Scientist Career Path
All the insights below are based on Jobtrees users’ actual career paths, aggregated together, instantaneously, to show you the real and unique most common career progression for each role. Use this as inspiration for your next job and to re-calibrate expectations for what success is in your next career step. After you search, toggle over to the Family View to see what roles are in the same job family. Use this to get a sense of the hierarchy of roles within this job family and inspiration for other jobs you can target.
The career path for a
Based on 230 Jobtrees users who were a Scientist in their career, on average, they have 4.13 years of experience and 3 jobs prior to this one. They spend 4.9 years on average in this job building experience and earn $98K per year before moving on.
3% of Jobtrees users moved to another job with this same title in their next career step. The most common career steps after Scientist are Senior Scientist, Research Scientist and Research Associate. While Senior Scientist is from the same job family, Scientist - General, there are other common opportunities outside this discipline that Jobtrees users are taking as shown by Research Associate, also being a common career path from Scientist.
If you are looking for more ideas on potential career paths from this job, you should also consider Research Assistant, Senior Research Associate and Postdoctoral Fellow as they commonly lead to Scientist as well. Find more insights below about this specific career path based on our Jobtrees users' experience.
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The roles above are the most common next steps in our users’ career paths.
Use the + button and watch the ‘branches grow’. It adds another level of potential career steps based on the most common paths taken by Jobtrees’ users.The roles below are the most common previous steps in our users’ career paths.
Use the + button and watch the ‘roots grow’. It adds another level of potential previous career steps based on the most common paths taken by Jobtrees’ users.Read insights on these paths here
Understand more about the career path
How can I become a
The most common career steps to get to Scientist are Research Associate, Research Assistant and Postdoctoral Fellow based on actual career paths reported to Jobtrees.
Research Associate, the most common step before Scientist, is a more senior role which is common to see in career paths. This is a natural and common career progression as titles aren't synonymous across companies so a higher title doesn't always mean higher pay and larger scope. Focus more on the scope of the next role than title progression in building a path to Scientist.
While Research Associate is the most common, there is no specific role leading to Scientist that is an overwhelmingly common path. Another characteristic of the Scientist career path is that experience within the same job family as this role isn't common and as a result likely not necessary. This shows there are many potential paths to becoming a Scientist so focusing on translatable skills is likely more important than a specific role.
While Research Associate isn't from the same job family as Scientist, Scientist - General, it can help to have direct experience in this discipline shown by Research Assistant also being a common career path to Scientist.
If you are looking for more potential career paths to Scientist, you should also consider Senior Scientist, Lecturer and Research Scientist as they commonly lead to Scientist as well.
What should I know about the career path
Career paths aren't linear with people often returning to a prior role which is what you see with Research Associate being on the path to and from Scientist. This is common when people move to companies of different sizes or choose to return to a function they fit well with.
Scientist is a role that people spend a significant amount of time in before moving on. In roles like this that are more senior, that is common as there is room and usually an expectation to grow within the role.
Scientist is part of the Scientist - General job family which has a variety of unique role within that discipline. Choosing to pursue a role within this family likely will mean that you will need to look outside of your discipline to find new roles and so should focus on related skills as part of that search.
Other common titles that have similar job requirements and career paths as Scientist are Scientist I, Visiting Scientist.