Natural Sciences Manager Career Assessment

2What is a Natural Sciences Manager?

A natural sciences manager decides what gets studied, who studies it, and where the money comes from. You write and manage grant proposals and you answer to the agency or the company that funded them. You keep the lab running: equipment that needs calibration, safety rules, chemical handling, sample tracking, and the paperwork that proves all of it was done right. You read your people’s data and push back when a conclusion is not supported. You hire scientists and you keep good ones from leaving for somewhere warmer. And you translate: the same result has to be explained to a funding agency, a plant manager, a farmer, and sometimes a reporter, in four different vocabularies.

The Reality: Read this part twice. Nobody is hired into this job as a manager. You were a scientist first, usually for eight to fifteen years, and usually with a master’s or a PhD. The road is graduate school, then research scientist, then senior scientist or principal investigator with your own projects, then somebody hands you the lab or the program. A business degree is nearly useless here without the science behind it, because the people you manage will not follow someone who cannot read their data. The second honest thing, and it is specific to North Dakota: there are about 130 of these jobs in the entire state, and O*NET projects 130 in 2034. Flat. About ten openings a year, mostly from retirements. This is a real career, but it is not a career plan you can make from scratch in North Dakota alone.

Your Responsibilities:

• Plan research projects and decide which ones get done
• Write grant proposals and manage the money after it is awarded
• Supervise scientists, lab technicians, and field crews
• Review data and results before they go out the door
• Keep the lab safe, calibrated, and compliant with handling rules
• Report findings to funders, regulators, company leadership, and the public
• Buy and maintain expensive equipment on a budget that will not stretch
• Hire and keep scientists in a state that competes with warmer places

You keep the science honest and the money coming.

3A Day in the Life

7:30 AM — Read overnight instrument logs. One analyzer drifted out of range and the run has to be repeated.

8:30 AM — Meet with two scientists about a study that is not showing what everyone hoped it would.

10:00 AM — Work on a grant proposal due in nine days. Rewrite the budget justification for the third time.

11:30 AM — Walk the lab. Check that the new tech is handling samples the way the protocol says.

12:30 PM — Lunch at your desk while you review a draft manuscript from your group.

1:30 PM — Call with the funding agency’s program officer about a change to the project scope.

3:00 PM — Quarterly spending review. The equipment line is over and the travel line is under. Move money.

4:30 PM — Sign off on a report, then read your own field’s new papers because staying current is the job.

Half science, half money, and the grant deadline never moves.

4Training in North Dakota

Graduate school and years of research first. There is no shortcut and nobody pretends there is. This job starts with a science degree and usually does not become real until you have a master’s or a doctorate and a track record of funded work. The management part gets learned on the job, by running your own projects and your own budgets before anyone gives you other people’s. If your goal is a lab or a research program in North Dakota, pick a field the state actually funds — agriculture, soils and crops, energy and geology, water, food science, or biomedical research — because that is where the grants and the seats are.

Training Pathways:

• Bachelor’s in a science (4 years): Biology, chemistry, agronomy, soil science, geology, food science, biotechnology. This gets you into a lab as a technician or a research assistant, which is where you find out whether you like the work at all.
• Master’s or PhD (2 to 6 more years): This is the real entry requirement for most of these positions. In many programs you are paid a stipend as a research or teaching assistant, so it is not the same as paying for undergraduate school. Choose an advisor whose grants are active, because you learn grant writing by watching it up close.
• Research scientist to principal investigator to manager (8 to 15 years): Publish, win your own funding, then supervise a technician, then a team. The day you are responsible for somebody else’s grant is the day this becomes a management job.

