On interviewing: to Skype or not?

As the academic year begins, it is also the beginning of job search season for TT applicants. In my field, the typical timeline is to have application deadlines in the Fall, with most interviews complete by Feb or Mar. Last year, I took place in some Skype pre-interview screening for the first time (it is not common in my field). Traditionally, my department has made the interview list using materials from the application file alone (see here for more details on our usual process). Then we bring in 4-5 candidates for a two day interview.

After seeing how helpful I found the Skype interviews (we used Skype--we had our candidates share their screen and give us a brief research overview), here are the pros as I see them:

• We can screen more candidates--it is hard to go from the long list to the short list just on the paper applications, and often we'd like to see more than 4 or 5 applicants
• We don't waste trip money plus 2 days of departmental time on candidates who obviously won't work (English not good enough, can't explain their research live, can't answer questions, etc)
•  It is harder to fake a presentation and answer questions than a written proposal (after some of our interviews, I have wondered if the candidate wrote the proposal)
• We can clarify points of possible research overlap/fundability/feasibility that may be unclear in the application due to the inexperience of many of our candidates in writing proposals. Naivete in a proposal may be due to moving into a new area and not being fully immersed yet, or it may be holes in thinking. 
• Skype pre-screening seemed to help less experienced candidates who are perceived as riskier choices to bring out for an interview.

It is not all positive though. There are some significant downsides too, and some of my colleagues are reluctant to add an additional step to an already long and intense process:

• It is not the norm in my field (though I think this is changing to be honest), and we may turn off good candidates 
• It is another time and work intensive thing to add to the search committee's burden (already large, since there are lots of files to read in a short time that overlaps with Fall proposal season)
• Technical glitches may influence opinions unfairly
• It can be hard to schedule time when all (or even most) of the search committee can be present at the same time as the candidate, and this is not considering time differences
• It is yet another hoop/timesink for candidates (since we asked for a brief presentation)

The bit about helping less experienced/riskier interview choices might end up more important in the end. I've noticed since joining ProdigalU that our faculty candidates (and therefore our new hires) tend to have more and more experience prior to getting a TT job. The percentage of applicants in the pool applying from their first postdoc without other experience is dropping, so in some sense, candidates are self-selecting (so if you are in your first postdoc, apply anyway!)

I am not sure this experience creep is a good thing (or even a bad thing, but it is a thing). It isn't even that we have loads of people doing multiple postdocs (we have some of this too)--many of these more experienced people just plain did something else at some point in life (like me!) before the TT. But life experience (especially writing experience) is a major advantage in a tight field, and it is hard to compare the files of a newly minted postdoc who has been in a student or trainee somewhere since age 5 to someone who has been a group leader, or a decorated educator, or an experienced science editor. With pre-screening, we can see both.

Common mistakes at the on campus interview

In honor of academic interview season, I thought I'd discuss a few common pitfalls I see candidates fall into on campus. Way back when I was interviewing, I made some of these mistakes myself, so I know how common a trap it can be. For those job hunting, xykademiqz has a great post on advice for Skype interviews, some of which carries over to on campus interviews as well.

The research talk: A good research talk will engage both experts and non-experts for at least a portion of the talk. It will also demonstrate your technical and research skills to the experts. Thus, it must have both breadth and depth. This is where I fell down in my first year interviewing. The most common mistake is to focus too much on depth (I did this), but it is equally problematic to focus too much on breadth (I've seen this) and not come across as an expert in anything.

The chalk talk: The chalk talk is hard, because it is unlike anything else most people have done in the past. One major issue is in presenting a bunch of projects that look like just a bunch of projects. From years of experience, most postdocs are used to thinking about their research in a project by project way. However, in the chalk talk, we want to see an outline of what the candidate's research program will look like over time. Pretty much all of the candidates invited to campus had some long term research plans in their research statements, but this needs to come out in the chalk talk as well. Our department wants to hire someone who will have a successful career, and that means making sure that the planned research leads somewhere beyond the immediate 3-5 year project horizon. What will your lab specialize in? When we discuss our new hire, what is the one sentence summary about your work that we will lead with?

