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In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, a reader asks:
Are there any norms around using a paper that is conditionally accepted/got minor revisions as a writing sample for a job? It would be much closer to the area of the job than my other published articles, and it would be one out of multiple writing samples (the others have been published).
I don't see any reason why not, especially if it's closer to the area of the advertised job! Do any readers think otherwise?
Since writing samples are often not even conditionally accepted, this seems fine?
Maybe the OP is worried about describing it as “conditionally accepted?” Even though that’s a good thing, it doesn’t . . . sound that good, does it? In that case, I would probably say it’s “under review” when applying and then send a cheerful update to the search committee when it gets accepted, since IME finalizing a conditional acceptance is often pretty quick (even if it takes 3 years to be in print).
Yeah, I don’t see the harm in that either. Although, on the face of it, I might save the unpublished piece as material for a job talk if your don’t have another prepared. This is what I did in a similar position. Job talks should be something that is fresh but highly polished, so a forthcoming or conditionally accepted piece would be rather perfect for that. All said, if you feel strongly that your conditionally accepted piece will make you the strongest candidate on paper, go with that and then refine a new potential job talk topic with plenty of other eyes on it for feedback.
Your writing sample should be your best work that is relevant to the AOS of the ad.
The fact a work is published is sometimes helpful to the committee if they have no expertise in the AOS they are hiring in: it is a stamp of quality, so to speak. Since OP has other already-published work, this is less of a consideration in their case.
I think many committees would take “conditionally accepted” as pretty close to “accepted,” which is clearly better than “under review,” so I disagree with newly TT on that one. The best case, of course, is to get those revisions in ASAP and have the status changed to “accepted.” If that happens between application and interview, email the search chair with that update.
As a department chair who has run a few searches, I can say that I’d take a really good unpublished writing sample to be preferable to an equally good published one. The obvious reason being that if gives some indication that you have more good work in the pipeline, whereas if you send something already published, I can’t tell what your publishing future might look like.
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