side hustle

This PhD Side Hustler Maintains a Healthy Work-Life Balance

October 8, 2018 by Emily Leave a Comment

Today’s podcast guest is Dr. Caitlin Faas, an assistant professor of psychology and perennial side hustler. We discuss her history with side hustling and her motivations for pursuing it. Caitlin’s current side hustle of academic coaching dovetails so well with her primary role as a faculty member that she’s even planning to include that work in her tenure packet. Her work involves coaching and teaching about time management, productivity, and overcoming psychological barriers to academic success, so listen through the episode and check out her website to learn the tips that work well for her and her clients.

Links Mentioned in Episode

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Play Music, Stitcher, or Spotify.

Give your feedback on Season 1 and influence the direction for Season 2 through this form.

0:00 Introduction

1:09 Please Introduce Yourself

Dr. Caitlin Faas is an assistant professor at small liberal arts college in Maryland. She’s had her job for five years, and soon she is submitting tenure packet. She went to graduate school at Virginia Tech, where she studied human development and family studies. She’s the developmental psychology professor in her department. Her research focus is emerging adulthood.

For her side hustle, Caitlin runs a business to coach busy professionals as they try to integrate school and academics into their daily life. She provides career direction and productivity tips to her clients, as well as offering advice on her blog and social media. Her clients are associate professors, graduate students, and professionals considering applying to graduate school.

3:17 Did you have a side hustle as a student?

Caitlin has always valued hard work and earning her own income. As an undergraduate, she worked while being a full time student. Then as a graduate student, Caitlin worked at the local yarn shop during the summer and had a couple corporate retail work experiences. Having extra spending money was her motivation for her side hustle. She’d usually spend her income from the yarn shop on yarn for her knitting hobby. She also used her money for non-funded academic opportunities, like going to conferences.

Caitlin and Emily both agree that having outside activities, whether paid or hobby, helps you personally while you’re a graduate student. A side hustles is a valuable way to learn other skills and discover what you enjoy doing.

Video Series: How to Increase Your Income as a Graduate Student

Subscribe to our mailing list to receive the 7-part video series on increasing your income as a graduate student, including side hustles and passive income.

8:10 How did you transition into self-employment as your side hustle?

Caitlin went from graduate school directly into her assistant professor position. For the first two years, she focused on her productivity, time management, and personal values. She decided that she wanted to work 9-5 and use her non-work time as she chose. She trained for a half marathon and on her runs, she listened to Nick Loper’s Side Hustle Nation podcast. The stories she heard on the podcast inspired her to start her own business on the side. Starting a coaching business seemed like a way for her to take more control of her career trajectory in the face of an uncertain economy. In contrast to other professors who may do consulting on the side, Caitlin decided to create her own platform to reach the general public. She wanted to help people beyond her students and outside her own academic network.

15:13 What do you do in your business and how does it complement your primary job?

Caitlin is a personal coach, working with clients to improve their productivity, time management, writing and academic life. To get started, she took coaching classes and offered her expertise to a broad audience. Most clients needed help determining if they should leave their job to go to graduate school, so Caitlin’s work has evolved to focus on that audience.

She spends about 8-10 hours per week on her business during the academic year and 20 hours per week during the summer. This time is spent coaching clients, collaboratively editing writing and teaching writing skills, speaking at conferences outside of her field, engaging her audience on social media, and on networking calls. She recently began working with corporations to help bridge generational differences. For instance, she has advised business how to help baby boomers and millenials work better together. She’s been paid to give webinars in a corporate setting.

Caitlin and Emily comment that academics are trained to view much of their work as voluntary service. Academics do many tasks, like reviewing papers, as a service for no extra money. Yet through a side hustle, Caitlin is paid for these tasks, generating income for her valuable skills.

20:50 What benefits have you experienced from your side hustle?

Caitlin benefits from flexibility with her finances that come from her side income. She has student loan bills, so this income helps her make those payments. She dreams of financial freedom. Also, Caitlin likes that her side hustle gets her outside of the ivory tower. She enjoys getting to know other people and helping people. Her goal is help people feel empowered to make decisions about their career and be productive. Through her business, she feels in control of her career, where she can learn lessons and grow opportunities.