Related to this issue is candidates who position themselves in competition with their previous groups. It is great that you love your current (or previous work). It is great that you can take it with you. HOWEVER, unless you can clearly articulate the differences between your approach and your supervisor's approach to non-experts, some in the audience will wonder if you will be successful in funding your work. Towards that end, a really common question is "why would a funding agency give you this money instead of your more established adviser?".  You need to have an answer.

The opposite problem (moving to a brand new area) can also be problematic. Without a track record, some will be reluctant to take a risk on a candidate. Also, proposals into a new area can come across as naive or not fully formed. Realistically, at ProdigalU we do consider the experience level of our applicants, so if one of three proposed projects in a new area comes across as naive or unrealistic for an inexperienced candidate, we are usually pretty forgiving if the other proposed projects are well done. This is particularly an issue for candidates trying to force their research to fit into a targeted job search, and it becomes obvious in the chalk talk unless the candidate is really interested in moving in that direction for the research's sake rather than just to get a job.

A final chalk talk issue is particularly common with those from large and well-funded groups. Really innovative research is a great attention grabber, but as a PI, you will have real students who really want a degree and therefore need to have some research success. You need to be able to articulate not just Plan A, but also Plans B and C for your projects, and also discuss what important (i.e. publishable) work will come out of your planned research directions even if the project is ultimately unsuccessful. There are no great rewards without risk, but you need to show some awareness of the other requirements of your research program (like that you will be training students, not just doing cutting edge research).

Personal interactions: Do not make flip or ironic remarks that could be misinterpreted (I did that when answering questions after my research talk my first year interviewing, and it was a mistake). Personal experience aside, every aspect of the visit is part of the interview, including the meals, the walks between offices, the interactions with non-academics, and the transportation to/from different locations! Be polite to everyone (including all staff members and students). Do not drink more than you can handle and remain in good control of yourself, regardless of how much your meal companions indulge. Do not make disparaging comments about pretty much any person, group, or place. Do not bring up politics as a topic of meal time conversation. I have seen candidates do all of these things, and it did not make a favorable impression.

What a TT job interview looks like to the search committee

It is academic job time again, and ProdigalU is running some searches. I've written before about how the search committee selection process, interview advice (personal experiences: post 1, post 2), and the research/chalk talk specifically. I thought it might be interesting to remove the curtain on what it actually looks like when you are on a search committee on an interview day.

The first thing to remember is that interview occur DURING the academic year. In my field, the most busy period for interviews is December, January, and February, though sometimes we extend into March if we get a late start. So, even before the candidate shows up, there is a scramble to book a room for the research talk if it isn't a normal seminar day. No matter when this talk is, some people will be teaching if it isn't a normal seminar day. Depending on the timing (like is it exam period?) it may also be hard to fill all of the one-on-one slots (typically 30 min) for the candidate. All of the search committee members sign up (they get first shot at the schedule), but in a typical interview, we have 10-12 slots per day to fill up over two days, and we have 35ish faculty members (some of whom are on leaves of various kinds), which means we need to coordinate the schedules of 30-35 busy people to fit a schedule that will not run on time anyway. Worse if it is during finals, the first two weeks of the semester, or during midterms. So, as the interviewee, if it seems like your schedule is constantly being updated, this is why.

The second thing to keep in mind is that you are one of 4-5 people who will be brought into ProdigalU in rapid succession for 2 days each. If multiple searches are going on (not too unusual at ProdigalU right now, since many of the Boomer profs are going emeritus/leaving in other ways), you might be one of 10-15 people brought to the department in rapid succession.  Most people take TT searches pretty seriously, since one of the unusual features of academia is that you get to pick your future colleagues with whom you might be working for 30+ years. But even so, some interview fatigue sets in. As the interviewee, you are on an adrenaline rush, experiencing what might be one of the most important days of your life thus far. The people interviewing you are trying to cram your visit into an already busy schedule AND they might be doing interview related stuff 2-3 times a week or more for two months. Your interviewers are definitely interested in learning more about you, and want to hear about what you can bring to the department. But, they are being pulled in many directions at once, whereas you (hopefully) have a laser-beam focus on your interview. The more you can keep your interest level up and your intensity high, the better.

