In the comments section of our most recent "how can we help you?" post, Eugene writes,
Beyond publishing in top-20 journals and teaching a diverse range of courses, are there any non-obvious things a post doc can do to stand out in a stack of job applications for an assistant professorship?
Securing a book contract comes to mind, but I'm not sure it's worth it, since that would mean spending less time expanding one's breadth of research. Securing prestigious sources of funding? That's super risky given how competitive those things can be. More service time, e.g. organizing conferences, refereeing, etc.? I don't know how much weight is put into that sort of stuff. Public outreach comes to mind, like teaching in prisons, but again, I'm not really sure about the pay off. Doubling down on publishing in top 20 journals? That risks putting one out of contention for a lot of non-R1 jobs.
Any feedback would be appreciated.
Any past or present search committee members willing to weigh in? I expect the answers to Eugene's questions depend quite a bit on the type of institution one is applying to–but let me share my own sense based both on my years on the job-market and time on two search-committees at a teaching-focused institution…
My sense is that when it comes to teaching institutions like mine, anything positive that separates you from the pack is likely to help–be it a book contract, securing grants, service organizing conferences, teaching in prisons, working with students, and so on. You have to understand: in a pile of hundreds of applications, quite a lot of CV's, teaching statements, research statements, and so on, look fairly alike. Most people have a handful of publications, many in good journals; most people have pretty good teaching dossiers; and so on. So, none of these things are likely to clearly distinguish you from others–and one more good publication may not do much to distinguish you either, as you may be going up against people with still more publications than you. No, what is likely to make a difference is something that makes you unique: something that truly makes you stand out from the crowd of similar applicants. A book contract makes you unique. So does teaching philosophy in a prison. So does coaching a student debate team. Etc.
Indeed, imagine yourself on a hiring committee at a teaching institution…
First, your institution may value research, but not necessarily in the same way that philosophers do. While book publishing is not the norm in philosophy, it is the norm in many other disciplines (e.g. English)…and a philosophy search committee at a teaching institution may have people from these kinds of departments on them. Not only that: for similar reasons, my sense is that administrators love book publishing. Given that book publishing is the norm in many disciplines, administrators may regard books as bigger research accomplishment than articles. So, having a book contract may make a big difference (it did in my case, increasing my number and quality of interviews substantially).
Second, the culture at teaching institutions is often far different than at research institutions. Service–to students, the university, and surrounding community–is a big part of the job. University faculty, administrators and departments at such institutions often place a high priority on "outreach" aimed attracting students to the university or philosophy major, and contributing positively to the university's public image. Further, teaching institutions typically sell themselves as offering a student-centered experience–so, if you have a good record of working with students outside of the classroom, that can be a distinct positive, showing eagerness to engage with students (in contrast, publishing yet another paper in Phil Studies does not show that). Or consider Eugene's example of teaching philosophy in a prison. I have a very hard time imagining this being anything other than a huge positive at at just about any teaching institution.
To go back to something Amanda said in a recent comment (I cannot quite recall where), my sense is that there is something of a disconnect between what job-candidates often appear to think will make them more competitive, and what actually will make them more competitive (at least at teaching institutions). I often come across blog comments where people talk about how many publications they have, expressing wonder about why they don't get more interviews. There are reasons for this. Teaching institutions look at publishing as just one qualification among many, and not necessarily the most important qualification. People at teaching institutions typically care at least equally–and often far more–about teaching and various ways one can serve students and the community. So, if you have publications and your CV jumps off the page with all kinds of ways you have engaged students and your university and community, you will almost certainly stand out.
In a way, Eugene's comment seems to me sort of indicative of the kind of disconnect I'm referring. In his comment, Eugene implies that things like book contracts, teaching in prisons, etc., are "non-obvious" ways one might improve one's competitiveness. My experience is the opposite: that when it comes to teaching institutions, everyone should recognize that these are obvious ways to stand out from the crowd (given that most people seem to focus on journal publishing).
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