23:02 Can you tell us about your website?

Caitlin’s website provides free content for interested people. She includes a blog with posts about productivity, self-improvement, and deciding whether to go to graduate school. Every two weeks, she sends an email newsletter. She provides videos with a transcript and worksheets.

Her first website was very simple and didn’t have much content. Having a website was an important first step to establish her business and build an audience. As she earned more money, she could put some of that money back into her business. Now, she hires a graphic designer and video editor to improve the quality of her online products.

25:34 How do you manage your time between your primary job, side hustle, and other commitments?

As a productivity coach, Caitlin practices what she coaches. She is serious about working her primary job 9-5 and having free time on evenings and weekends. She is super strict about sleep, so she always make sure she has 8 hours of sleep each night. She encourages people to start with getting enough sleep. Caitlin critically considers how she likes to spend her time, so that she spends it on activities she enjoys. For instance, she has decreased the time she spends editing papers, because she finds more fulfillment from coaching clients in person. She read Gretchen Rubin’s books for inspiration, and suggests that others look for productivity role models to follow.

Increase Your Income

Join the mailing list to receive our 7-part video series, "How to Increase Your Income as a Graduate Student," including side hustles and passive income.

30:48 How does your side hustle interact with your primary job?

At first, Caitlin kept her business idea quiet. Now that she has established her side hustle, she is open about it with people in her department. She says typically people don’t think too much about what she’s doing, but colleagues ask her about time management.

Coaching clients has made Caitlin a better professor, because skills she learned while she trained to be a coach showed her how to be a better teacher. She’s including information about her coaching business in her tenure package. She is making the case that her coaching business has improved her performance as a professor.

33:38 Would there be a situation where your side hustle became your primary job, or alternatively, you would stop it?

Caitlin has other goals that are fulfilled through her professor position. For example, one of her goals is travel, and her professor position gives her the opportunity to take her students abroad. She took her students to Greece, and her travel was paid for. She sees this as a perk of being a professor.

She is in a growth mode in her coaching business. She has 8-10 hours each week, so she’s examining how she can grow even though her time is limited. Additionally, Caitlin and her partner will be foster parents for teenagers soon. This family life transition may change her priorities and time management.

37:12 How could someone with a PhD find a side hustle that complements their primary work?

Caitlin recommends completing “What’s your purpose?” and “What are the things you like to do?” activities offered on several entrepreneur websites. Even though the entrepreneur path may not seem like an intuitive one for many with a PhD, Caitlin suggests plugging into the entrepreneur network to find support.

Through a side hustle, you can truly explore what you want to do and find something you love to work on. When you find something that you love, Caitlin says you have energy to overcome road blocks and make it grow. If you don’t love the work, you have the freedom to change direction.

39:40 Final Comments

Caitlin and Emily are both part of a self-employed PhD network led by Dr. Jennifer Polk. The network is very supportive and includes a diversity of people. Caitlin and Emily welcome people to reach out to them directly.

40:55 Conclusion

Code Maintenance Consultant

October 3, 2018 by Emily Leave a Comment

Name: Carolyn Chlebek

University: Cornell University

Department/Program: Biomedical Engineering, PhD student

What is your side or temporary job?

I work as a consultant for a Gait Analysis Laboratory on campus. I maintain the code that provides the interface and analysis packages for the laboratory.

How much do you earn?

I earn $18/hr.

How do you balance your job with your graduate work?

I set aside 5 hours per week in my schedule. Typically, I look at my weekly schedule Sunday night and find some time that I physically block off – I ensure that I work 9 hr/day in total, therefore ensuring I give enough time for my research (minimum 40hrs/week).

Does your job complement your graduate work or advance your career?

Yes, this job can definitely influence my career. Much of my research requires me to create and maintain code, so this side hustle is good practice. Additionally, the graduate student who held this position before me went into consulting and found that this position was a great talking point in interviews and demonstrated his skills that made him a great fit for a consulting position.

How did you get started with your job?

Another graduate student in my lab held the position before me and recruited me to take over from him after he graduated.

Is there anything else you would like to share about your experience?

I enjoy the challenges of this position, and the more translational nature of this work – the lab uses this data to evaluate the healing progress of pet dogs after surgeries. They also use this data to guide future surgical decisions – as a dog lover, this is very motivating!

