Is getting a master in Quantum Information Science a bad idea for a senior engineer in tech?

I'm a senior platform engineer (bachelor in cs) working in northern Europe (Not a EU citizen) in my late 30s. Overall I have around 12 years of experience in tech, I have worked as a software engineer or lead engineer before as well. I don’t have any physics background.

I am really drawn into QC and relevant potential use cases. I’m not planning to start over my career but I’m hoping to get sufficient domain knowledge to work as an infrastructure/SRE in a QC company in the next few years.

Do you think it's a bad idea to plan to study a master in Quantum Information from an online university which allows me to study while working? I understand that the industry is mostly research based, it's tough for people without physics PhDs and overall might disappear if the software doesn't deliver any promising use case. In contrary a generic software master or AI would be more useful, but at the same time I think they don't really position me in a place to do something great with it, given how competitive those already are. I'm betting this situation would change in the future and the industry would attract more funding to hire domain familiar engineers (SRE, Platform, Quantum Networking etc).

I like to know if it actually makes sense or it would be likely a waste of my time and money which could be invested in something more practical.

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u/opshack — 28 days ago

Is getting a master in Quantum Information Science a bad idea for my future career?

I'm a senior platform engineer (bachelor in cs) working in northern Europe (Not a EU citizen) in my late 30s. Overall I have around 12 years of experience in tech, I have worked as a software engineer or lead engineer before as well. I worked very hard to get to where I am today.

I don't see much excitement in my role really, it's the same work everywhere. I can try very hard and get myself to FANG level but I am not really motivated for that.

Do you think it's a bad idea to plan to study a master in Quantum Information from an online university which allows me to study while working? I understand that the industry is mostly research based, it's tough for people without physics PhDs and overall might disappear if the software doesn't deliver any promising use case. In contrary a generic software master or AI would be more useful, but at the same time I think they don't really position me in a place to do something great with it, given how competitive those already are. I'm betting this situation would change in the future and the industry would attract more funding to hire domain familiar engineers (SRE, Platform, Quantum Networking etc)

My goal is to get some domain knowledge in QC and eventually work on exciting projects pushing the boundaries of science forward. I just have this desire in me to do something greater than what I'm doing today :-)

I like to know if it actually makes sense or it would be likely a waste of my time and money which could be invested in something more practical.

reddit.com
u/opshack — 1 month ago