On top of that, almost no one in academia is actually trained in interview techniques, so most people are going to default to the same kind of talk about their science that they do when meeting seminar speakers from outside their field. This is your chance! If you want to discuss something, ask questions about it! Ask about facilities, how things work at InterviewU, their science, interactions with other departments, the students, etc. People are happy to talk about things they know you will find interesting.

So, what does a typical interview day look like for me when I am on the search committee:

• 8:30ish     Arrive in office and caffeinate, emails, prep for lecture
• 9:30          Teach class
• 10:30        Office hours
• 11:30        Email catch up
• 12:00        Lunch with candidate
• 1:30          Candidate seminar
• 3:00          Meeting with one of my grad students
• 3:30          One on one with candidate
• 4:00          Escort candidate to next meeting, stop by main office for administrative stuff
• 4:30          Email catch up
• 5:00ish     Head off to pickup the ProdigalKids

On non-teaching days, the teaching slots are when I actually get research done. Sometimes I have dinner with the candidate instead of lunch, and work then too. All search committee members try to have at least one meal with each candidate. If not on the search committee, I don't (usually) have meals with the candidate, but everything else remains on the schedule. A TT interview is a massive resource sink for the department, since the whole department makes a huge time commitment to the process.

If in doubt, just apply

I don't know what people are telling their students/postdocs these days, but our department has a TT search ongoing right now, and I am getting a surprising number of inquiries about whether someone should apply for the position or not, especially since I am not a contact person for the position, nor am I the search chair. And these are all from people who seemingly have a fairly decent overlap with the listed areas of interest in the ad.

I suppose these may be veiled requests for more details on what we are looking for, but still, if in doubt just apply. The worst that will happen is that you will not get the job, which is the default without submitting an application. This is good advice for anything, really. If you overlap with the selection criteria, just apply and let them reject you if you aren't what they are looking for.

Announcing the alternate science career information aggregation page

As promised, this is a page devoted to linking possibly useful information for scientists looking outside academia. I hope some of you looking for non-academic career information will find it useful. This is by no means a complete list, so if you know of other useful sites, let me know, and I will add them in!

Permalink available on the Prodigal Homepage.

Blog posts about non-academic careers:

• "Alternate" careers describing actual science jobs (Prodigal Academic)
• CVs vs. resumes (Biophemera)
• Recasting your skills for outside academic (The Chronicle of Higher Education)
• List of non-academic career options (Bitesize Bio)
• The value of internships (Just Another Electron Pusher)
• Transferable skills (Just Another Electron Pusher)
• Postdoc at a National Lab (Prodigal Academic)
• Staff scientist at a National Lab (Prodigal Academic)
• So you want to be a ... series (The Black Hole)

CV vs resume:

• Example of a CV turned into a resume
• Differences between a CV and a resume
• Resume advice

Possibly interesting career guidance:

• The versatile PhD
• Science careers
• Nature Jobs
• Alternative Science Careers
• Just Another Electron Pusher (a blog about careers outside academia)
• Materials Research Society Career Connections
• American Physical Society Careers in Physics
• Chemical and Engineering News Career and Employment
• AVS Career Services

Interesting non-academic science online discussion:

• Leaving academe forum (The Chronicle of Higher Education)
• Science careers forum (Science)

More on interviewing: student vs. colleague

In my last post on interviewing, I suggested that candidates should "act like a colleague, not like a student". There have been a couple of requests for clarifying what I meant, so here are some thoughts on the subject.

1. Address people by what they call themselves when they introduce themselves. Nothing says "student" to me like someone who calls me Dr. Academic after I introduce myself as Prodigal. My colleagues (and research group for that matter) call me Prodigal. My students call me Dr. Academic. If someone says "Hello, I am Dr. Pretentious", by all means call them Dr Pretentious. And definitely DON'T do the starstruck thing, even if you are meeting a personal hero or Nobel laureate.

