About Academic Entrepreneurship
From depressed PhD to monetized professor
As a depressed PhD student, I thought monetizing research was dirty. Now, I’m a tenured prof making an extra 5 figures from my solopreneurship. Here’s the mindset shift that changed everything.
The biggest lie in academia:
Good researchers give their work away for free.
Meanwhile, publishers make MILLIONS off your papers.
You only get 15% royalties from book contracts.
Who's really being exploited here, friends?
During COVID, I had a watershed moment.
I was teaching courses on “how to write better papers” and people were actually listening.
My wife (in sales) asked me:
Why are you giving this valuable knowledge to associations instead of selling it yourself?
Great point!
Like most academics, I felt ashamed about making money from research.
We're conditioned to think our value comes from:
External validation systems
Peer review approval
Tenure committees
Citation counts
But here’s the brutal truth...
I have value in me.
Not just the value that student evaluations or citations assign to me.
But real value I can create through helping others solve problems.
The question isn’t “Should I monetize?”
It’s: “Why am I letting others profit from my expertise?”
Every public academic you admire likely has a branding coach.
Wharton bestselling authors?
Stanford thought leaders?
Harvard professors?
They didn’t become famous by accident.
They worked with coaches for 5+ years to build their academic brands.
You just weren’t told this.
Academia taught me it’s always just either/or:
Academic integrity OR monetization
Scholarly work OR business
Pure science OR profit
This is a false choice.
You can advance science AND get paid fairly for your expertise.
The real mindset shift is:
FROM: What will journals publish?
TO: What do people actually need?
FROM: Writing for 5 other experts.
TO: Creating value for thousands who need your knowledge.
FROM: External validation.
TO: Internal purpose + market validation
Your research sits behind paywalls where 5 people read it.
Meanwhile, there’s huge demand for quality education and expertise.
If you find a cool new method, you could:
Write a journal paper (2 years, 30 readers)
Create on social media (1 hour, 1000+ viewers)
Which creates more impact?
Academic entrepreneurship is not abandoning research.
What it really is:
Choosing research you're passionate about
Getting compensated fairly for your value
Communicating it to people who need it
Building the career YOU want
This is true research freedom.
TL;DR: on the academic entrepreneur mindset:
You have inherent value beyond external validation
Major academics all have branding strategies
True research freedom = choosing your path
Publishers profit while academics get scraps
Market validation > peer review validation
You can serve science AND earn fairly.
Found this shift helpful? Restack this sucker to help other researchers break free.
What's your biggest mindset block about monetizing your expertise? Leave a comment and let’s build research freedom together.