during that time was undoubtedly fueled by its willingness to grow and innovate with each new project, never resting on its laurels. But the technology served the stories they were telling, never dictating or limiting the narratives. In addition, those at the company will tell you that its operation was driven by a willingness for creative and technically gifted individuals from diverse backgrounds to collaborate on projects that were driven at their core by stories to make the audience feel something.

The lesson to take from this is, I think, is to not innovate just to innovate but to think about how a new technology or idea serves others. Does it help solve a critical problem? Does it make peoples' lives or society better in some way? Does it bring joy to the world? Does it provide entertainment and life lessons (in the case of many movies)? Innovation without impact will fall flat. If the technologies or innovative ideas you are leveraging aren't in service of something that improves peoples' lives, they rarely resonate. In Pixar's case, they leveraged technology to create characters and stories audiences cared about and that spoke to human challenges, struggles, and ultimately triumphs (even if many of their characters weren't human, they amazingly made us care about bugs and fish!).  

"What most people call overnight success is actually the market suddenly realizing the value of a great product or service that had been kept in obscurity for too long while its creators refused to give up." - Entrepreneur and author Luis E. Romero, from Forbes

Another lesson from the Pixar story is the commitment and perseverance often required to see a novel concept "breakthrough". The conviction of Pixar's founders to stick to their core business over the first 5+ years as it gained its footing allowed it to be in a position to make Toy Story and what looked like an overnight success in 1995 after Toy Story's release was many years in the making. Pixar's animators developed their expertise on commercials and short films in the company's early years and realized producing a full-length computer animated film​ at its core is still an exercise in constructing a compelling and moving story. The combination of compelling narrative, endless storyboarding and editing (story development for a Pixar film can take YEARS), a committed and technically gifted team, and innovative technology allowed Pixar to create movie magic. The company and its employees gave audiences something they had never seen before and, in the process, left a lasting impact on the entertainment industry.   ​

Learn more about the animation innovations Pixar pioneered in the video from Business Insider, below (and the follow-up video here):

Disney Magic In Real Life - Innovation and Iteration

Crafting of real-word experiences through physical rides and attractions requires another level of commitment. Examples of technical and impactful achievements in the Disney parks include the floating mountains in the Pandora - World of Avatar land within Disney's Animal Kingdom, the creation of Cars Land (based on the Pixar movie) and its mountain range at Disney's California Adventure Park, the Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind attraction at EPCOT, and Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge at Disney's Hollywood Studios. The combined efforts of designers and engineers led to the creation of immersive and unique experiences that help transport park visitors to locations they had only see on a movie screen before and in the process allows them to escape the worries and challenges of the real world, if only for a bit. 

None of the work Disney does is easy, especially when it comes to building actual rides and landscapes people interact with in their parks. Imagineers blend creativity with modern technology and an understanding of human perception to create amazing experiences. And the more you learn about how they build attractions the more you appreciate how Imagineers not only invent new technologies to bring an attraction to life but often build on previous designs and take lessons from the design of past attractions to make new ones. There are so many examples including leveraging the technology from Test Track in Epcot (opened in 1999) for Cars Land's Radiator Springs Racers (opened in 2012) to improving on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad with new projection mapping technology and revolutionizing the classic Pirates of the Caribbean boat ride for the 21st Century with the installation of Pirates of the Caribbean: Battle for the Sunken Treasure (and use of technology to guide the boats through immersive sets) at Shanghai Disneyland. These examples highlight that Disney never stops innovating and improving, realizing that creating magical experiences requires learning from the past while constantly pushing the boundaries of technology and storytelling.     

As mentioned earlier when discussing Pixar films, storytelling at its heart requires the need to make the recipient feel something, to care about the characters, relate to their challenges, and celebrate in their triumphs. To be an effective story it must relate to our human experiences including struggle, loss, love, friendship, and family and the realization that happily ever after is often the result of overcoming adversity in our lives. 

The Story Comes Together

In my last post, I reflected on our human relationship to time. Recently, while watching the Behind the Attraction series on Disney+ that I mentioned above I learned about this amazing "nighttime spectacular" at Hong Kong Disneyland titled "Momentous". Learning about the history of creating this show we discover that when Hong Kong Disneyland was renovating and updating their castle, the technology for Momentous was literally built into the castle's redesign. The show has been described as "a love letter to the memories we make throughout our lives" and if you watch the video of it below you can see that the creators of this spectacular incorporate Disney and Pixar characters, stories, and songs over the past 30+ years from The Little Mermaid and The Lion King to Aladdin, Moana, and Up. Featured songs include classics like "Kiss the Girl", "You'll Be in My Heart", "A Whole New World" and lesser-known but appropriate songs like "Friends on the Other Side" from the Princess and the Frog and "Remember Me" from Coco. 

The feelings the show generates are tied up in the audience's memories of Disney movies and it can only achieve the effect of moving onlookers due to the fact that it builds on the creative efforts of the thousands or animators, artists, and musicians who contributed to the creation of the content. In addition, the spectacular itself relies on a variety of technological advancements from the Disney Company including projection mapping technology, water screen projections, and sophistically timed pyrotechnics and fireworks that can be positioned with pinpoint accuracy via compressed air. The result of all these efforts is magical. 

Live the Moment & Love the Memories - Momentous Nighttime Spectacular's Tagline

The show's "theme song", Love the Memory, that unites its various chapters has a super catchy and impactful chorus:
Time's always moving, we can't slow the hands
Won't last forever, so take every chance
To learn and to love and to dream and to dance
Live the moment and love the memory

Momentous's songs and storytelling remind us that life is a journey and ultimately consists of the impact we have on others and them on us. It is filled with highs and lows, love and loss, but through all these things we learn and grow, hopefully becoming better versions of ourselves in the process. A powerful notion, for sure.  

Making Impact Everyday

While most of this post has contained reflections on the Walt Disney Company's and Pixar Animation Studios' quest to create memorable experiences through creativity, technology, and hard work, I think the lessons from their efforts can apply to everyone's work and life. 