2. When you talk about your research, own it. It is YOURS. Not your advisor's, not your program officer's, and not your university's. Also, don't refer to your advisor all the time. The interview is about you not her/him, and talking about him/her all the time will reinforce that you are a student/postdoc.

3. When you do talk about your advisor (and it will come up), don't act deferential. Be respectful, but it seems strange to me when interview candidates call their advisors "Dr. Advisor". Don't call your advisor "my boss" either.

4. When you meet with your potential colleagues one on one, and the topic turns to research, they want to have a discussion with you. Even if the person you are meeting with is a giant in your field, they do not want you to just accept their suggestions as the "word from on high". When a candidate does that instead of engaging in the conversation, it makes me feel like I am having a one on one with one of my own trainees, not discussing science with a colleague. Bonus points if you can offer something constructive about their own research!

5. When meeting with students and/or postdocs, remember that you are interviewing to be a faculty member. No matter how tempting it is to talk about stuff you got away with in grad school, or how annoying your advisor is, don't.

6. While "I don't know" is a perfectly valid response to a question (and certainly better than trying to fake it), another response is to try to think things through, or offer your thoughts about the topic (obviously, this isn't true of questions about factual things!). People who can pull this off definitely seem more scientifically mature.

I'm sure there are other things, but this is what comes to mind from my (admittedly) brief experience on the other side of the interview.

Quick tips for TT interviews

It is interview season in my fields, and we have a few searches going on here at ProdigalU (and keeping me out of trouble). I know I've blathered on about interviews here, here, and here before, but more tips can't hurt, right? Here are a few things I've been noticing this time around:

• You MUST be able to answer questions/think on your feet. If this is a weakness, practice! When you give a practice talk, ask your colleagues, friends, or labmates to grill you. Even the best prepared talk will not erase that "deer in the headlights" look.
• You should be able to articulate the central problem(s) your lab will working on and how many people you need to do this.
• Both your job talk AND your chalk talk need to be accessible to people outside your sub-field. Everyone gets a say on the candidates (even if only the committee votes).
• Your research plans should look like they will last more than then next 3-5 years.
• Be ready to answer questions about your competitor labs--who are they? What will be special/different/better about your lab or approach? What is your edge? Do not position yourself in competition with your advisor(s) if you can avoid it.
• You should be able to articulate clearly why you need anything on your startup list (especially the really expensive stuff and/or stuff you could potentially share) AND talk about the research significance of the resulting data.
• You don't need to propose formal collaborations, nor do you need to know what everyone in the department is doing before you arrive. However, if after meeting with someone one-on-one, you see a new overlap possibility, it is a great idea to mention it in your chalk talk! We had someone do this to nice effect.
• Try to behave like a colleague (but not an arrogant ass). If you feel and act like a student or postdoc, the faculty will respond to you like one. If you feel and act like a colleague, the faculty will see you as one.
• Be nice to the students! We listen to them.

Good luck to all those on the TT job hunt this year!

The chalk talk, non-bio edition

Gerty-Z has a great post up about chalk talks in her field. In my field, we also do chalk talks, and it is absolutely crucial to do well there to get an offer. Like G-Z, I really enjoyed my chalk talks, since I went in well prepared and found it to be a fun scientific discussion. I came away with lots of good ideas for interesting research directions after most of my interviews. Unlike in G-Z's field, in my field, it is common to do "chalk talks" with powerpoint slides. That said, there are many important differences between a normal talk and a chalk talk.

Typically, the chalk talk will be restricted to faculty only, since you will be presenting your future research ideas and vision for your lab. Although it starts out like a normal talk, you should expect to be interrupted frequently. Although most of the faculty will have seen your job talk on the previous day, you can't assume everyone did (or that everyone remembers the key points). Any really important points from your job talk that are crucial to understanding your future research will have to be BRIEFLY reviewed (emphasis on the briefly). Your goal in the chalk talk is to describe what you envision doing as a researcher. You should describe the scientific problem and then explain your approach. You need to be really clear on the scientific problem, and also describe your approach.

