Hi ML community,
I’m nearing the end of my three-year PhD journey. Throughout this period, I’ve dedicated myself to producing a research paper annually, targeting top-tier conferences like ICML, ICLR, and NeurIPS. Despite my efforts and resubmissions, none of my papers made it through. As a result, my publication record consists solely of three manuscripts on arXiv.
My initial post-PhD ambition was to delve deeper into machine learning research at leading tech companies such as Facebook, Google, or Microsoft. However, my applications were turned down, primarily due to the lack of publications in prestigious conferences, which seems to be a crucial criterion for these roles.
Confronted with this setback and the pressing need to manage my finances, I shifted my focus to more traditional industry roles in consulting and finance. I’ve recently secured a position in quant finance, which, while exciting, means I won’t have the bandwidth to revisit and resubmit my research papers.
Reflecting on this journey, I sometimes feel disheartened, questioning the value of my PhD experience, especially when I consider my lack of published work in major machine learning conferences.
I see other PhD students in my field publish 2 papers per year in these top conferences which makes me wonder whether I am a failure? I’m open to any thoughts or advice on my situation.
You will certainly face an uphill battle when trying to compete in ML these days. A huge percentage of the people getting into top tier ML programs already have 1-3 papers in those conferences so you would need an incredible connection to even make it through most screening levels for an internship. I definitely wouldn’t say it was a failure or waste but I think you set yourself up poorly and then allowed that to compound when it didn’t work (by repeating the action/goal rather than resubmitting and getting publications in other conferences and journals). If you wanted to get into one of those careers I would suggest staying in your program for another year or doing a post doc but if finances are important right now then you have to prioritize. Nobody can really tell you what is important to you so I would say it’s about deciding what is important and choosing that rather than letting life happen to you.