We often seek the "magical solution" to our problems or want a quick fix to the challenges we encounter. We want to lose weight NOW, we want to earn more NOW, we want to be more productive NOW, we want to be recognized for our achievements NOW. But these things are most often the result of consistent work and incremental improvements that slowly and steadily build on themselves to achieve the desired result. And sometimes, maybe even often, the end result of our efforts is more impactful than we could imagine when we begin on our journey. I don't think the creators of The Little Mermaid when it was released in 1989 would have ever imagined its scenes and songs would be projected on a water "screen" and physical castle at a Disney theme park in Hong Kong purpose built for these projections but that is what ultimately occurred. 

Good content and story that touches us as human beings is timeless and transcends any specific media. Much the same way, each of us doing "good work" and making "good decisions" ultimately leads to good outcomes and impact ​in time. We all know deep down what is good and right and will ultimately lead to the outcomes we want for ourselves (eat more healthily, exercise more, stress less, make more time for those we care about, help others etc...) but the consistent commitment to these actions over time (often in the face of very little short-term "results") is what is needed to produce the magical (ie, impactful) results we are looking for. 

It is also worth mentioning here that we often cannot fully predict how our work and actions now will impact our (and others) future. And we shouldn't necessarily try to map all our actions to some future state because the future is always in flux. Rather, we should work to do good and important work now and realize that the positive impacts of this will resonate over time. This work may also be built on and improved upon by others to produce further innovation and impact, as is often the case with the Disney attractions and experiences mentioned above. 

So, what ideas do you want to share with the world?
How can you contribute your gifts and talents to society to impact others?

• See my Career Exploration 101 piece to help with your self-reflection

​What story are you trying to tell about yourself? 
How can you collaborate with others as part of a larger narrative and goal?

• Learn more about volunteering and the impact of cultivating serendipity through your relationships  

The Often Long, Methodical Grind to "Success" 

So, what's my story? How do I see my gifts and talents contributing to the world? ​

Well, I have always been interested in helping others, even from a young age. I am fairly empathetic and find a lot of joy in teaching and mentoring others. I do this to some extent in my day job helping support postdoctoral researchers at Virginia Tech. I also use this blog and platforms like LinkedIn to share resources, programs, and opportunities with a wide audience. My hope is by doing this I can help others realize how their skills, interests, and values can be applied productively to activities and careers that benefit the world in distinct and important ways. I firmly believe we all have something to contribute. Personally, I have been working on building my platform and finding my voice so I can reach and impact more people, including those of you reading this post or leveraging the information shared on my blog and website. 

And the statistics show I am slowly making progress in these areas. ​

In a blog post from January 2021 I spoke to the fact that returns on our efforts to build skills, invest in our networks, and growth our brand often compound. Seeing measurable growth in these metrics can be slow at first but many online activities result in network effects where knowledge accumulation and impact can increase over time non-linearly. For example, building one skill early on helps you develop a related one more easily next time or one connection can lead to another. Similarly, the publication of one piece of creative or scholarly work can lead to citations by or engagement with others who then amplify your work to their networks and, in the process, help your ideas and content spread more rapidly than you could manage alone. 

I figured now, three years from when I spoke to the compounding returns I was seeing from my creative and scholarly works, would be good time to revisit the stats. For context, I launched this personal website in August 2014 as I began my postdoc position at Vanderbilt University. I figured I need to work on building my professional brand as a neuroscientist at the time and later launched this blog in April 2019 after having written pieces on my postdoc experience for the NIH BEST website (see those archived here). The blog launch was an attempt to build up a writing portfolio for potential future use in my career. I also enjoyed the process of sharing resources, advice, and research focused on a variety of topics from career and professional development to Ph.D. career pathways, the job search, and neuroscience findings with others.  

As you can see from the chart above that only reports my personal website traffic data over full calendar years, for 5 YEARS yearly unique visits to my website were under 2,000 and from 2015 to 2017 struggled to cross 1,000 (in 2017 the number of unique site visits for the year was 1,068 or an average of 89 per month). Beginning in 2020, however, visitors to the site began to rapidly grow (rising 243% from 2019 to 2020 and another 117% from 2020 to 2021). Essentially, unique visits to my site more than tripled from 2019 to 2020 and then more than doubled from that level from 2020 to 2021. Growth has slowed since then but now I average more unique site visits per month than I did in all of any year from 2015 to 2017: average monthly visits August - December 2023: 753 versus unique visits compared to 341, 476, and 626 unique visits in the years 2015, 2016, and 2017, respectively.  

Compounding growth like the stats mentioned above is hard for us to wrap our minds around.

​In the case of my website, growth in visits is most likely the result of several factors:
1) In 2021 I launched a newsletter (now with 181 subscribers) to share resources and readings with interested individuals, where I also highlight my new blog posts as well as a few select posts from my blog archive 
2) As I create more content there is more for a visitor to my website to engage with
3) I have added content beyond the blog over the years including job search resources, funding resources, and a growing list of career and professional development research studies
4) I often point to past content in new posts so individuals can "rediscover" older posts/content and this may, in turn lead to the growth in overall views of my content
5) As I grow my network and professional brand outside my website, when I point to blog pieces or resources on LinkedIn or X/Twitter more individuals see my posts on these platforms

I also believe well-written and useful content ultimately resonates with people and hopefully I am providing that via this platform. 

But my own journey to greater reach and impact has not happened overnight. It requires commitment and dedication. I have written 55 blog posts over the 57 months from April 2019 (when I launched my blog) to now, January 2024, or nearly one post per month. I try to consistently share something interesting and thought provoking here. Mostly I do it for myself, to keep my writing skills sharp. But I also do it for those who read these posts and in the process hopefully learn something or are made to think more introspectively about their lives and the impact they can have on the world. Sometimes this is accomplished through a resource or process I share to aid readers in their career and professional development but other times it is through sharing an insight into neuroscience research, like findings illustrating the power of our mindsets and beliefs. In a way, I seek to inspire others to take steps to improve their lives, whether that be spending more time with loved ones or realizing that finding fulfilling work is a process. I plan to keep doing this hard work (this post alone is probably the culmination of at least 30 hours of research, writing, and revision) because I think I have something important to say and I hope it helps my readers live better, more fulfilled, and more impactful lives.  

Growing One's Network & Scholarly Impact

In my blog post on network effects from January 2021 I also mentioned LinkedIn as a powerful tool for professional networking and how one's reach on the platform can grow with both a commitment to engaging on it and time to allow for growth. For a superb guide to leveraging the platform for career success, including building your network and engaging in career exploration, see the 2022 book Linked: Conquer LinkedIn. Get Your Dream Job. Own Your Future. by Garriott and Schifeling. 