Your audience will ask lots and lots of questions. Some will be really easy and some will challenge your science. You need to answer all of them to the best of your ability respectfully. DO NOT get defensive. Saying "I don't know" or some variant is better than trying to BS your way through something--there will probably be someone(s) who are also well-versed in the field. The department will be watching to see how you think on your feet, how well you have thought things through, and how you interact with your potential colleagues.

You need to be able to answer the following questions:

1. Where will I look for funding for this project (in general is OK--is it NSF/DoE/DoD fundable?)

2. What will happen if the project doesn't work? This is important--is there important science to write up along the way, or is the project only publishable if everything works as planned?

3. What are other groups doing in this area? Why is your approach unique/better?

4. If this is a continuation of prior work, will you be in direct competition with your mentor for funding? If so, why would agencies fund you and not your mentor?

5. What do you need to do the work equipment and space-wise, and how much will it cost (ballpark is OK)?

6. What are your initial staffing needs? Will you need a tech? How many students/postdocs will you look to get in the first 2 years when you are running on startup?

You should also be able to describe your target steady state group size, how quickly you can get started if you were to get an offer, and what mix of students/postdocs/techs are you looking for. Your research plans should include things that are short term, medium term, and long term. This is really important--you need to convince the department that you have a research agenda that is sustainable for 10+ years. If your proposed project is amazing, but it will be more or less complete when done, you need to know what will be next. You should plan on describing 3 projects, 2 in detail and 1 in outline due to time limitations, but be prepared with details on all 3 just in case. It is also a good idea to point out potential collaborations in the department and/or at the University if it is a natural extension of your proposed research.

They will probably also ask you what you want to and/or are prepared to teach in the department. This is not a deal breaker, but you should at least give it a little thought--you are applying to work at a University!

Procrastinating with the NRC grad school data

In my post about academia and pyramid schemes, Games With Words left a comment about grad schools and outcomes. He later discussed this over at his blog and associated comments, and lamented about lack of data and lack of knowledge of what exactly my field is. While I am not inclined to publicly pierce my pseudonymity (though I bet people can probably guess if they are really determined), thanks to the NRC, we can talk about data for my field (which has a strong industry demand for PhD and MS holders, and has a very low unemployment rate compared to the national average).

I, like him, was interested in data beyond anecdotes, since attrition rates, outcomes, and the "value" of a PhD from a non-Top 5 school seem to me to be very dependent on field. Looking in detail for my field (and with the caveat that there are definitely problems with the NRC dataset), I was very surprised by the data. Here is what I found (using the NRC S-ranking, and noting that academic plans means signed contract for postdoctoral fellowship or permanent academic job):

Top 10 schools: ~60% complete PhDs, ~20% with academic plans

Top 20 schools: ~50% complete PhDs, ~20% with academic plans

Bottom 10 schools: ~50% complete PhDs, ~20% with academic plans

Bottom 20 schools: ~50% complete PhDs, ~20% with academic plans

I will note that academic plans does not mean faculty positions (as implied by the Chronicle for Higher Ed flash tool, now pay to use)--the NRC definition is negotiating or signed a contract for an academic position including postdoctoral fellowships. In fact, I suspect most of these are postdocs. I think it would be really hard for schools to report on how many students have faculty positions for my field, given that a postdoc is more or less required, and most schools don't seem to follow up much after the initial placement (at least no one I know has been contacted as an alumni for that information). Still, the numbers are a lot smaller and a lot more consistent across the rankings than I would have expected, especially given the hysteria about overproduction of PhDs. I should also note that for a graduate of a US University, it isn't incredibly difficult to find a postdoctoral position in my field, though positions in top schools and/or top labs are very competitive.

The average number of PhDs graduated per year ranges from ~2 to ~30, with a mean of ~14. The net result is ~2500 PhDs produced per year (which is in line with the data from my field's society), of whom ~500 will go into academia (probably postdocs) immediately after their degree. This does not seem like a terrible oversupply of PhDs/postdocs even just considering those 500 per year, especially since anecdotally, some large percentage of them will not pursue faculty positions. Granted, not all of them can get positions at large research universities (which is what many people who want faculty positions profess to want), but I would guess that across academia at all levels, there are probably 200-300 faculty openings per year in my field. This is a much better match of supply with demand than I was expecting, even given my hand waving invocation of anecdata at the end.

