Applying for overseas postdocs, especially for doctors who have just graduated from China and have no work experience, is really the result of the joint action of luck and strength, and both are indispensable. Even if you are strong, if there is no laboratory to recruit people (especially your major) when you apply, you will have to wait, unless you find another way to apply for post-doctoral funds such as Humboldt and JSPS, and the government of the other country will pay for you. On the contrary, even if your strength is average, your articles are few, and your resume is not exciting enough, if your professional laboratory is in a hurry to recruit people when you apply for the job, and you just contacted them on your own initiative, then congratulations, you are not far from taking the first step.
So, first of all, you should recognize your personal strength. What is your level among your peers? There are many articles, high influence and plenty of time. Of course, it is recommended to find someone to directly apply for postdoctoral funds such as Humboldt and JSPS, or directly apply for the guidance of the top laboratories of top foreign schools. But I think most people who visit wood bugs like me are only of medium level. There are not enough articles and time. So, how to open the door of overseas postdoctoral students in a short time with your only achievements? There are actually many skills in this …
First of all, you should prepare all the materials, resumes, cover letters and so on. Needless to say, the skills of materials, how to make a brilliant resume and how to write an impressive cover letter, because each major is different in every direction, so the outstanding places are different. In short, you should strive to be professional and highlight your own advantages. Some may have more publications, some may have more overseas experiences, overseas exchanges or meetings, and some may have outstanding experimental skills, instrument operation or system software. ...
The second is to make a list of overseas experts in this major. This may be a bit time-consuming and laborious, but it is definitely the most useful. I used Excel to organize it. How to organize it specifically? If you want to read the authoritative journals of your major, of course, it is not the paper version, but the online version (which is what we call the journal database). You should look back from the recently published papers, and then list the names, units and email addresses of the communication authors on the excel form. Of course, there are many articles, many of which are not what we need, so we need to simplify them, such as entering the country name with keywords. Then only read the articles published in a certain country. American journals published in the United States may not be imported to other countries, so they can only be imported from one state to another (for example, new york, California ...). Through this method, I basically established the excel of this overseas professor. Of course, there are several pages, each page is a country (USA, Germany, Canada, Australia, Japan ... Of course, it also involves Singapore, New Zealand, small Nordic countries and so on. ). In fact, after I have experience, I will know which country it is from as long as I see the email address of the correspondent of the article. The ratio is:. Edu (an American university). Gov (U.S. government department, possibly the State Key Laboratory). Org (an organization in America, some research institutes, hospitals, botanical gardens, etc. ),. Germany (. . African Union (Australia). Jp (Japan) Se (Sweden) Sg (Singapore). Be (Belgium) Nz (New Zealand). Fr (France) Uk (Britain) and so on. More importantly, if those who use. Com basically stays in the company, will not confess, or you can forget. Generally speaking, it is enough for me to read only the last two years of each issue, because there are actually many repetitions …
Secondly, you should mark the list of overseas experts you have done, because now you only have the professor's name, school unit (laboratory), email address and so on. And you have to make some comments on the professor you want. I made two suggestions at that time, one was academic level, and the other was the relevance of research direction. Because I study chemistry, I searched these two through SciFinder, a chemical database. Just search by author on SciFinder and enter the professor's first name, last name, etc. You can basically see his published articles and meetings. I recorded the number of their articles at that time. Generally speaking, I think that less than 20 articles may be a lecturer or assistant professor at most, and 50- 100 may be an associate professor. The article 100-200 may be a professor, and the numbers greater than 200 are basically awesome. Some people may think that this number is a bit large. In fact, SciFinder may contain repeated articles, or it may just be a conference paper (I remember that this number reached 1 1 when I just graduated from my Ph.D.), and the definition of the specific number can be adjusted in all directions for each major. In fact, when reading their articles, you can see the titles of the articles, and you can judge whether the professors are in the same direction or in the direction you are interested in in in a short time. For example, my list will be marked with the words "partial analysis", "partial synthesis", "partial biochemistry" and "partial pharmacology". There are other situations that can be marked. For example, I found that one or two bosses actually hung up most of their articles, so I marked them at this time because I thought these bosses might have personality problems. Other marks can also be added, such as "China people" and "female professors".
After the list of overseas experts mentioned above was basically completed, basically, my heart was a little better. At this time, you should start to submit CVS and cover letters of countries and professors you are interested in, and there are also some skills. Here I emphasize that the way to quickly find overseas postdoctoral positions is the word "Haitou". Some people may think that this is not a good method, but I think it is undoubtedly a good method for a person who just wants to find a decent overseas postdoctoral position and his own conditions are not what we call "awesome". Again, after finding an overseas position, luck accounts for at least 30%, or that. Although the boss's lab may be eager to recruit a doctor in your direction, the investment in sea is king. The more you invest, the more people will know that you are looking for Dr. Bo. Maybe one day a professor's Dr. Bo returns to China or finds a new home, and the professor's staff will be short of people immediately. Then, he may think of someone looking for Dr. Bo's position. Fortunately, you may get an interview inadvertently ... at least I found it this way.