Over the years the number of my LinkedIn connections continues to grow as I interact with new colleagues and coworkers, meet people at professional conferences, or work with new leaders and volunteers in organizations I am involved in. Additionally, individuals will reach out to me to connect and I almost never turn down a personalized LinkedIn connection request.  

I joined LinkedIn in April 2013 and by the end of that year had 43 connections. I really worked to expand my network on the platform during my postdoc position, which began in August 2014. In the graph below you can see the steady rise in my cumulative LinkedIn connections for calendar year 2014 to 2023. Steady investments in leveraging the platform have resulted in my total connections increasing 36-fold over 10 years. 

Big things can come from small beginnings and consistent effort. ​

Over the past few years I have leveraged LinkedIn's "Creator Mode" to better broadcast the content and resources I share and have moved away from gathering connections (Creator Mode replaces the default network option on LinkedIn from "Connect" to "Follow"). In 2023, my follower count grew by 19.5% and now allows the content and resources I share on career development, the job search, networking, mentorship, and more to reach thousands of people. Through the technological platform that is LinkedIn I am able to amplify my impact, helping more people learn of opportunities and resources to assist them in their career development and professional journeys. 

I firmly believe LinkedIn is a powerful multiplier for networking and brand building that you simply cannot ignore as a professional in the 21st Century. So, start investing in that platform today.​

As an administrator who supports early career researchers (graduate students and postdocs in particular), I understand that growing one's scholarly profile is essential to academic success. One of the most important metrics for a scholar is one's citation count as it indicates other researchers acknowledge your work in theirs. By definition, citations of your work take time to accumulate as your work must be disseminated first (passing through an often lengthy and grueling peer review process to get published), others must read and cite it, and then they must also publish their work before your citation is registered in various systems (Google Scholar, Scopus, Web of Science). So, it can take years for citations to accumulate on your work. This can sometimes discourage early career researchers as they don't feel they are gaining traction at the beginning. Patience and persistence is required in one's academic scholarship. If you are putting out work that contributes to your field by asking important questions and addressing critical topics, it will eventually be cited. It also takes time and some promotion to help get your work discovered.  

My first peer-reviewed publication was in February 2012 and I did not start seeing citations of it until 2013. Over the years I published more publications in neuroscience from 2012 until 2019 (and to a lesser extent now as a researcher interested in mentorship and the faculty job search) and slowly the citations of this work grew along with the number of my peer-reviewed publications. So, the chart above is the result of continuing to publish, even as an academic administrator, and letting time work for my prior work's visibility. 

You can certainly see in the Google Scholar stats the effect of me transitioning from postdoctoral researcher to postdoctoral affairs administrator in January 2019 and a stunting in my citation momentum in 2020 but in June 2020 I was listed as an author on my first non-neuroscience paper, focused on a survey-based analysis of the academic job market which led to new connections and research directions for me. Recently, I was involved in important work on mentorship of which our analysis of faculty mentoring experiences was published in December 2023. I expect to continue to work in these areas as a postdoctoral affairs administrator as these topics relate to my work supporting this population and, as a result, my scholarly output may increase in the coming years. And while it is nice to put out work that gets recognized and cited, that isn't really ​why I do it. Rather, I try to be part of teams contributing important insights into processes that need improvement in higher education including the hiring of faculty members and providing increased support and training for aspiring and new faculty members. 

And though I don't actively publish in the neuroscience area anymore, my past research is still being cited and contributing to new knowledge in reward processing, decision making, and substance abuse risk. That prior work is, in effect, still having an impact. When you publish scientific findings, you are leaving a legacy and contributing to the broad, upward trajectory of human knowledge and progress. When you are in the thick of the scholarly work, though, you can sometimes forget this but know that "good work" can have an impact and though it might not immediately be recognized that does not mean it won't be of value to future researchers.    ​

Your Mileage May Vary

Before wrapping up this piece I want to emphasize that the personal metrics presented above reflect my priorities in brand building (personal website, LinkedIn followers) and networking (LinkedIn connections). Growing one's scholarly metrics is mostly out of your direct control but ultimately does partially depend on producing good work consistently that others value. The activities and platforms you leverage to measure your "success" could look very different. The metrics you care about may also differ from those I shared. 

Everyone's goals are unique and the pathway to achieving them distinct. I hope seeing how my metrics and impact grew from small beginnings with time drives home the point that if you invest in activities important to you, their reach and impact can expand through consistent effort and commitment over many years. The key is to decide what you value in terms of your personal and professional growth and invest your time in those areas. Success won't come overnight but I believe you can increase the odds of making an impact through dedicated action that is genuine, internally motivated by your values, and leverages your unique skills and gifts. ​

Final Thoughts

In today's post, hopefully you can see that to have an impact you have to start by taking action to share your knowledge and gifts with the world. That looks different for each of us. It might be putting out creative works or thought pieces on the internet, it could be publishing scientific and scholarly papers, or making YouTube videos explaining complex research topics to the public. It could be as simple (and important) as showing a student in your research group how to perform a new experiment or analysis (ie, mentoring them). Whatever you are doing and sharing, the process requires engaging with others in some way. You can also take advantage of network effects to ensure your message is being amplified by reaching others you don't know but who could benefit (ie, your connections shares it with their connections or the student you teach shares the knowledge with another and then another and so on and so forth). Only by sharing our skills, talents, and ideas with others can we truly spread them. Similarly, others can only build off your ideas if they know about them. So put your thoughts out there in the world! 

Magical outcomes, which we might rightfully call innovation, begin with novel ideas that through collaboration with others and the combination of hard work, creativity, and technical know-how result in real-world impact. The impact might be creative, scholarly, or entrepreneurial. To achieve these results, though, requires a person to reach and impact others and in the process make their lives better - more informed, more efficient, more joyous, more fun, or more meaningful. The final result can often to an outsider seem like magic or overnight success but it rarely is that. Rather, consistent effort, belief in your craft, and the right group of people in your network combined with, yes, some luck, is essential.

