[Bob T.]

I'll tell you something else about experimental design....

When I was younger, for about a dozen years, I worked in the reserch facility for a major corporation. It was the kind of place, where as one of my friends said 'If you're a smart person here, you're just another face in the hallway.' I can't tell you how many people there just had a BA but it wasn't that many, and I was one of them. It seemed like having at least a masters was a prerequisite for getting hired, and at a mimimum I would guess that at least 50% of the people there had a Phd. Anyway the key to my survival there, was that I COULD do experimental design and data analysis and manipulation. Because even though people were able to get advanced degrees which meant that they probably had to survive at least one experiment for a thesis, they weren't necessarily able to see the connections between what they wanted to test, and the data they were able to generate with their tests, and the applications that that data could be used for.

Oh yeah, and if you are ever in that position, it probably will help you to get promoted, if you never look at your boss's work and say, 'why are we comparing apples and avocaodos here? [img]/images/graemlins/grin.gif[/img]'

Anyway, the two skills that I think every corporation can always use are, people who can write well, and people who can use applied mathematics.