Faculty Panel: Getting Faculty Positions
Panel: Matt Holman (MH), Julia Lee (JL), John Huchra (JH), Doug Finkbeiner (DF), Alyssa Goodman (AG)
Sukanya opened the panel saying that we would be asking for general
advice, impressions on the faculty search.
The following are the questions, with answers from various members of
the panel.
Sukanya asked: What are the first cut considerations to go from a large pool of say
300 applicants to a shortlist?
JH:
The ongoing job search at Harvard for an observational cosmologist
had roughly 90 applications. 300 is rare. It's a system of triage in
which we cut up the list into thirds. 2 people read all applications,
if both agree, then there's further consideration. If one agrees and
one disagrees then the application is read by a third
person. Generally there are very few yes/nos. Both people either agree
or disagree Fare amount of agreement for top 30. Then the whole
committee reads the top applications. People who don't make it to the
top 30 or so list are mostly not a match for the ongoing search, and
are either obviously not ready or are obviously in a different field.
Lisa asked: What do you look for in the subset? How do you make a
further cut? For example is teaching important?
JH: Junior people are generally not going to have much teaching. Look
primarily research activities, a little bit of service, TAships,
outreach, publications. Most important things are the publication
record, letters of recommendation, and research statement. I am personally
interested in research statement. Does the person make connections to
work/people/facilities in the department. Know your location.
Sukanya asked: Do you have people in mind for the job even before the search?
JH: Sometimes, not always. For the Harvard search 20/25 people were
asked to apply. 75% of those people did apply, and the rest said no
for various reasons. Either they were happy where they are or they did
not feel ready and wanted to continue on a fellowship.
AG: Mostly junior faculty searches are open, so this is an
exception. I look for independence in research. Candidates must have
some goal - the specifics of the goal don't matter as long as it's a
coherent program. Variety doesn't matter at every stage in career, so
if people have spent a considerably amount of time on one area, that's
not a bad thing. So I too emphasize the research statement and letters
of rec. It really helps if the letter-writers are known the search
committee.
Lisa: What's more important for letters? Name of letter-writer or that
the person has more knowledge of what you do.
Committee says a bit of both.
JH: Some really big people always write
the same letter for everyone. This is never useful. You want people
who can write about you, what you've done.
JL: Be proactive about giving talks, making yourself known. That way
it is not all dependent on the letter writers if you've made your own
connections.
AG: Yes it's very important to go to meetings and increase your
visibility. But be wary when you set up these talks that you don't
overdo it and become a pest. It's a fine line.
Karen: It seems there's a fine line between actively pursuing a job
search and actually getting work done.
JH: No substitute for having done some work.
MH: Yes, the publication
record is very important, whether your publications have been cited
and used. We don't look at number of citations per se, but we want to
see that papers are used by your particular research community,
whatever the size of that community is.
JH: Yes, so it's not
necessarily the pure number of citations. For example in Physics -
cold fusion is the most cited paper. So it's the quality of the work,
whether the papers have impact.
AG: For example when grad students
have 80 papers, you start to wonder which ones they've actually
contributed to.
Question: Is there a minimum number of publications?
DF: No, but if you've been a part of large teams with many
publications, it's good to separate out the things you really did. You
don't want your real contributions to get lost.
JL: As an observer,
it's useful to list projects that you lead and won on proposals. Show
that you can bring in projects.
JH: Some universities care a lot that
you can bring in telescope or super computer time and that you're
successful at getting those things. It is often the letters of
recommendation that will sort out the issue of what you've actually
done when you've been working in a group. If the letters writers don't
do that then you're in trouble.
Heather: Where are the job openings published?
JH: Most are in the AAS job register except for a
small number of
directed postdoc positions where information is sent around to friends
of the PI. But for faculty, job openings are required to be posted. The
job register won't have the job openings in other countries and some
of the small colleges. And for Physics jobs in general it is also good
to look in Physics Today, Nature or Spires. It costs $2000 to
advertize in Physics Today. Spires is free.
Question:Are there official requirements to apply for a faculty position? For
example do you need to have X number of years as a Post doc?
No.
JH: We've offered jobs to people right out of grad school.
Question: Can you start your own group?
JH: Sometimes searches are targeted. But Junior faculty searches are
generally open.
AG: At Harvard, we prefer if you do something that's
not exactly the same as someone already here. But that depends on the
place.
MH: The named postdocs for example, are generally wide open in
terms of research and we just want to get the best person.
Karen asked the panel to comment on the importance of doing research on
a hot topic area. Generally this is quite important.
JH: In the case
of directed postdocs, you need to have the skills to do whatever the
work is. For faculty jobs again the research area is generally very
open, with the exception of Princeton physics, which is known for
hiring people basically as senior postdocs to work with some faculty
member in the department.
MH:
So pay some attention to what research
area the committees are looking for, but you don't have to stay
totally within the lines. Sometimes when good people become available
committees are willing to shift focus.
Sukanya asked: Does it matter if you've already been rejected once
from a particular opening for a job?
The panel didn't seem to think this was a problem.