Furthermore, the impact from one's creative or innovative efforts will only endure if you and those who come after you build off prior work and knowledge to make it even more impactful, allowing it to compound to a level of scope and reach its original creator could never have imagined. In the process these efforts hopefully move others to contribute to making the world a happier, healthier, safer, and more prosperous place through the deployment of their own gifts, skills, and actions. That's when the magic happens. ​

More from the Blog

• Career Exploration 101
• Compounded Returns: Growing Your Network and Personal Brand
• Past, Present, Future: Reflections on Time
• Mind Over Matter
• To Be Rather Than to Seem
• Giving Thanks: Finding Personal Fulfillment
• Find Your Passion? Finding Meaning and Purpose in Your Work & Life

Additional Readings & Content

• Disney & Technology: A History of Standard-Setting Innovation
• The Imagineering Story documentary series on Disney+
• Pixar Animation Studios - Our Story Timeline
• The 22 Rules of Storytelling, According to Pixar
• Pixar follows 5 storytelling rules to make every movie feel so perfect (video)
• Pixar in a Box - The Art of Storytelling (Online Learning from Khan Academy)

Life is not a zero-sum game.

In 21st Century American society it is easy to get sucked into the mindset of "us against them" or "me against the world" that appeal so much to our basal instincts, including fear of others. Human's penchant for being alert to threat and risk is deeply embedded in our evolution and requires cognitive effort to resist. Additionally, inequality and the precariousness of making a living in modern, capitalistic America leads to many living on the edge and/or fearful of falling from their current economic position.

​This pessimistic economic mindset and mood has negative spillover effects on society. Studies show that increases in economic inequality are associated with political polarization in the Unites States (US) and globally. An adversarial mindset to "the competition" both individually and collectively (ie, "zero-sum thinking") can thus drive both economic and political actions that are harmful to society as a whole. ​

What is "zero-sum thinking"? Essentially it is the belief that benefits to one person or group tend to come at the expense or cost of other persons or groups. The concept is thought to originate from work by the anthropologist George M. Foster who investigated "peasant" societies' view of the world and came to the conclusion that many individuals in these societies have an “Image of Limited Good.” That is to say, many people see all of the desired things in life (food, property, wealth) as existing in finite quantity and limited supply. 

A fascinating paper by Chinoy et al from 2022 found, among other things, specific factors that were related to more or less zero-sum thinking in a survey of 15,000 individuals in the United States. Specifically, they found respondents view the world as less zero-sum if:

• They, their parents, and their grandparents experienced more upward mobility during their lifetimes.
• They, their parents, or their grandparents immigrated to the United States.

While zero-sum thinking is commonly felt and believed, a further investigation into just what this doctrine proports leaves one feeling a different approach is not only needed but warranted. When others win, you can win. A modern nation relies on taxes from its citizens (and immigrants - to the tune of $467.5 Billion in federal and state/local taxes 2019) to fund projects and priorities that benefit others. What becomes tricky to negotiate is who is being taxed and who benefits from the government's actions and interventions. I would argue we all benefit at the most basic level as a growing tax base ultimately leads to more robust services and programs. ​

Despite the fact that the US Federal Government provides useful benefits to its citizens (Social Security, rule of law, security), the "rugged individualism" that is so pervasive in American culture leaves many to feel they have to "got it alone", that the government is not their friend, and that "others" are the competition. In truth, no one succeeds alone.  ​

Ironically, perhaps the most outward manifestation of the combination of American Capitalism and individualism is the reverence for the entrepreneur. The lore of the Silicon Valley start-up that grew from a garage to a global behemoth is seductive if not often the full story. Entrepreneurship is most often predicated on having a sufficient "cushion" of support including family wealth (among other factors) or a partner who is working in a more "stable" position with provided employer-sponsored health insurance, for instance. In some ways, pursuing entrepreneurship in America seems to be privilege inaccessible to many. Perhaps not surprisingly, then, some studies have found a positive relationship between inequality and entrepreneurship across US states, though the relationship between entrepreneurship and measures of a country's overall economic health are nuanced (economies as a whole can benefit from entrepreneurship even if all individuals don't). 

In essence, many American entrepreneurs have in place their own "safety net" to ensure that they can take risks in starting something new and bringing new ideas and products to market. What might be possible for entrepreneurship and innovation in the US, though, if more people were given a sufficient social safety net?

Entrepreneurship is a risky endeavor. One is taking the chance on advancing a new idea, solution, or product that faces a variety of hurdles to success. Some of these hurdles include entrenched interests and firms who seek to maintain market dominance while other challenges include communicating the value of the new idea to potential investors, partners, and ultimately customers. ​

On top of the myriad logistical challenges of entrepreneurship, systems of social support within the United States in particular make striking out on one's own a major challenge. For example, health insurance in the US is often tied to employment and while expansion of health insurance options through government initiatives like healthcare.gov are helpful, the costs of many of the government-backed health insurance offerings are prohibitive. This is perhaps the most salient example of how the robustness of a "social safety net" can affect one's willingness to engage in entrepreneurial activities, which has been demonstrated to be the case in prior work. There are a variety of social safety net programs beyond affordable health insurance that can matter including some form of universal basic income to provide a floor of economic stability and/or childcare subsidies to limit an expensive cost barrier to millions of parents participating fully in the economy. One can imagine more robust government initiatives to lower healthcare and childcare costs alone could make an entrepreneurial path more attainable. ​

There are also arguments that redistribution through the provision of public goods may help reduce both inequality and political partisanship/polarization. These initiatives help individuals, our communities, and our society function better. ​

The injection of stimulus checks to US households during the COVID-19 pandemic provided a mini experiment in the effect of income stabilization on entrepreneurship. We saw an increase in small business formation within the US during this time and while correlation does not prove causation, many speculate increased government stimulus was a key driver of this behavior. 

Regardless of the exact causes for the spike in new businesses, these trends are quite different than prior years where entrepreneurship was on the decline. And while entrepreneurship in the US is climbing post-pandemic, it remains uncertain whether the new businesses formed will result in an increase in employment (ie, businesses that ultimately hire employees to grow).​

It is often the case that for a new business to grow and expand it must be in some way innovative, bringing new products and solutions to market. And innovation at a macro level is critical to the growth and development of large economies. So, where does innovation stand today? 