Group Fitness Instructor on Campus

September 26, 2018 by Emily Leave a Comment

Name: Carolyn Chlebek

University: Cornell University

Department/Program: Biomedical Engineering, PhD student

What is your side or temporary job?

I work as a group fitness instructor through the Cornell Fitness Center.

How much do you earn?

I currently earn $18/hr, but anticipate raises the longer I teach and more certifications I receive. Additionally, this position allows me to get free gym membership.

How do you balance your job with your graduate work?

I teach 1-2 classes per week and select times that will not conflict with my experiments – right now I am teaching on Sunday nights, so it is a nice calming way to start my week.

Does your job complement your graduate work or advance your career?

My job does not directly impact my graduate work, however I study biomechanics so I can make very broad connections between my work and my side hustle. Additionally, the teaching experience that comes with group fitness will certainly add to my confidence should I go into academia & need to teach or give public presentations often.

How did you get started with your job?

Another graduate student in my lab taught group fitness classes and recruited me to join & learn how to teach.

Is there anything else you would like to share about your experience?

I love being able to connect with students – both in and out of my department – in a more social and healthy way! I also love being able to help people in their fitness journeys, and having an excuse to learn more about fitness and healthy lifestyles as I go through this job.

The Complete Guide to a Side Hustle for a PhD Student or Postdoc

September 17, 2018 by Emily 2 Comments

It’s no secret that PhD students and postdocs are paid a meager salary, sometimes not even as much as the local living wage. While a fraction of graduate students have probably always pursued side income to supplement their stipends/salaries, e.g., through part-time jobs, moonlighting, or odd jobs, only in recent years has it become easy to make money online or make money from home. Enter the ‘side hustle.’ The term exploded in popularity during the Great Recession along with the ‘gig economy.’ The flexibility of modern side hustles has made it possible for students and postdocs to fit their income-generating activities around their busy research schedules.

This article details why a graduate student or postdoc would want to side hustle, whether it’s allowed by their university/institution, examples of real side hustles held by PhDs, how to best manage the side income, and advice from PhDs with successful side hustles.

Motivations for Side Hustling

The motivations for having a side hustle during your PhD training are to make up for the deficiencies in what the university provides: money (primarily) and career-advancing experiences.

Increase Income

Pursuing your PhD during graduate school or gaining additional training as a postdoc is supposed to be your full-time (or more) pursuit. Research is life, right? Unfortunately, the positions don’t pay anywhere near as well as a regular full-time job.

The best case scenario for a PhD student or postdoc is that you will be paid enough to support yourself without making extreme lifestyle sacrifices, i.e., living in a van. However, there are plenty of programs and universities that do not even meet that low bar for a single person with no dependents. For a graduate student or postdoc with a dependent spouse (e.g., of an international trainee) or children, the low stipend or salary is almost certainly inadequate.

Graduate students almost always turn first to cutting their living expenses to be able to live within their means. They know that they are supposed to devote the lion’s share of their weekly energy to their coursework, research, and teaching. But when their backs are against the wall, some make money on the side to avoid going (further) into debt.

Career-Advancing Experiences

Some graduate students and postdocs are motivated to side hustle not by lack of income but rather lack of practical career preparation.

What careers does a PhD or postdoc prepare you for? These days, the vast majority of PhDs are not hired into tenure-track faculty positions. (Time to stop calling the jobs most PhDs get “alternative”, right?) Some universities have acknowledged this and put in place programming to help PhDs transition out of academia (my alma mater, Duke University, and in particular the Pratt School of Engineering, is innovating in this area), while others are still catching up.

Of course, PhDs have plenty of transferable skills that can be put to use in a wide variety of careers, but landing a job is still challenging.

Further reading: How My PhD Prepared Me for Entrepreneurship

A judiciously chosen side hustle (or even volunteer work) can help a PhD build out her resumé/CV and network to stand out from the other PhD applicants. A side hustle can teach you new skills, give you an opportunity to demonstrate the skills you already possess, and introduce you to professionals who can further your career journey.

Video Series: How to Increase Your Income as a Graduate Student

Subscribe to our mailing list to receive the 7-part video series on increasing your income as a graduate student, including side hustles and passive income.

