Co-Founder Highly Values the Intellectual Rigor from Her PhD

Name: Shreya Jha (she/her)

PhD: Sociology of Development (specialism: Women's agency in South Asia), University of Bath, 2018

What was your main area of research?

I studied how women express their agency, the idea that individuals or groups can act in such ways that they are able to change some material conditions of their lives.

Women are thought to have much less agency in male-dominated societies – this is true! But I also showed that women have more agency than we think they do, because we do not realise that agency can be expressed in many different ways.

I used data from my on-ground research to show the many different and less-visible ways in which women demonstrate their agency and how these actions result in changes in their lives and those of their families.

What is your current job?

I am a Co-founder of Relational Wellbeing Collaborative (RWB, https://www.rwb-collab.co), based in Noida, India, but I work internationally.

A co-founder's job requires doing everything!

Substantively, I undertake consultancy and research on Relational Wellbeing, an integrative approach to wellbeing that investigates both the experience of wellbeing and the underlying factors that enable people to live happy and fulfilled lives.

At RWB Collaborative we design, build, and implement comprehensive wellbeing strategies, design wellbeing assessments and toolkits for our partners' unique contexts, undertake qualitative and mixed-methods research to generate evidence for what works (or not) for promoting wellbeing and why, and train partners to undertake participatory wellbeing assessments.

In addition to this, I also contribute to developing our own business and marketing strategies and translating these into action. These are aimed both at promoting awareness about relational wellbeing and the work of RWB Collaborative, and at building partnerships and collaborations.

I am constantly on the lookout for funding opportunities and talking to funders and potential partners. This involves also writing and speaking about our work through various media (podcasts, briefs, seminars, etc.).

What is your favorite thing about your job?

I am lucky that I enjoy the work I do – both in terms of content, and in terms of being able to learn something new all the time. I am presently also enjoying trying to build a viable company based on our research ideas.

It is also a challenge to try and market a research idea which is often very nuanced in a way that is attention-grabbing and easily digestible for someone new to the idea. Grappling with this can be frustrating but enjoyable when you get it right (like all things)!

What is the most important skill you developed or experience you had during your PhD that now helps you in your current position?

The most significant skill that has stayed with me from my PhD is intellectual rigour. For me, this is the ability to stand back from my own work and critically assess whether it stands up to intellectual scrutiny from multiple perspectives. This is hard work and happens in phases, not necessarily in one go. It also demands honesty, i.e. being able to say that I am wrong and re-work an earlier concept.

This has remained useful because my present role demands the same intellectual rigour that is required of a PhD. Equally importantly, it means that I do not make false promises and tall claims as a consultant when collaborating with partners. I consider this humility to be important both to be honest and ethical in working relationships and in order to constantly remain open to learning new things.

How did you build the skills necessary for your current role?

My present role demands both the skills of a researcher and practical skills of a marketer. My research skills draw on a foundational training as a therapist as well as my experience of doing research for the past 20 years.

Thinking like a marketer or developing our company brand is a very different set of skills which I am still learning. I build on a base of also having managed a retail store before I ever become a researcher. I haven't done any special courses for my present role.

How did you find this position? What were the career steps you took to get to where you are now?

I and my co-founder (also my PhD supervisor) started this company together, and so we created my (and her) position.

PhD ➡️ Independent researcher (consultant) ➡️ Research and Evaluation Manager in NGO ➡️ Co-founder of company

If someone is interested in a similar role, what would you recommend they start doing now to prepare?

The main thing I would say to somebody who is otherwise steeped in research is to think entrepreneurially.

Why did you decide to not pursue a career in academia?

I did not seriously consider a career in academia even though I have been doing research for about 20 years now. This is in large part because I have never seen myself teaching – which academic life would have involved.

As I did my PhD, I could also see the pressures to 'publish or perish' – something I could not really get behind. I was also not sure that academia would enable me to be a 'do-er', i.e. implement ideas on the ground and see what effects they have on people's lives.

I would say this was a relatively easy decision, in fact almost a foregone conclusion for me.

What advice do you have for someone getting their PhD and looking to pursue a career outside of academia?

In general, my advice is for before someone embarks on a PhD. I think it's important to work before starting a PhD, especially in my kind of field (International Development/ Development Studies). Ideally, it would be good to do a research job, which would give you some sense of what parts of the PhD would feel like. This might also help you decide whether a PhD is right for you. It might also be useful to take on roles that teach you completely different skills, e.g. communications, marketing, managing projects and teams.

A PhD equips you with many skills which are transferable, and I would focus on how these are useful for jobs outside academia. These obviously include your substantive specialist knowledge which might be useful in your job itself, but also include your process skills.