Recent data suggests declines in US innovation over the past several decades. A January 2023 paper published in the journal Nature found that from 1945 to 2010 scientific papers and patents are increasingly less likely to break with the past in ways that push science and technology in new directions. While some work suggests the key measure in the aforementioned Nature paper, the disruption index, may be biased by citation inflation or a growth in publication rates, the study prompted many to ask if our current systems and incentives are hindering true scientific innovation. 

There is a twisted irony to the fact that a concentration of resources and power in a hyper capitalist "winner take all" system ultimately can stifle innovation and progress. Established power players (think big technology companies in the US) become entrenched and work hard to maintain their market dominance. 

The concentration of resources also occurs in various societal structures and working environments. Even those institutions deemed a societal good can succumb to market forces. Higher education, especially in the United States, is an interesting example where there truly are "elite" institutions whose resources dwarf others, leading to higher levels of research productivity (through graduate student and postdoctoral research labor advantages) and placement of their alumni into faculty positions. Cumulative advantage takes hold, ensuring those considered the "winners" in their spaces continue to win. 

We must ask if all this concentration is good for our society as a whole, especially as innovation drives economic growth. ​A paper by Nicholas Bloom and colleagues (Are Ideas Getting Harder to Find?) posits that economic growth arises from people creating ideas and can be captured by the product of research productivity x number researchers. Their paper finds that while research effort has risen substantially over the past few decades, research productivity is declining sharply. 

How might we advance research and innovation further? A more thoughtful distribution of resources to ensure funding is not overly concentrated would help. Furthermore, increasing access to opportunity will help bring diverse perspectives, skills, and ideas to the table.
​And so we come to the importance of improving immigration to the US to help in these areas. 

The US is a nation of immigrants and data show embracing more accessible immigration practices can assist us as our current population ages and in the process help grow our economy. In addition, immigrants drive American research and innovation, making our economy more dynamic. An important study released in December 2022 found that while immigrants represent 16% of all US inventors, they produce 23% of total innovation output (which was measured by number of patents, patent citations, and the economic value of their patents). The study also found that immigrant and native-born collaborations drive additional innovation through the mixing of ideas and perspectives. 

Another study released in 2022 has shown immigrant entrepreneurs play a large role in founding or co-founding successful US companies. Specifically, over half (55%) of America's start-up companies valued at $1 billion or more had at least one immigrant founder. That percentage rises to 64% if founders or co-founders who are the children of immigrants are included. ​

What is amazing about the impact of immigrants on US innovation is how difficult it is for many highly skilled individuals to successfully work in the US. Current caps on H-1B employment visas for the private sector and various backlogs in the review of applications for green cards makes the recruitment and retention of foreign talent to the US challenging. ​

And while fears of immigrants taking US Citizens' jobs and opportunities are certainly understandable, they are often unwarranted based on the data. 

Importantly, data show an increase in H-1B science, technology, engineering and math (ie, STEM) workers in cities is associated with significant gains in wages for natives. A recent study, published in March 2023, found evidence that large multinational companies based in the US were likely to replace skilled visa rejected employment with "offshoring," ie, employing a skilled worker outside the US, implying that US companies cannot necessarily get talent from current citizens in all cases.

The evidence that H-1B employment is not detrimental for native employees is somewhat conflicting, however. An October 2022 study looking at US firms who "won" versus "lost" the H-1B visa lottery (ie, were able to obtain H-1B visas for skilled, immigrant employees, or not) found some evidence that additional H-1B employees "crowd out" other workers at the firm. Furthermore, this study found some evidence that additional H-1Bs increase firm profits and decrease payroll costs per employee. From a purely economic point of view, one could argue that these data are supportive that the H-1B program improves firm profits even if it potentially hurts the employment prospects of some native employees. 

The Economic Innovation Group, a bipartisan public policy organization, has published important data on the topic of immigration and innovation, among others. They also surveyed the American voting public in 2022 on their perspectives on skilled immigration in the United States. They find that most US voters do not have strong opinions on the economic impact of immigration on the country or are split in its effects being economically net positive (38%) or negative (37%), despite evidence that skilled immigrants boost a variety of economic metrics. When the survey administrators better gauged support for specific skilled immigration programs that would boost the US economy and innovation, support was over 70% overall and over 60% in registered Republicans, who are politically more likely to oppose immigration. Thus, there are signs that immigration reform can be a winning political position, especially if it is framed as an economic and innovative "win" for the country. 

In closing, to grow entrepreneurship and innovation in the United States we need to make opportunity more inclusive to our citizens and support more effective immigration pathways for skilled workers. We need to have an abundance agenda - more social safety nets, more community support, more inclusion, and more access to education, opportunity, and employment in America. 

Scott Galloway echoes this abundance notion in a piece on greater accessibility to higher education. Knowledge itself should not be a scarce and expensive resource to obtain. Increasingly, with the proliferation of data and content on the internet, finding information is easy even if extracting knowledge is not. One could even make the argument that it is precisely due to the overwhelming amount of information available online that finding true knowledge has become more difficult. Our higher education institutions have a role to play in helping turn data and information into knowledge and producing individuals with the necessary skills and values to grow our economy responsibly. The US is in a unique position to provide opportunities and freedom of thought and expression to our citizens and future citizens (ie, immigrants), which allows them to innovate and make the world a better place. Higher education is and can remain our "front door" to the some of the best and brightest young minds who come to America to learn, live, and prosper, while positively impacting our economy. But we can't take international students and scholars for granted. 

In order for the United States to reach the ideals expressed in our founding - "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" from the Declaration of Independence - we must recommit to being a welcoming nation. Expanding immigration pathways for highly skilled workers who want to live and work in the US and contribute to our economy while advancing their own well being should be a win-win for these individuals and our country. We must get past our zero-sum thinking and remind ourselves that in a truly inclusive and democratic society, when our neighbors are allowed the freedom and opportunity to leverage their skills and expertise to their economic benefit, our economy as a whole becomes more robust and we all prosper. 

To innovate, people must be allowed to think, speak, publish, associate, and disagree.
They must be allowed to save, invest, trade, and profit. In a word, they must be free.
- From ​Superabundance 

The diversity of our nation presents challenges and opportunities. As a nation of immigrants, cultures and beliefs collide and mix here like almost no where else on Earth. ​

The American entrepreneurial spirit, commitment to capitalism (greed is good?), and our "rugged individualism" are all assets and, sometimes, liabilities. How we leverage and refine our current systems and beliefs will ultimately determine whether our future is bright or diminished. Through caring and compassion for our current citizens and those who want to join us (immigrants) I think we can achieve a more prosperous future for all of us.   

