Cross-post: Why Leaving Academia Doesn't Mean Leaving Your Identity Behind

Today's cross-post is an excerpt from "From the Lab to the World," a LinkedIn newsletter by Silvia Pineda-Munoz, PhD. She is the founder of Climate Ages & Outreach Lab. Pineda-Munoz's reflections on transitioning to work outside academia are relevant for many scientists, both inside and outside academia.

Why Leaving Academia Doesn’t Mean Leaving Your Identity Behind

Silvia Pineda-Munoz, PhD

When I left academia, I thought I was leaving myself behind, too.

So much of my identity was wrapped up in being “the scientist.” The one who spent years piecing together the climate past through fossils and data. The one who was trusted to write papers, teach students, and present findings at conferences.

The titles mattered. The postdoc mattered. Even the conference name tag mattered more than I’d like to admit.

So when I started to imagine a life outside of academia, I hit a wall:

If I wasn’t “Dr. Pineda-Muñoz, paleontologist and ecologist,” then who was I?

The Hidden Weight of Academic Identity

I think a lot of us who have been through the PhD pipeline feel this. You spend years proving your worth in publications and grant proposals, measuring your value in metrics that don’t always translate to the outside world.

And when you even consider walking away, people ask:

“But what about all those years of training?” “Won’t you waste your degree?” “Don’t you want tenure?”

It’s hard not to internalize those questions. For me, it felt like I was betraying a part of myself if I admitted I wanted something different.

But here’s what I realized: leaving academia doesn’t mean leaving your identity behind. It means carrying it forward in a different way.

The Scientist’s Brain in a Different Arena

When I stepped into entrepreneurship, I didn’t stop being a scientist.

I brought the same habits with me:

• Asking questions first. Science trains you to start with curiosity. In business, that means listening to your audience before trying to sell them anything.
• Running experiments. I can’t help but treat every campaign like a hypothesis. Try it, measure it, adjust. That’s not failure; it’s iteration.
• Thinking in systems. Ecology taught me that nothing exists in isolation. Entrepreneurship is no different: content, audience, offers, operations: they’re all interconnected. And just like in the natural world, if one part fails, your whole business ecosystem collapses.

The lab coat may be gone, but the brain that put it on every day is still here.

Photo: Silvia Pineda-Munoz, PhD.

Read the rest of Pineda-Munoz's journey from academia to becoming an entrepreneur, science communicator, and founder at "From the Lab to the World."

Silvia Pineda-Munoz is also happy to speak with anyone further on what leaving academia is like, her journey, and any other questions. Reach out to her on LinkedIn at Silvia Pineda-Munoz.