Are Side Hustles Allowed by Your PhD Program or Postdoc Position?

While some academics may take the view that side hustling distracts from classes, teaching, research, etc., for some people a side hustle is the main factor that enables them to stay in their graduate programs or postdoc positions. They side hustle because they want to keep doing PhD-level research; otherwise, they can just leave and earn more money elsewhere! If conceived and managed properly, a side hustle is not a distraction from the student or postdoc’s training but rather an enhancement of it.

If you think about graduate school or your postdoc as similar to any other type of job, usually the only stipulations regarding your side hustle are that: 1) it does not interfere with your primary job and 2) it does not present a conflict of interest. That logic is helpful for thinking through whether a side hustle is allowed, but the universities sometimes add layers of complexity.

Further reading: Can a Graduate Student Have a Side Hustle?

Side Hustle Permissibility by Position Type: International, Fellow, Employee, Etc.

There may be explicit bans on making money on the side or it may be frowned upon. The income and experience gained from a side hustle is not worth getting kicked out of your graduate program or postdoc position.

International trainees

The F-1 and J-1 visas generally only permit employment directly in your capacity as a graduate student or postdoc. Sometimes, you can seek permission for other employment ventures, such as Optional Practical Training (OPT) for F-1 visa holders. A side hustle that you work on simultaneously with your research will likely not comply with these rules, so it’s a no-go.

Fellowship Recipients (Graduate or Postdoc)

Check the terms of your fellowship funding supplied by your university, employer, or funding agency. There may be a stipulation that no outside income is allowed as the fellowship is designed to support you completely and require your complete dedication. If you choose to pursue a side income against the terms of your fellowship, proceed with extreme caution and recognize the downside is potentially losing your primary funding. In other cases, outside income is not mentioned by the fellowship terms or is even explicitly allowed.

Research and Teaching Assistants

This is the category of graduate students most likely to be able to get away with a side hustle or be explicitly allowed because your responsibilities are generally time-limited to 20 hours per week (officially). Of course, beyond that, you are responsible for your dissertation work, so side hustling might conflict with that important pursuit. If you are in a contract with your university, check its terms. If outside income is not allowed, proceed with caution as you might lose your assistantship. You might, however, find a provision that allows outside income, perhaps up to a certain number of hours per week.

Postdoc Employees

A postdoc employee has a regular job, albeit a demanding one. Your desire to side hustle at that point in your training is more likely motivated by career advancement rather than income. Again, check your contract, but a side hustle may very well be permissible as long as it doesn’t interfere with your work. If you are working in your field, though, it could be a good idea to seek your advisor’s permission in advance.

What Does Your Advisor Think?

The person with the most important opinion on your side hustle–after you–is your advisor. Allowed, disallowed, frowned upon… The status of side hustling in the eyes of your university, department, or funding agency is less important than its status to your advisor. If your advisor is an unforgiving taskmaster who expects his myopic view of the supremacy of research to be adopted by his trainees, a side hustle is a very risky endeavor. However, if your advisor is a reasonable and kind person who respects work-life balance, it may be better to ask for forgiveness rather than permission if your side hustle is discovered and viewed negatively.

The Bottom Line: The Spirit of the Law

The spirit of the law when it comes to side hustling during graduate school or your postdoc is that it should not distract from your training. (This sentiment does not apply to visa holders; the letter of the law is most important in that case.) Financial and career stress itself can easily distract from training, so it may be a matter of choosing the lesser of two ‘evils.’

Prohibitions against outside income make sense when the income comes from a part-time job with fixed hours (meaning that you wouldn’t be able to stay late in lab if necessary) or if it takes so much time overall that you can’t complete your work healthily. But I don’t find prohibitions against outside work that doesn’t interfere with the student or postdoc’s primary ‘job’ any more logical than prohibitions against having a family or a hobby (assuming no conflict of interest).

Ultimately, rules or no rules and advisor’s opinion aside, you are the only person who gets to decide whether to pursue a side hustle. You are the one who will manage it and make sure that it enhances your PhD training instead of detracting from it.