Personal Perspective, Future of Work, Innovation

The rapid globalization and integration of the economy, including the power of technology to make work performed and done anywhere more accessible have resulted in our 21st Century societies finding themselves at a potentially critical moment in humanity's millennia-long story. 

Our world has shrunk considerably over the past 50 to 75 years. The end of World War II saw with it the birth of a more integrated global economy with capitalism gaining influence as communism waned into the early 1990s. The emergence of China from the 1990s to 2020s also reflects the triumph of global capitalism, albeit state-sponsored capitalism.

​As with any change in how society is structured, there were groups that benefited massively from this shift to a globalized, capitalist (neoliberal) world and those who didn't. One of the main results of this shift was many goods became cheaper to produce and consumer prices, at least in the United States, remained low for decades. 

For nearly 40 years, the average percentage change in consumer prices in the United States barely crossed 5%. In fact, median "inflation" (ie, yearly change in consumer prices) was 2.8% from 1983 to 2021 (we are a far cry from those levels in 2022, though). Compare this to the growth of capital and investment returns over the same time period. The median rate of yearly return for the S&P 500 (a basket of the 500 largest US-based corporations) from the same period, 1983 to 2021 was 12.8%. While this is not perhaps the most elegant economic analysis, I think it demonstrates how much relative value in capital was produced relative to costs passed on to consumers...nearly 10% more per year. 

Clearly, the returns to capital relative to the costs born by consumers was the result of companies trading more expensive labor for cheaper means of production. For a time, this bargain seemed "good" for many...prices were kept (arguably) artificially low through low-cost labor. Many workers in more economically developed countries didn't see this shift in economic structure as a problem as it benefited many of their pocketbooks either via high rates of return on capital and/or lower cost goods. Some individuals, especially those working in manufacturing sectors in the United States, Europe, Japan, and other developed countries saw opportunities shrink in favor of increased outsourcing of their work to China or, at least in the past few decades, automation. 

For a time, a global, capitalist, and neoliberal economy seemed to produce more overall prosperity than what came before it. Millions were lifted out of poverty and provided jobs that allowed them to live a life of greater convenience and security. The emergence of China's middle class was the growth engine of the global economy for the past 20-plus years. In a cruel twist of fate, however, the continual pursuit of maximum profit, minimal cost, and "optimization" of a global, capitalist economy may end up resulting in an overall more impoverished world. Globalization produced ever more competition amongst labor markets and the shock of the COVID-19 pandemic illustrated that a complex, global supply chain only works when all its requisite components and inputs are allowed to flow across borders and oceans.  

Competition drives innovation. The market forces that have dominated western economies in the neoliberal area allowed corporations and organizations with more innovative products to increase their profits. In sum, the lives of those using these products also became better. However, those groups that could not innovate and adapt died, resulting in layoffs and loss of entire sectors of our economy. The destructive nature of capitalism is fundamental to its success. There must be winners and losers. 

A bigger philosophical question facing the United States in particular as we approach the end of the first quarter of the 21st Century is whether we will allow the innovative and destructive forces of capitalism to continue to affect our citizens' personal health and wellbeing. Deaths of despair (from suicide and drug overdoses) have risen in the United States over the past 15-20 years despite our overall gross domestic product (GDP) per capita continuing to rise relative to other developed economies. 

The juxtaposition of income inequality and high poverty rates in the US along with overall greater economic growth and productivity of our economy as a whole illustrates that our current form of "US-led, global capitalism" results in big winners and losers. 
​
Some illustrative data from McKinsey's Rethinking the Future of American Capitalism report drive home the point: 

• American firms rank among the most widely known and the most profitable globally: in economic profit, they make up 38 percent of the top 10. 
• In the United States, just 6 percent of counties account for two-thirds of GDP output.

​In addition, a variety of data available from inequality.org, sourced from OECD statistics and the Credit Suisse Global Wealth Report highlight the enormous share of wealth concentration in the United States relative to other developed countries.

In exchange for our dynamic and growing "economy" (ie, corporate profits) in the US do so many have to be left behind?
​
What is the ideal balance between creative destruction, economic progress/reinvention, and the stability of our society? When should workers be protected at the potential expense of consumers? Will work as we know it be a thing in the future? And if not, is more time for leisure and creative pursuits for all a good thing? Will humanity fill the free time of a technology-laden future making the world better or worse?  

These are thorny questions and ultimately how things transpire is unpredictable but that does not mean we don't have some agency in shaping the future we want to see. ​

We have constructed a society in the United States where so much of the social safety net has been removed that we may ultimately become less innovative as a society. Who can afford to take the risk of starting a small business or company when they lack affordable access to health insurance or reasonable childcare costs? There is data supporting the notion that innovation is lower in more unequal societies. ​

Innovation also threatens many people's sense of value and contribution to society. As artificial intelligence (AI) becomes more capable at replacing work traditionally performed by humans, even white-collar work, many are left asking how they can contribute to society. The decline in American's confidence in institutions leads one to wonder whether individuals will feel the need to engage with larger societal structures in the future or choose to escape to some version of the metaverse (a la Ready Player One). 

Clearly, this is a time of immense change and uncertainty.
Will we become a less globalized and interconnected world, retreating inwards as societies and people?
Will the speed of automation and change result in many being left behind economically in the new world order?
​Will inequality continue to increase with potentially explosive societal consequences? 

A fundamental set of questions arises: Is our system broken? Can it be reformed? Must it be re-envisioned? Do we have the collective and political will to make real change?

The current structures of our society add further complexity to addressing the problems we face. What is "right" is not always what is popular making it difficult for a democratic country to push forward with changes that may be difficult in the short-term but lead to long-term positive impact. While pursuing my Ph.D. in neurobiology from UNC Chapel Hill, I looked at delay discounting behavior...the tendency for people and animals to discount the future. The future is "worth" less than the present partially because at an individual level the future is uncertain. You may not make it to the future and so why delay consumption now? The YOLO ("you only live once") choices of many young adults reflects the underlying basic instinct of all living things to prioritize the NOW over the LATER. It is in our nature to do this.  

