Professional Plans 2026

Values
I would thrive in a job where:

1. I can build relationships with teammates, mentors, clients, and (in the far future) mentees
2. I can go physically see the thing being built, and meet the people I'm building for
3. I have massive personal responsibility for my work
4. I occasionally operate in public (presenting, writing, or speaking)
   • I can work across multiple threads of execution, at once or at different times in a year

I professionally instinctually value and care about:

1. doing excellent, high-quality work
2. discipline
3. curiosity
4. production
5. compellingness
6. longterm value creation

I have historically been good at:

1. Operating in ambiguous, fast-paced environments
2. Mathematical + physical intuition (physics background)
   • Modeling + structured reasoning
   • Programming: Python, Java, OCaml, HTML, some C
3. Interdisciplinary synthesis
4. Pattern recognition (PPE, Philosophy)

In the long term, I want to put impactful products in peoples' hands, and would find it fulfilling to learn about the world in the process.

Options

1. Startup (Founding Engineer / Early Employee)

This path fits because it offers high ownership, fast feedback loops, and direct exposure to product, users, and systems that actually need to work. I’m most effective in 0→1 environments where the problem is not fully specified, and product and system design evolve together. I gravitate toward roles that combine technical building with product thinking and some level of user interaction.

Q: When I was running my archeology startup, we didn't know when an opportunity would arise, which made it hard to rest and set work boundaries that allowed us to work for sustained periods and learn more. Is this less of a problem in more mature startups?

2. Research (General)

I've done research at Penn. Research aligns with my strengths in modeling, first-principles reasoning, and open-ended problem-solving. I’m particularly drawn to applied or adjacent-to-deployment research.

The tradeoff is pace and distance from impact.
Looking back at my work in the Miskin Lab, I do think I operated relatively fast, but needed a lot of mentorship. I also could not talk to users, which made me a bit sad.

Q: How can I do research while staying connected to the real word? My current instinct is to document work through blogging, but talking to other people in STEM isn't the same as talking to people the work is impacting.

Q: Would I learn faster in an industry role due to the higher pressures to iterate towards a specific goal, even if it is less technically open-ended?

Q: Econ PhD vs Engineering PhD?

3. Quant / Finance

Quant roles fit my background in math, modeling, and structured problem solving. I perform well in environments that reward fast iteration, correctness, and independent thinking.

The main tradeoff is that the work is more abstracted from tangible impact and real-world users. There’s also a risk of optimizing within a closed system rather than contributing to broader, external outcomes.

Before I graduate from Penn, I'd like to:

• Publish in economics and do some modeling work
• Publish in robotics
• Ship a project used by students through the DP or an undergraduate CS group
• Start a forward-deployed engineering group
• Run a reading group
• Intern at a robo/drone startup
• Intern as a quant
• Increase my conscientiousness and math stamina

And, outside the physics curriculum, take:

• CIS 4210/5210 - Artificial Intelligence
• MEAM 3200 - Intro to Mechanical and Mechatronic Systems
• MEAM 5200 - Introduction to Robotics
• MEAM 6230 - Learning and Control for Adaptive and Reactive Robots
• MEAM 5160 - Advanced Mechatronic Reactive Spaces
• MEAM 5100 - Design of Mechatronic Systems

Q: How can I measure what I am better at right now, with the learning curves I am facing and the interdisciplinary work involved in each of these roles?