Types of PhD Side Hustles and Examples of PhD Side Hustles

I break side hustles for PhDs into four categories: ones that advance your career, ones that you enjoy, ones that pay well (enough), and passive income. A side hustle that pays well and advances your career is ideal. If you can’t achieve that, doing something you enjoy is obviously preferable to doing something that you dislike or feel neutral toward that simply pays some bills. Passive income is outside of this ranked order as it doesn’t involve trading time directly for money.

By the way, if you are looking for a way to increase your income that your advisor would be totally on board with, try applying for a fellowship. I’ve created a guide to applying for and winning fellowships that includes a list of broad, portable fellowships that pay full stipends/salaries.

Further reading: How to Find, Apply for, and Win a Fellowship During Your PhD or Postdoc

PhD Side Hustles that Advance Your Career

There’s no better type of side hustle than one that pays you and helps you along in your career. Through this type of side hustle, you put your current skills to use, learn new skills, expand your network, and/or explore a possible career path. Often, this sort of side hustle is related to your current field of research or uses skills you’ve honed during your PhD. You might even be able to start working for a potential future employer while you’re still in training.

Examples of PhD side hustles that advance your career are:

Consulting
- Teaching (Derek)
- Zoo and aquarium evaluation (Kathayoon)
- Design (Mark)
- Data science (Edward)
Writing
- Freelance writing (Derek)
- Freelance academic writing (Vicki)
- Journalism
Editing
- Freelance scientific paper editing (Julie and Amy)
- Freelance scientific paper editing (Jenni)
- Thesis/dissertation editing
Internships
- Scientific research summer internship (Alice)
- Engineering summer internship (David)
Professional fellowships
- Science policy fellow (Emily)
Analysis
- Research analyst for investor relations (Adam)
Teaching
- Adjunct
- Online professor (Kathayoon)

PhD Side Hustles that You Enjoy

Sometimes an enjoyable hobby can be monetized or you can find meaning and delight in a side hustle. This kind of side hustle is one you would likely spend some time doing even if you weren’t being paid and can be particularly revitalizing during the long slog of your PhD or postdoc.

Examples of PhD side hustles that you might enjoy are:

Monetized hobby
- Art
- Crafts
- YouTube (Shannon)
- Singing (Meggan)
Non-academic teaching
- Piano (Kathayoon)
- Fitness classes (Anonymous)
Resident advising
- Resident advising for graduate students (David)
- Resident advising for a fraternity (Adrian)

PhD Side Hustles that Pay the Bills

If the only purpose a side hustle fulfills is bringing in some money, it’s done its job. Sometimes these pursuits are necessary for survival, but you shouldn’t spend any more time on them than absolutely necessary.

Examples of PhD side hustles that (likely) simply bring in income are:

Tutoring
Retail
Food service
Uber/Lyft
Childcare

PhD Passive Income

Passive income has become a bit of a buzzword in recent years. Ostensibly, passive income occurs after you make some kind of investment that then pays a residual.

Making a monetary investment in a rental property or dividend-paying stock is a classic example of passive income. The former is definitely a possible income source for a PhD who owns her own home.

Further reading: Should I Buy a Home During Grad School?

If you don’t have money up front, you can “invest” your time and talent into a product that people will buy over time. The classic example of that type is an author who is paid a royalty with each book sale.

The current fad incarnation of passive investing is a promise that you can “make money while you sleep!” through online business, generally selling previously created digital products. (I do this in my business.) However, almost no online business runs for long without input of time and labor. The upside for a graduate student or postdoc, however, is that the large time investment needed up front to generate passive income and the maintenance over the long term can generally be performed on your own schedule and under the radar.

Examples of PhD side hustles that are passive income:

Writing (i.e., published author)
Patent holder (licensed)
Digital products
- Flash cards and ebook (Alex)
- Courses
Investing for current income
Landlording

Video Series: How to Increase Your Income as a Graduate Student

Subscribe to our mailing list to receive the 7-part video series on increasing your income as a graduate student, including side hustles and passive income.

