PhD on PhD....

I attended a talk given by Prof Fred Higgs III, from Carnegie Mellon University last Fri. The title of his talk is "The PhD, the Whole PhD, and Nothing but the PhD" - not that I want to get a PhD, but this prof background was quite intriguing prompting me to at least listen to him.

Some background on him, extracted from phamplet :
After his second undergrad year, Dr C Fred Higgs started a company www.goCarpeDiem.com with some friends to motivate and train students and young professionals to become high achievers. He now actually does a lecture circuit in the U.S.A to encourage students to pursue advanced degrees. The U.S. National Science Foundation and other government agencies such as NASA have engaged him to speak to young scholars about the many good reasons why they should pursue a PhD degree. Dr Higgs hopes to try to get the top NTU EEE, MAE and SCE students get excited about pursuing a PhD degree.

* Still on fight to way up there *

Anyway, he laid out some interesting points about PhD in a very engaging manner - talking about why a PhD is essential, he raised that point saying that many decision makers at the top of big companies has got a Ph.D, due to their problem solving skills. He also said that with a PhD, you basically have a VIP pass to anywhere you want to go - (I'm not really that sure about that though, though, it'd be relatively true in a good job market) He also raised the theory of delayed gratification - saying that PhD tend to earn much more than the others. Most importantly, education is free for those top brains (which unfortunately, I ain't under at this moment in time)

From the talk, you could tell that Prof Higgs is really different. He's a prof but he talks like a motivational speaker, making the topic really engaging. I wish there are some Prof.s like him here in NTU.

Anyway, I had considered the points that he raised up during the talk and in fact do agree with most of them. It sort of made me to reflect on path of growth - I intended to through the industry route getting CCNP, CCIE, etc. I did ask his view on this and his reply was - "Would it be relevant in the changing times"

Which I though, hmm, yeah, Cisco is here for now, but how about 10 years or even 20 years down the road. That doesn't mean I'm gonna give up going for my CCIE, but it does make me reflect on what sort of skills should I gain to remain relevant to society and to be able to contribute back to society. Something definitely worth to ponder about every now and then.