In large part, I think our politicians and leaders have failed to articulate a truly promising view of the future and America's place in it. Rather, "othering" and blaming certain groups is used for political gain while real solutions go undiscussed and our two-party system fosters division and extremism. We have the potential to move closer to being a true melting pot of culture and ideas, welcoming immigrants from across the world who seek to better their futures and our country as a whole by leveraging American Capitalism and the innovative ecosystems it can foster.

​If we don't find a way to strike the right balance between growth at any cost and compassion for all people within our society, though, we could lay the seeds for the destruction of the future we all want to see. 

More from the blog:

• The End of Work as We Know It: How an Increasingly Automated World Will Change Everything
• The Challenges of Being an International Researcher: Implications for Advanced Degree Labor Markets
  • Part 1
  • Part 2​

For Further Reading:

• What exactly is neoliberalism?
• Book: Capital in the Twenty-First Century
  • See also the documentary on the topic
• Rethinking the future of American capitalism (from McKinsey)
• Inequality: A persisting challenge and its implications (from McKinsey)
• The social contract in the 21st century: Outcomes so far for workers, consumers, and savers in advanced economies (from McKinsey)
• Book: The Power of Creative Destruction: Economic Upheaval and the Wealth of Nations
• Book: US vs. Them: The Failure of Globalism
• Book: Six Faces of Globalization: Who Wins, Who Loses, and Why It Matters
  • More on this concept from one of the book's authors, Anthea Roberts on her personal website
  • Who wins and who loses from globalization? There are (at least) six answers (excerpt from the Book)
  • The Corporate Power Narrative: How Corporations Benefit from Economic Globalization (excerpt from the Book)
• Book: Deaths of Despair and the Future of Capitalism 
• America's crisis of despair: A federal task force for economic recovery and societal well-being
• Book: Forward: Notes on the Future of Our Democracy 
• Relevant political reads from The Atlantic:
  • ​How the U.K. Became One of the Poorest Countries in Western Europe
    • ​A cautionary tale?
  • The Wreckage of Neoliberalism
    • The postwar neoliberal economic project is nearing its end. The question is who will write the last chapter, the Democrats or the totalitarians?

Sites Worth Exploring:

• INEQUALITY.ORG (United States and global data)
• realtimeinequality.org (United States data)

Last week was National Postdoc Appreciation Week, an annual event organized by the National Postdoctoral Association (NPA) to raise awareness for the work postdocs do and encourage the institutions they work at to show their appreciation. 

As someone who was a postdoctoral scholar and now works as an administrator to support postdocs, I know the value they provide to their institutions. However, many people - including those working at our institutions - either don't understand what a postdoc is or the impact they make through their research, mentorship, and teaching efforts.

The NPA has launched a whole campaign to try to better articulate that while postdocs perform important research and scholarship, they are also human beings like anyone else - mothers, fathers, leaders, volunteers, immigrants, and innovators. If you are a postdoc, I encourage you to share your story as part of the What's a Postdoc? initiative. 

The definition of a postdoctoral scholar (postdoc) by the NPA reads:
"An individual who has received a doctoral degree (or equivalent) and is engaged in a temporary and defined period of mentored advanced training to enhance professional skills and research independence needed to pursue his or her chosen career path."

The major task associated with postdoctoral scholars is helping lead and drive forward research and scholarly work at their institutions. And these institutions can range from universities and academic medical centers to national or government labs and corporations. My experience lies in supporting postdocs at universities which is what I will touch on in the rest of this piece. However, there is important emerging research that pursuing postdocs outside academic institutions does not necessarily preclude one from pursuing a faculty career. Perhaps a topic for a future post.  

​I ran climate surveys on our postdoctoral population at North Carolina State University in 2020 and 2021 as well as at Virginia Tech in 2022. In these surveys we asked how postdocs spend their time and the distribution of their work devoted to the tasks below were remarkably consistent across survey years and institutions.  

As you can see in the figure above, postdocs spend a nearly equivalent amount of their time performing research or scholarship related to their personal interests/goals and those of their supervisor(s) and that these efforts take up ~60% of their total work hours each week. It is great to see postdocs are working on their "own" research/scholarship efforts as a key point of the postdoctoral position is to develop as an independent researcher and scholar.

​Writing takes up another large portion of postdocs' time (~16%) with manuscript writing being the largest area of focus outside research/scholarship. Finally, mentoring junior colleagues (7%) and teaching (6%) were tasks most postdocs reported doing as part of their roles, although there was large variation in the distribution of effort on these tasks based on the disciplinary background of the postdoc. 

Clearly, then, postdocs do report focusing largely on research/scholarship but are also doing work beyond that, including mentoring others. There is data to emphasize that postdocs play a critical role in the development of research skills in Ph.D. students working in their groups. The authors of the PNAS study that investigated postdoc mentoring of graduate students discussed a "cascading mentorship model" where faculty supervisors' mentoring of postdocs allows for postdocs to then mentor their more junior colleagues. So, postdocs are both mentoring and are being mentored. 

Given many postdocs also seek to move into future careers where they will need to mentor others, increasing the development of effective mentoring skills in this population is critical. The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine's report and online guide on the Science of Effective Mentoring in STEMM is a great place to start. 

Many readers may wonder what is the purpose of a postdoc? How is it different from graduate school? These are good questions. Traditionally, a postdoctoral position was seen as a type of apprenticeship where aspiring faculty members (especially in the sciences and engineering fields) would be mentored by a more senior faculty member as they worked to develop the various skills (experimental design, analysis, manuscript and grant writing, people and project management, etc...) needed to become an "independent researcher". To achieve a faculty position at many research-intensive institutions a postdoctoral position is becoming essential. And data demonstrate that completing a postdoc improves scholarly productivity and positively contributes to securing a tenure-track faculty appointment. However, one can have too much postdoctoral training and experience diminishing returns from extended postdoc positions. 

Many postdocs do not ultimately land faculty positions and move on to a variety of careers, post-postdoc. Additionally, while postdocs are at their institutions, they contribute importantly in a variety of ways from mentoring students (as discussed previously) to teaching and assisting in the management of their research groups. Perhaps their most important contribution to their institutions, however, is driving research and innovation forward. 