Balancing Your Side Hustle with Your PhD Work

Figuring out how to make money and settling into a groove of earning a side income can be exciting. It can even be more gratifying at times than your research as research is basically a series of failures punctuated by occasional successes. In those weeks and month when nothing is going right in your research, being able to turn to an activity with a known outcome ($$!) can be a welcome relief. However, you should not forget why you are pursuing the side hustle in the first place: to finish your PhD and pursue a certain career. (Of course, your side hustle may spur you to leave your program, but only do so after serious reflection! It shouldn’t be about the side hustle per se but a carefully considered evolution of your career plans.)

To that end, there are a few strategies you can use to make sure your side hustle complements and does not compete with your primary role:

1) Track Your Time

Set weekly limits for yourself on the amount of time you will spend on your role as a graduate student or postdoc vs. on your side hustle. If your time spent side hustling creeps too high or your time spent on research dips too low, you know you need to readjust. Expect your weekly time goals to change throughout the seasons of your PhD training.

2) Set Geographic and/or Temporal Boundaries

It’s best if you conduct your side hustle in a different location than your primary PhD workspace; for example, you could work from home on your side hustle and never in your office or on campus. An alternative to geographic boundaries is temporal boundaries, such as never working on your side hustle during daytime working hours. The exact boundaries you set will depend heavily on the nature of both your PhD work and your side hustle.

3) Choose a Flexible Side Hustle

An ideal side hustle for a PhD is one that can be accomplished from anywhere at any time and ramped up or down depending on how busy you are with your research. This is not realistic for all side hustles, but the more axes of flexibility yours has the better it will complement your primary job.

4) Keep Your Side Hustle Quiet (If Possible)

An internship or professional fellowship that requires time away from your graduate program or postdoc obviously can’t be kept secret, but many other side hustles can fly under the radar of your advisor and department if you want them to. The seriousness of the possible repercussions or how “frowned upon” side hustling is should dictate how open you are about your pursuit. Keep in mind that a side hustle in your current field of research may very well get back to your advisor as communities are quite small, so in that case it may be better to be completely above board.

Best Financial Practices for Your Side Hustle

Most side hustles are independent contractor or self-employment positions, which means that you become an entrepreneur (or solopreneur) of a kind. There are some common best practices in self-employment you should put in place from the start of your side hustle.

Further reading:

1) Use a Separate Business Checking Account

Separating your personal transactions from your business transactions at the account level will help you keep track of exactly how much money you are earning after expenses and what is deductible on your tax return. You can make periodic transfers from your business account to your personal account to pay yourself.

2) Set Aside Money for Tax Payments (Quarterly or Annually)

Your PhD side hustle generates (potentially) taxable income, subject not only to income tax but also in many cases self-employment tax. Add your marginal tax brackets at the federal, state, and local levels together with the FICA tax you must pay, and set aside that fraction of each of your side hustle paychecks to ultimately pay the extra tax. If you earn enough in your side hustle compared to your primary job, you eventually will need to start paying quarterly estimated tax. Fellowship recipients who don’t have automatic tax withholding are already familiar with this process. Even if you aren’t required to pay quarterly, expect a larger year-end tax bill.

Further reading: The Complete Guide to Quarterly Estimated Tax for Fellowship Recipients

3) Give your Earnings a Job

The best way to ensure you don’t blow your side income is to assign it a job to be completed as soon as it hits your personal account. You could pay a specific bill or two with your side income or only allow yourself certain indulgences from your side income. For example, Jenni saved her side hustle earnings for travel.

Closing Advice and Thoughts from PhD Side Hustlers

“Honestly, it kept me sane to have other things going on… [They] helped me to finish my dissertation more quickly because I was more focused on the time I had, instead of having lots of unstructured time to work.” – Kathayoon

“I’d encourage graduate students to pursue a lot of different opportunities while in school, even ones that are at a slant from what they usually do. It’s easy to get tunnel vision as a grad student, but if you open yourself up, you can develop really useful skills while reinvigorating your academic work.” – Derek

“I definitely recommend finding something in grad school that’s unrelated to the work you do, monetized or not, so that if all your experiments fail one week, you still have something meaningful to throw yourself into.” – Shannon

“This experience was critical for my transition out of graduate school. I ended up getting a full-time offer at the same company after maybe 2 months of hourly work and have been there for almost 2 years now. The best part was that I had an opportunity to try out my job before starting full-time. How else do you know if you want to launch a career in a certain field?” – Adam