What should I do before I go to Haitou? Email problem, first of all, gmail, Hotmail, yahoo (the United States, not China), I have always recommended gmail, and I feel very easy to use (mentioned below). Generally speaking, it is enough to send 5- 10 letters a day. If you send too many letters, you can't manage them (and they will be finished soon). If you send too few letters, you may not get a reply. After you send it, remember to add the words "sent", "sent" and "contacted" at the back of your expert list to remind yourself that the professor has sent a letter, and never send them a letter many times in a short time. Because it is very likely that your mailbox will be blacklisted by the other party, and he will not receive any letters from you in the future. Gmail has a memory function (it may be another mailbox). As long as you enter the email, he will prompt you when you enter it, which is very helpful. There are also some tricks in the title of the letter. Many people may directly state their purpose of finding a blog post, so that people can know your purpose by looking at the title. Of course, normal email communication is very suitable for this, but personally, I think that if you want to find a blog post, you should restrain yourself and use a simple "inquiry" as the title, because if the title is too clear, the other party may not even open and look at the contents of your email, so just delete it. No matter how wonderful your resume is, overseas professors receive hundreds of similar emails from all over the world almost every day. They can't read each one, but if your title is different, they may open it. Even if they open it and look at your purpose, they don't necessarily want to recruit you (most of them can be temporarily unavailable), but at least they open it. Usually, all the calls are made, and the other party will give you one. I hope to keep in touch or something. This is my personal experience. The first batch of letters of 10 may have only one or two or no reply at all. Later, I changed the email title, and I felt that basically all my letters were opened. Basically, 6-7 letters from 10 replied to me. Some of them didn't have the money, and even forwarded me to his colleagues, which moved me very much ... Generally, my application letter is written directly on the email, so that the other party can see it as soon as they find it. Resume can only be attached. If you have a great article, it is recommended to attach it directly. If the other party is interested, the other party will come down and have a look, and then at least they will have an impression on you. Some people have great articles, but they only read them on CV, and the other professor has not been idle to download them from the database and read them slowly. Please help him download it and let them look good.
PS: We are not encouraged to use "query" as the title here. In that case, foreign professors may delete "Inquire" when they see it in the future … just think of a common title yourself …
In addition, as mentioned above, you can send 5- 10 letters regularly every day, and then brush your email every day when you are free. This is basically what everyone who applies for blog posts does every day. In China, you can use the forwarding function of gmail to go to your own email address 139, and then you will receive an email arrival reminder in the form of SMS (only applicable to China Mobile). If you receive a reply from the other professor, you should also update your list in time. For example, most of the professors I contacted are retired (that's why I want to sort out the latest articles), so I will add the standard "retired" after their names, and then I will leave him (her) alone in the future ... In some cases, the other party's reply may contain other information, and some may say that you will contact him now in a few months. In this way, you should also indicate it on the list, lest you forget it later. Some may say that they need to apply for CSC in China, or they may indicate (if they don't want to apply for CSC, they can ignore it) …
That's it, over and over again. Maybe, a month or so, I said it's possible. Maybe your overseas professors all over the world ask you to contact an article (of course, you may have your contact criteria: for example, for me, underdeveloped countries don't contact, South Africa and South Korea don't contact, and so on. During this period, you may receive many rejection letters, and there may be many potential offer. At this time, you should tidy up well and refuse the letter first. Interested bosses can continue to send letters to communicate. With luck, some bosses may ask you to send a letter of recommendation, or some bosses may give you an interview. In this case, congratulations, you have made a big step forward, so all your efforts will be rewarded … interview skills are beyond the scope of this post.
Let's talk about bad luck If the whole world really contacted and did not find a potential offer, it is time to analyze the reasons. Is personal strength really not up to the level? Or for other reasons, personal strength is a process of gradual accumulation. No matter how hard you try to accumulate, improve your resume at any time, and there will definitely be an offer for you in the future. In this case, as I said before, you can't send an email to the same boss in a short time, so how soon can you send it again? Generally speaking, I personally think it will take more than three months, that is to say, if all the experts on your list send it once and still can't find your quotation, then you can send it again every three months to half a year to make an inquiry. In this process, you should constantly improve yourself, find all the articles that should be published, upgrade your resume well, and strive to get an offer when you cast your net for the second time.
PS: Why every three months? If the interval is too short, the other party will find you annoying. As far as I know, some overseas professors no longer accept emails from China, which is why I can't send them sometimes. Moreover, there are too many people in China. If everyone posts frequently, it will really affect other people's work and be bad for future generations, so everyone cherishes every email. Here, I remind you, no, Indians like this, so American bosses are very disgusted. They hope that their compatriots should be self-disciplined. When sending an email, you should not only be accurate in the other person's name (I don't need to say the importance of this), but also say something you are interested in according to the research direction of the other professor, or directly tell him what articles you have read in a journal and are interested in his research direction, so that he always has something to say to him. Also, I can send it again after three months because I heard that American bosses usually send advertisements, and they also like to find suitable candidates in their historical emails. They will ask the secretary to type all the emails that have been sent for nearly three months, and then choose from them, so that everyone can send them again three months later, which increases the chance of being selected …
Finally, I hope everyone can find their own satisfactory offer… in the new year …
Haitou has skills, remember to be too diligent!