Where to Train in North Dakota:

• North Dakota State University (Fargo) — Biological Sciences, with undergraduate majors and minors and both master’s and doctoral programs, plus a Biotechnology major, minor, and undergraduate certificate, and food science coursework within the agricultural sciences (ndsu.edu/programs)
• North Dakota State University (Fargo) — the state’s land-grant research university, with the agricultural research stations that fund much of the natural sciences work in North Dakota (ndsu.edu)
• University of North Dakota (Grand Forks) — Geology & Geological Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Energy & Petroleum Engineering, and Biomedical Engineering in the College of Engineering & Mines, undergraduate and graduate (engineering.und.edu/academics)
• University of North Dakota (Grand Forks) — Master of Public Health, 42 credits and fully online, with a Population Health Research & Analytics specialization that is STEM-eligible, if your science is health-related (und.edu/programs/public-health-mph)
• Minot State University (Minot) — a Master of Science in Management and graduate certificates in Leadership Studies and Knowledge Management, useful for the management half after the science is already in place (minotstateu.edu/business)
• University of Mary (Bismarck) — online MBA and Master of Organizational Leadership for working professionals who already hold a science degree (online.umary.edu/academics/masters-doctoral-programs)
• Bismarck State College (Bismarck) — Leadership certificate, online or on campus, with no prior coursework required, as a low-cost way for a working scientist to get the supervision basics (bismarckstate.edu/academics/programs/Leadership)
• Honest note: no North Dakota college offers a degree in research management or lab management. Those skills come from doing the work, from grant-writing workshops run by your employer or funder, and from professional societies in your own field.

Before You Start: Strong science and strong statistics. A bachelor’s in a natural science to start, and realistically a master’s or doctorate to be considered. Real writing ability, because grant proposals and reports are most of what a manager produces.

Tip: Start with financial aid, scholarships, and any help an employer offers — that is where the money starts. After that, ask a career counselor or Job Service North Dakota whether WIOA or other programs can help with what is left over, like training, tools, work boots, or exam fees. What can be paid for depends on the program and on your own situation, so ask before you sign up rather than after. Registered apprenticeships let you earn a paycheck while you learn — see jobsnd.com/job-seeker/apprenticeships for ND programs.

5Certification & Licensing

No license, no single credential. Your publications, your grants, and your degree are the credential. Nothing licenses a natural sciences manager. What people look at instead is your degree, the work you have published, the funding you have won, and whether your lab has a clean compliance record. A few technical certifications matter inside particular specialties, but none of them substitutes for the science.

What Actually Carries Weight:

• A master’s or doctorate in your science — this is the real gate, and in most of these jobs it is not negotiable
• A record of funded projects — grants you wrote or co-wrote and delivered on. This is what turns a senior scientist into a manager
• Project Management Professional (PMP) — PMI’s credential, worth having if you run large multi-year projects with outside partners. With a bachelor’s you need 3 years of project management experience, plus 35 hours of project management training and a 180-question exam, renewed with 60 professional development units every 3 years (pmi.org)
• Field-specific certifications — for example a Certified Crop Adviser in agronomy or a professional geologist registration in states that require one. These belong to the science, not to the management
• Lab safety and compliance training — chemical hygiene, biosafety, radiation safety, and animal or human subjects rules, depending on what your lab does. Employers usually provide it and you are responsible for your people following it

The Exams: There is no exam to become a natural sciences manager. Any exam you sit belongs to a specific certification or to your graduate program, not to the job.

Cost: Your real cost is graduate school, and many science graduate programs pay a stipend and waive tuition in exchange for research or teaching work, so ask each program what it funds before you assume you will pay. PMI does not publish the PMP exam price on the pages linked from its certification page, so ask PMI. Employers commonly pay for safety and compliance training.

Keeping It Current: Nothing to renew for the job itself. The PMP takes 60 professional development units every 3 years. Lab safety training is usually renewed yearly by your employer. What really keeps you employable is staying current in your field and keeping your funding record clean.

6Salary & Job Outlook

North Dakota Natural Sciences Manager Pay (May 2025):

• Starting out (bottom 10–25%): $47.35–$52.89/hour ($98,490–$110,020/year)
• Middle (median — half earn more, half earn less): $63.16/hour ($131,370/year)
• Experienced (top 25–10%): $79.81–$104.15/hour ($166,000–$216,630/year)

What that means: The pay here is excellent and the story is unusual. The middle natural sciences manager in North Dakota earns about $131,370, and the bottom tenth earns about $98,490 — while the national bottom tenth is only about $79,710. North Dakota pays its entry-level science managers far better than the country does. The national middle, though, is about $167,220 and the national top tenth reaches about $316,850, against about $216,630 here. That is what happens when a state has agricultural and energy research but no pharmaceutical or biotech industry. The short version: North Dakota is a good place to be a mid-career science manager and a poor place to become a rich one.