Serving as a Resident Advisor Freed this Graduate Student from Financial Stress

August 13, 2018 by Emily 1 Comment

This episode’s money story features an interview with Adrian Gallo, a PhD student at Oregon State University. Adrian serves as a resident advisor in a fraternity house close to campus. For most of his four years in the role, it was a dream side hustle: high-paying (in defrayed costs), low time commitment, and personally gratifying. However, when the house experienced a calamity, the time he had to spend in the role rocketed up; his research suffered, and he had to have difficult conversations with his advisor. We discuss the pros and cons of side hustles generally and resident advisor roles in particular, including how this side hustle frees Adrian from the financial stress some of his peers experience.

Subscribe on iTunes!

Links mentioned in episode

0:00 Introduction

1:06 Please Introduce Yourself

Adrian Gallo is a fifth year at Oregon State studying carbon cycling. He also hosts a radio show, Inspiration Dissemination, which interviews grad students about research and their path to grad school.

2:45 What is the scope of your role as a resident advisor?

Adrian started as a resident advisor concurrently with starting grad school. His contractual obligations are minimal: he is a liaison between undergraduates and landlords and responsible for dealing with big-picture items, such as replacing appliances.

The role is in a fraternity house; Adrian is also a member from his undergraduate years. He knew the possibility for growth inherent in participating in this fraternity, so he decided to also serve as a mentor to the fraternity members. He helps with big-picture planning such as five-year goals.

The time commitment of the role fluctuates throughout the academic year and has also varied year-to-year. When the fraternity leadership was running well, Adrian didn’t do as much, but he became more involved when it was warranted.

On average, the time commitment of the position is 2-3 hours per week, which includes two hour-long meetings. Typically, he chats with the kitchen manager or house director as well a few times. On the ‘big’ weeks, the job has taken 20+ hours.

7:33 What pay and/or benefits do you receive for the role?

Adrian doesn’t pay rent (the average rent in Corvalis is $500 to $700+) and lives very close to campus so it is quite convenient to get to and from campus. He has two bedrooms in the fraternity house (one serves as his office) and his own washer/dryer. Utilities and a parking spot are included.

He also receives food service during the academic year: breakfast, lunch, and dinner five days per week. He can get to and from the house and eat a pre-prepared meal in just an hour lunch break. This is an amazing degree of time savings.

10:09 How did you land this resident advisor position?

Adrian initially inquired with the local fraternity chapter about finding a place to live and a roommate. Instead, they offered him the resident advisor position, which he though was outlandish. He was nervous about living in a fraternity house with approximately 50 college students. However, after a few phone conversations, he decided to give the position a try for a year. After one year in the position, he realized he really enjoyed the role and had found a home.

13:41 How do you make sure you’re fulfilling the expectations of you as a graduate student while holding this side position?

At first, there was no problem as the time commitment was so low.

Last year, 10 rooms in the house flooded and the floors had to be removed. The damage was so extensive that it couldn’t be fixed right away, which deprived everyone of sleep and wore them down.

Adrian had to spend significant time dealing with contractors (all day on the phone) and contacting the landlords, which kept him out of the lab for some time. He wishes he had asked for help from the student leadership in dealing with this situation much earlier as the time management was so difficult.

17:00 Did you let your advisor and co-workers know what was going on during the house disaster?

For about a week and a half, Adrian wasn’t at work and finally his advisor initiated a conversation with him about what was going on, at which point Adrian filled him in. He wishes he had been more forthcoming.

Adrian’s advisor knew about the position and that he was able to balance the roles well for the first two years. His advisor started to question whether the resident advisor role was compatible with Adrian’s role as a graduate student.

Ultimately the floor repair took approximately 2.5 months. Adrian learned more than he ever expected to about working with contractors, repairs, etc. The time commitment was very intense at the beginning but tapered over time.

22:22 How did you decide to stay in the resident advisor role and also convince your advisor that it was a good idea?

Adrian finds witnessing and facilitating the growth of the undergraduate fraternity members so fulfilling that he didn’t seriously consider resigning his position. Another job wouldn’t compare to the resident advisor role.

25:10 Have you received any additional intangible benefits aside from the mentorship that you’ve found fulfilling?