AG got the job at Harvard on the second try. It's important to realize
that your record is changing every year.
On the other hand, DF did 8 interviews one year without getting any
offers, and the 5 places where he was called to interview the next
year did not overlap at all with the original 8.
JL: Practice helps. If you have done some more things by the time you
re-apply, then it's fine.
AG: When you're visiting places as a faculty candidate, instead of
only talking about your own research, always ask people what they're
working on. That way you don't get bored by the time you give your
talk.
DF: Also when you question people about their work, they will
generally think that you're smarter.
MH: If you're on a shortlist,
make sure that you meet with the whole selection committee. Each
member will already have their top person. So if you can at least make
a good impression, when the negotiations happen, then even if you're
not everyone's top candidate they'll at least be happy to have you as
a member of the department.
Question: What if you don't know who the selection committee is?
Ask.
Question: How should you structure your research statement? Is it enough to
identify people that may be interested in your work in the
introduction or conclusion, or should you interweave this information
throughout your whole statement?
AG: Could be time consuming to tailor each statement. I would usually
make connections at the end. Personally for me it doesn't have to be a
beautifully interwoven statement. Just remember that issue of
independence and strike the right balance. Show that you are coming to
start a research career of your own. This is true for most jobs, but
not for instrumentalists.
Question: Should you email people that you know in a department and tell them
that you're applying for a position? Should you also send your
research statement?
AG: Yes, but this depends how well you know the
person. Even as a letter-writer, you're always trying to figure out
how to strike the right balance in promoting someone, and whether
you're being a pest. Generally, the letter writers should promote
people. If I can't write a good letter for someone, I try to give an
indication of that to the person in some way. So watch for clues from
letter-writers, because most people don't have the stomache to just
tell you that they can't write you a good letter.
Question: What is the deal with about being invited to apply?
You should definitely apply! You shouldn't assume you're on the
shortlist, but at the very least it might mean you'll get a nicer
rejection letter.
JH: Top 20 people will be very good. It's not easy
to distinguish between them. Once you're at this stage, subsequent
choices are not made on clear criteria: generally criteria are fuzzy
like how well will someone fit in to the life of the department? For
Harvard it's important that you're doing something different than
faculty already here. But there are departments where they want to
build up a particular research group.
AG: Very often it comes down to
people's talks. When you're equivalent on paper, then the talk is
important. Don't under-stress the talk. It has to be a mixture of
being very well prepared and relaxed at the same time.
Question: What are your tips for how to make the job search fit in with the rest
of your work? How much time do you spend doing the applications?
DF: You lose two months of your life when you apply, no question.
Figure out who is your advocate at the places you apply. Then ask them
the questions. What is your department really looking for this year?
etc. I spent a lot of time fine-tuning things.
JL: Try out the
waters. It didn't occur to me to contact people in the department, and
for me it was more of a process. Just give a talk whenever you can.
MH: Every talk you give is a job talk. I remember when people give
good talks. When you give a good talk it may have unintendedly good
consequences.
Question: Should the talk be in-depth in one field or should you describe
everything you've done?
AG: Don't give review talks.
DF: I talked
about what I thought was interesting, rather than give a review of
everything I'd done. For example I didn't talk at all about SDSS.
JL:
Find a common them for all your work if you're describing different projects.
Question: What about if you give a lot of talks one year and then you're invited
for an interview? Part of the room will have already heard your
talk. Is this a problem?
JH: You want to be interesting. Even if it's on the same subject, say
something different and new. Not necessarily a whole new talk, but at
least address latest results.
MH: On the other hand, an audience likes
to feel smart, so it's not necessarily a bad thing if you give the
same talk even if members in the audience may have already heard
it. If it's interesting enough, then they'll take away new things from
it.
JH: The currency in science is ideas. Need to have ideas. You have
to come forward and show that you have ideas about what to do next.
Karen: It can take several years to get a faculty job. When do you
give up?
DF: You have to approach it like failure is not an option.
AG:
Biggest problem is that people don't know what they want. You have to
really think about what you would be happy doing.
JH described a study
which kept track of where AAS full members work. 40% at research unis;
30% at FFRDC = govt labs; 10% small colleges, 10% industry, 10% other,
science writers, etc. So roughly a third of active people (who want to
be considered full members of the AAS) get jobs in academia.
Question: How do you get feedback once you've applied and not made it?
DF:
Hopefully you know someone at the institution and can get feedback
from them.
JH: It's my intent to write every one on the shortlist a
letter.
AG: Your letter-writers may have some knowledge. Also can talk
to the chair of the search committee or chair of the department.
Question: Do you see differences between the letters written for men and for
women?
AG: I haven't personally seen things that are not actually true. For
example, women tend to have fewer papers than men. Presumably there's
a reason for this, maybe women hesitate to write papers unless they
have something to say.
JH: You used to see a lot of letters with an
extra paragraph emphasizing personal qualities especially for women
and minorities. I think that now people have realized that this is not
a good thing to do.
JL: Definitely women tend to question more if
we're ready for the job.
AG: If there are any doubts about the
independence of a particular candidate, then for women people
definitely question attachment to the advisor more.