I am about to submit my application to a PhD in Statistics and I was wondering whether writing in the SoP about being willing to work in the industry to make a tangible impact would downgrade my application with respect to writing that I would enjoy being a professor in the future.
They already make clear that they prefer recommendations from academics rather than practitioners but I do not know what figures they expect to train (professors vs. practitioners).
Yes (but it's usually an unconscious bias, and not openly stated).
Many academics consider failing to become a professor actual "failure". An academic career is supposed to be a vocation. PhD students are supposed to be passionate about the topic, so much so that they'll want to continue to work on it after graduating. The best graduate students go on to become professors; the not-so-good ones are eliminated and "get a job" (because being an academic isn't actually a job!). The belief is pervasive enough that many academics who quit felt compelled to write blogs about why they're quitting and why they don't consider themselves to have failed.
Viewed this way, a prospective PhD student openly states they want to work in industry is a red flag. They've already ruled themselves out of being the best, they're likely to fail. Admission committees might not think this crassly, but they'll come up with the closely-related reasons "not passionate enough" or "applicant is not motivated by the subject, therefore when things inevitably go badly in the PhD they might drop out", both of which stem from the idea that the only way to be sure the applicant is passionate/motivated enough is for them to want to be a professor.
Granted not all academics think like this, but unless you are certain otherwise (e.g., you are applying to work under Phillip Greenspun, or the program description explicitly says they have an eye on preparing students for industry jobs), I think you should err on the side of caution and say you will consider an academic career even if you are almost certain you will join industry, or at least be non-committal about your future plans.
Nearly all PhD students will never be professors. Some PhD programs might prefer to recruit PhD students who intend to become professors, but sensible PhD programs will realize that students who wish to work in industry are students capable of making a realistic plan. That is a good thing.
Stating your intent to work in industry is unlikely to hurt your application. If it does, then you probably applied to a program that will not help you reach your goals.
PhD admission committees are made up of people, and people are notorious for having individual opinions that vary greatly from one person to the next. So: some people may care; others won’t care; and some people will care, but in the opposite direction from what you think. (For example, if I were to read your SOP and got a sense that you want a PhD because you have a passion for changing the world through groundbreaking industry applications of statistics, I would regard that as a wonderful motivation to have, and one that is much better than the generic “I’ve always dreamed of becoming a professor” line I see in every other grad school application I look at. Disclaimer: I’m in pure math, not statistics.)
For that reason, personally I feel it’s a fool’s errand to try to game the admissions system by trying to guess what the admissions committee “really” wants to hear and then give it to them.
Of course, I am confident that now that I have publicly posted this bit of wisdom, grad school applicants everywhere will stop these silly guessing games and just write the honest truth about who they are and why they want to do a PhD.
Anyway, best of luck with your applications, and my apologies for this non-answer.
I am faculty in a Biostats department. In my experience, there is a small premium placed on students who are likely to remain in academia (doesn't matter what fashion) in that they are more likely to publish components of their dissertation. As these papers often include substantial contributions from their advisors, this means more senior-authored papers for the advisor. However, a PhD is such a winding road, students who claim to be dead-set on acquiring a faculty position will not seem so credible in a personal statement.
My advice: do be honest with what sort of problems excite you, and why they motivate you to pursue a PhD. But perhaps do not spend much time describing your eagerness to enter industry per se. After all, a PhD is a poor time and money investment for an industry career in statistics / data science right now.
this generally seems to be the case in econ. not sure how it is in stats. my advice is to say that you want to be in academia and don't hint that you'd rather do something else even if that's the case. i agree with others that it's very hard to get a job in academia and that you should have a backup plan as a result, but for the sake of maximizing your chances of getting in, please keep those non-academic plans secret.
phd programs are for producing academic researchers. the thing about getting recommendations from academics instead of practitioners for this purpose is that academics will generally be far better judges of your ability to survive a phd program and become a successful researcher than someone who has never taught in one or even been through one.
I think it's difficult to answer this question universally. However, you can look at the placement record of the institution of which you are applying. If many previous graduates go on to academia, then you might be hurting your chances at that particular school in stating a desire for industry. If it's 50/50 or even more-so weighted on industry, then it probably doesn't matter. Of course, applying to grad school is always a crapshoot, but this is a way to get some 'data'.
Generally speaking, however, I would be honest with yourself and your application. I'm currently a PhD student in a statistics department, and a good department and good faculty/adviser (both of which can be hard to find) will help you reach your goals. It's going to be a long 4-5 years if you're working towards a goal you don't really want.