Jobs in North Dakota: About 130 people do this work in ND today. By 2034, that should be about 130 (no growth (about 0%)). Expect about 10 job openings every year in ND from growth and people retiring or changing jobs. Across the U.S., the change is about 4% growth.

Outlook: Be honest with yourself about this one. O*NET shows North Dakota with about 130 natural sciences managers in 2024 and about 130 in 2034 — zero percent change — with about 10 projected openings a year. Ten, statewide, and nearly all of them from retirements rather than new positions. Nationally the job grows about 4%, which is average, so the country is adding these jobs slowly and North Dakota is not adding them at all. The seats that do exist are concentrated at NDSU and UND and their research centers, the state agricultural experiment stations, the Energy & Environmental Research Center in Grand Forks, state agencies like the Department of Environmental Quality and the Geological Survey, and a handful of ag, food, and energy companies. If this is your goal, understand that you are aiming at roughly ten chairs a year and be ready either to wait for one or to look at Minnesota, Iowa, or Colorado, all of which have far more research employers.

Who Hires in ND: North Dakota State University and the University of North Dakota and their research centers; the state agricultural experiment stations and extension centers; the Energy & Environmental Research Center in Grand Forks; state agencies including Environmental Quality, the Geological Survey, and Agriculture; federal labs and field stations; agricultural, seed, food processing, and biotechnology companies; and environmental and energy consulting firms.

Work Setting: A lab, an office next to the lab, and field sites. Depending on your science, that field site is a research plot in July heat, a well pad in January, or a river in spring runoff. Usually 45 to 55 hours a week, and more in the weeks before a grant is due. Travel to conferences and to funding agencies is part of the job.

Physical Demands: Low to moderate, and it depends entirely on your science. A chemistry or biomedical lab manager stands and sits. An agronomy or environmental manager is outdoors in ND weather, walking plots, carrying sampling gear, and driving gravel roads. Lab work means proper handling of chemicals and biological material, and you are responsible for your people doing it right, not only yourself.

Sources: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, North Dakota, May 2025 (SOC 11-9121); North Dakota and U.S. long-term employment projections 2024–2034, via O*NET OnLine. Numbers are rounded.

7Where This Leads

Path 1: Lab or Research Technician — You run the assays and keep the instruments honest. This is where you learn the bench.

Path 2: Research Scientist — After a master’s or PhD, you own a project and publish the results.

Path 3: Senior Scientist or Principal Investigator — You write the grants and the money comes in with your name on it.

Path 4: Lab or Program Manager — Now you run other scientists, their budgets, and their deadlines.

Path 5: Research Director — Several programs, several grants, and the plan for what the group works on next.

Path 6: Chief Scientist, Station Director, or Department Chair — You set the research direction for an institution.

8The Real Talk

What's Great:

• Strong pay, with a middle of about $131,370 and a bottom tenth of about $98,490
• ND pays entry-level science managers far better than the national bottom
• You keep doing science instead of leaving it behind
• Agriculture and energy research in this state is genuinely nationally important
• You decide which questions get asked, which is real power
• Graduate school in the sciences is often funded, so the degree may not cost what you expect

What's Hard:

• About 10 openings a year in the entire state, and employment is projected flat through 2034
• A master’s or doctorate is effectively required
• Eight to fifteen years of research before the management title
• Grant money runs out, and when it does you are the one telling people
• The national top tenth earns about $316,850 — ND is about $100,000 behind that
• You are responsible for lab safety and compliance that other people carry out

Be Honest: Are you willing to spend years in graduate school and more years at the bench before this becomes possible? Can you write a grant proposal that a skeptical reviewer will fund? Can you tell a scientist you respect that their data do not support their conclusion? And can you look at ten openings a year in this state and make a clear-eyed decision about whether to stay, wait, or move?

9Part 1: What Attracts You?

10Part 2: Are You Ready?

11Part 3: Your Next Move

Your Natural Sciences Manager Assessment Results