Would mentioning that I switched career plans mid-undergrad look bad?

[warm-valley]

Long story short, I was initially planning to go into software engineering, but then realized that it wouldn't give me what I want out of a career. I then discovered that being a research scientist would allow me to do what I liked. Would this look like I am not commited to my goals? Or would it look like I put thought into it? Or both, depending on how I phrase it?

[bh1ge3u1hqwdjb]

I didn’t have much guidance from anyone in high school and college, so it took me several years to find my passion and what I really wanted to do in life. Maybe the following can help you in some way:

I graduated from undergrad in Field A, where I took a bunch of classes in Subfield B, but was miserable when I got a job in Field A, so then went back to school and got a graduate degree in unrelated Field C because it paid well (which was not at all a good deciding factor, by the way). Anyway, while doing my studies in Field C, I got interested in Subfields D and E and did a lot of part-time work or projects during school in those two subfields. But after graduating, I was miserable again after getting a job in Field C+D (actually Field C was the problem, not Subfield D), so I switched careers and used my background to get a career in unrelated Field E (the other subfield from my graduate studies) which was also related to Field B (the subfield from my undergraduate studies). This time I was truly happy in my career, but after some time I realized that I would need further qualifications to truly get ahead in the Field B+E industry, so I applied for a masters in Field B+E and got accepted to one of the top universities in the world.

I had been worried about the admissions committee’s reaction to how much I had switched my fields before finding what I truly cared about. But I was honest about that weakness and demonstrated in my statement of purpose how my studies in undergrad and grad school had brought me to that point. In fact, the masters was for advancing in my new industry, not for switching once again, so it was completely relevant. I guess they must have understood from my SOP, since I got in to both of the masters programs that I applied to.

Now I’ve been working full-time in Field B+E for a few more years and also started interning in a research project which is related to Field C+D (which I’m actually enjoying this time because there is no pressure and it’s now related to my main Field B+E). And now I’m applying for PhD programs in Field E that combines B, C, and D (in a very relevant way) because I want to be a professor and researcher in this niche. I guess I’ll see how that goes.

I don’t know how related your current and previous fields of study are, but if you think that it will be a glaring part of your application, then it’s better to explain it clearly in your application than to ignore it and hope that no one notices. In interviews, either for jobs or university admissions, I’ve always been asked about about my change in studies, but I’ve always drawn connections between them and explained how I had developed an interest for one while studying another and can still use the skills and knowledge from the previous ones. Now that my studies have all been combined in some form or another (except for the original Field A), this question isn’t a big deal anymore and I think has actually helped me stand out.