Innovative programs that promote start-up company creation led by postdocs are gaining steam including those at Cornell University's main campus and Cornell Tech in New York City; University of Memphis; University of Washington in Seattle; Carnegie Mellon University; Duke University's Department of Biomedical Engineering; and now Virginia Tech. Postdocs are uniquely situated to help lead the commercialization efforts of new technologies emerging out of university research groups. It will be exciting to see in the years to come how these programs perform in allowing postdocs to spearhead the creation of start-up companies from universities' intellectual property. ​

While many anecdotes and assumptions exist suggesting postdocs are critical drivers of research and innovation at their institutions, I have found surprisingly little analysis of this topic. 

So, I set out to do a crude analysis myself. 

The National Science Foundation (NSF) publishes a wealth of information on research expenditures and snapshots of the graduate student and postdoctoral scholar population at institutions across the United States. Specifically for this analysis, I leveraged data from the Fall 2020 NSF Survey of Graduate Students and Postdoctorates in Science and Engineering (most recent data available) and NSF Higher Education Research and Development (HERD) Survey data from fiscal year 2020 (released in December 2021 and the most recent data available). So, we will be comparing research expenditures from the HERD Survey (both overall and federally-funded) to postdoctorate and graduate student population size in 2020. 

Caveats: NSF data on population counts are self-reported and institutions are left to determine the best process for counting their graduate student and postdoc population. Postdoc population counts can be quite variable (see this blog post from Gary McDowell for more on that). 
In addition, I removed three institutional data points as they vastly skewed the postdoc data in particular: Johns Hopkins (1,723 postdocs in 2020), Harvard (5,787 postdocs), and Stanford (2,446 postdocs) all had postdoc populations >2.5 standard deviations of the mean postdoc count of all reporting institutions in 2020 (mean postdoc count: 260, Std Dev: 520). In addition, Johns Hopkins research expenditures are nearly double that of the next largest institution (University of Michigan), making its data an outlier on both metrics - postdoc counts and research expenditures. With those outliers removed we are left with 200 institutions who reported postdoc counts in 2020. 

Let's look at the correlation between the number of postdocs at an institution and its overall research expenditures in 2020.

An R-squared value of 0.81 demonstrates a very strong correlation between the number of postdocs at an institution and its overall research expenditures in a given year. The R-squared value between postdoc counts and federally-funded research expenditures was 0.75. As a reminder correlation does not equal causation but clearly there is a strong association between research expenditures and number of postdocs at an institution. 

Plotting the same 200 institution's fulltime Ph.D. student populations against research expenditures we see a strong but weaker correlation. 

The R-squared value between number of Ph.D. students and federally-funded research expenditures was 0.59.
​
The trendline equations for the relationships plotted above can be used to "measure" how research expenditures associate with either the number of postdocs or Ph.D. students.
​REMINDER: This is an overly simplistic interpretation of the data as there are many factors we aren't looking at here but for sake of argument, let's run the math.

For the postdoc vs research expenditure trendline: y=1038.4x + 81898
Where x=postdoc number & y=research expenditure (in $1000).
If x=1; y=82,936.4
So, based on these overly simplified (and not to be taken literally) data, 1 postdoc equates to $82,936,400 in research expenditures & 1,000 postdocs to $1,120,298,000 or $1.12 billion in research expenditures. 

If we do the same math for Ph.D. students, 1 Ph.D. student equates to $48,629,790 in research expenditures & 1,000 Ph.D. students to $331,137,000 or $330 million in research expenditures. 

So, while this is a very crude analysis, hopefully it emphasizes the very strong relationship between postdocs and research "output" (ie, expenditures of funds on research) at institutions AND that this relationship is stronger than for Ph.D. students who also lead research will making progress towards their degree. 

While research expenditures are perhaps not the best metrics of "output" from postdocs or Ph.D. students, it is available data we have. Long term, we must do a better job of understanding the impact of graduate students and postdocs on not only research/scholarship and innovation but the teaching and outreach mission of many of institutions.

​I discussed the need to better measure the impact of postdocs in a prior blog post from 2020 and there is still much to do in that regard. 

Postdoctoral scholars do a lot. Clearly they play a large role in research output at their institutions but are also critical mentors for many working in research groups and universities and other academically-focused research organizations.

While it is difficult to fully capture the impact postdocs make, those of us who work in this space know it is large and often underappreciated. We must do better to measure and report on postdoc impact moving forward. Why? Because if institutions don't find a better way to understand postdoc impact, they will not invest in supporting them. This in turn, will make the postdoc path less desirable. In fact, that is already happening, with many faculty reporting difficulties in recruiting postdocs. Granted, some institutions - St. Jude Children's Research Hospital and the Van Andel Institute in particular - are working hard to increase compensation for their postdocs but systemic barriers (grant budgets, organizational classification of postdocs as non-employees, etc...) make it challenging for compensation and benefits to be increased for many postdocs. Add these challenges to the opportunity cost in pursuing a postdoc and one should not be surprised to see Ph.D.s pursuing different paths post-degree.

It is my belief that we must think of creative ways to reimagine the postdoc experience to make it a more holistic training experience that sets those who pursue it up for success. The innovation postdoc fellowship programs I mentioned earlier are one example but I think a variety of creative solutions could be proposed. To begin with, though, we must all do better in collecting and reporting on data that allows us to advocate for postdocs and the critical roles they play at our institutions and beyond.

For Further Reading
From the Blog

• ​Measuring Postdoc Impact​
• Reimagining the Postdoc Experience
• Factors That Affect Career Choice and Diversity in Science
• Ph.D. Recipients' Employment Trends: Insights from National Science Foundation (NSF) Data
• Ph.D. Employment Trends: Insights from NSF Survey of Doctorate Recipients 

Papers and Programs of Potential Interest
United States National Postdoc Survey results and the interaction of gender, career choice and mentor impact

Career choices of underrepresented and female postdocs in the biomedical sciences

Surveying the experience of postdocs in the United States before and during the COVID-19 pandemic

​A startup postdoc program as a channel for university technology transfer: the case of the Runway Startup Postdoc Program at the Jacobs Technion–Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech

​Postdocs to Innovators program (consortium of European universities and partners)

Virginia Tech Presidential Postdoctoral Fellowship Program