Staying in close contact with the undergraduates helps Adrian in his teaching role because he can make relevant references, which his students find engaging.

27:28 What might cause you to resign this position?

Adrian had second thoughts about the position during the flooding situation, particularly because he couldn’t sleep in the house with the soundproofing missing. The sleep deprivation really got to him; he couldn’t think or work well.

30:30 Do you think you’ll continue with the role even through writing your dissertation?

Adrian already has written his master’s thesis while in the resident advisor role and actually found it helpful to live in the fraternity house. He would come out of his office mentally exhausted and find refreshment in the escape of interacting with the undergraduates. This approach isn’t for everyone, but it worked well for Adrian.

33:28 How has your role as a resident advisor affected your finances?

Adrian paid off his student loans from his undergraduate degree and bought a car. He bought a nice mountain bike, which bring him a lot of joy and health benefits.

The chief intangible benefit is that he doesn’t have to feel concerned about his finances. Many of his friends have to budget very tightly to make it on their stipends. In contrast, Adrian can absorb unexpected expenses without worrying.

As an undergraduate paying his way through college, Adrian found concern about finances to be a constant cloud over his head, but it’s not something he experiences any longer thanks to his side hustle. The resident advisor role frees Adrian from the constant cloud of financial stress in exchange for (usually) only a few hours per week.

The benefits of this role have on balance been very much worth the time put in, even though he went through the tough period during the renovation. Thankfully, his advisor was ultimately supportive.

Resident advising is a great solution to the problem of insufficient stipends, and often comes with the side benefit of mentoring students.

41:15 Final comments

There are a few other graduate students serving as resident advisors to the fraternities and sororities, including two who had not previously been involved in the Greek system. A social scientist might find it very interesting, and in fact the person who held the role prior to Adrian used observations from her resident advisor role in her dissertation.

Try serving as a resident advisor out! Being willing to experiment with this role has enabled Adrian to make significant financial progress during graduate school. What’s the worst that could happen by saying “yes” for a year?

Undergraduates are worth getting to know as well (networking)!

36:40 Conclusion

Video Series: How to Increase Your Income as a Graduate Student

Subscribe to our mailing list to receive the 7-part video series on increasing your income as a graduate student, including side hustles and passive income.

Hairstyles YouTuber

November 14, 2016 by Emily 1 Comment

Today’s post is by a PhD student runs a YouTube channel about her passion-hobby, which also happens to bring in some money!

Name: Shannon

University: University of California, Los Angeles

Department: Social Psychology & Neuroscience

1) What is your side or temporary job?

Making hair tutorials on YouTube.

2) How much do you earn?

$200-250 a month

Increase Your Income

Join the mailing list to receive our 7-part video series, "How to Increase Your Income as a Graduate Student," including side hustles and passive income.

3) How do you balance your job with your graduate work?

My work and my YouTube channel are pretty darn orthogonal, haha.

4) Does your job complement your graduate work or advance your career?

Because my work and my channel are so different, it’s difficult to balance. At the beginning of grad school I was able to put out a new video every week because I could film on the weekends and edit in the evenings during the week. However, now I’m involved in a lot more projects at work, so I’ve been failing to meet the every-week benchmark. Since this is my hobby, I always have to remind myself “if I feel like it’s something I have to do instead of something I want to do, then I need to back off a bit.”

5) How did you get started with your job?

I started my YouTube channel somewhat accidentally back in undergrad. I recreated a bunch of Game of Thrones hairstyles for fun and posted them to reddit, which went viral. Lots of people were asking for tutorials, so that’s why I created my channel and it’s been steadily growing ever since. That big boost at the beginning was really important to making this channel monetized, because for most channels it’s really difficult to get past the first 5k subscribers.

6) Is there anything else you would like to share about your experience?

I definitely recommend finding something in grad school that’s unrelated to the work you do, monetized or not, so that if all your experiments fail one week, you still have something meaningful to throw yourself into. YouTube is a difficult way to make money on the side, though, I will say. I was really lucky with it. It takes a lot of work to make it monetized, and at times it’s been like another full time job. So I wouldn’t recommend this route if you’re just looking for money. But if you have a passion that you like sharing with others through video, it can be very fulfilling while still getting you money for groceries!