UPDATE: Note, that I am NOT implying that getting a faculty job is easy, since I know it isn't. Nor I am implying that many openings don't have hundreds of applicants (I know we get that at ProdigalU). Just that supply of jobs across academia is probably a lot closer to demand than I would have guessed in the absence of data, especially if we lump all the different types of Universities together, which is obviously a gross simplification. I know that many of my research colleagues (me included!) would have gone to industry to do development rather than a community college to teach due to personal work preference.

Prodigal U does its part to help out TT wannabes

We're hiring! My department at Prodigal U is searching for not one, but two TT positions (one is a failed search from last year, one is a retirement replacement)! This means a lot more work for me, though thankfully I am not on either committee this year.

In honor of TT job postings, I sum up my short list (ha ha) of academic job hunting advice:

1. Thoughts on the academic job market.
2. Looking for a TT job from outside academia.

3. How search committees go from 200+ applications to a short list.

4. Interviewing from the perspective of a TT applicant and from the perspective of the search committee.

5. Success! Negotiating the offer.

6. Outside academia: how I got a National Lab job, and other possible careers.

Just a quick re-post, since I am still drowning in work. Personal update: one Sept proposal is done, one was sent to my co-PI for comments, and I am starting the last one today (it is a short 4-pager). Three more for October, but one just requires minor revisions before resubmitting, and the other two are short white papers. One is now due the first week in Nov (not sure if I just want to be done or not), and one is already outlined.

Next year's job market

In my department at Prodigal U, we've been on a hiring binge. Over the last 10-12 years, we've run 1 to 3 searches a year (not all successful). How are these jobs opening?

1. Retirement! We've had three models--profs who really retire and no longer come in, profs forced out (he finally ran out of money after his last grant was not renewed) and profs who are tapering off to retirement but take Emeritus status even with a grant or two to make way for fresh blood (we have 2 or 3 of these). These voluntary Emeritus profs are really considering the interests of the department in going Emeritus, and as a bonus often end up as wonderful mentors (if you care enough to make room for someone, you also care enough that your replacement does well).

2. Old prof dies at the bench (yes, this happened--he had a heart attack in the lab at age 85 and died a week or so later in the hospital).

3. Non-deadwood, non-research active. These are the profs our Chair has been successful at getting the Dean to open lines to "replace". They are still very active in service to the department and University, and take much higher than normal teaching loads on service classes to free up the more active folks to teach the majors/grad students and have lighter loads. These people are really helpful in accommodating sabbaticals and family leaves without crushing the TT profs with work, so I really appreciate them!

4. Expansion. Prodigal U is growing both the number of undergrads and grad students, and as a service department, we got some extra TT lines in the past.

That said, I think our run of hiring is about to end. Given how Wall Street ate most people's retirement money, I am thinking the wave of retirements is likely to end for a while. Let's face it, unless you do research that requires arduous field work, most STEM professorial jobs are not particularly strenuous. It is easy to hang on for a long, long time, especially if your retirement savings have evaporated.

#2 is not only a random occurrence, but it seems really unlikely to happen again soon!

We've been really lucky to have a Dean who is interested in increasing the research profile at Prodigal U, so we've gotten to add some TT faculty to replace not just retirements, but also some of the research inactive faculty in the department. Now that Prodigal U is in budget crunch mode, we're not getting any more of these. And any expansion workload issues will similarly have to be eaten by the department.

I fear for those on the job market this year.

How I got my National Lab job

A couple of people have mailed me asking how I got a position at my National Lab. If you are looking for a good guide, I'd have to say don't look at me--I got my job through dumb luck. When I was finishing up, I thought I didn't want to go into academia, so I ruled out academic postdocs as a first choice option. I was hopelessly naive as a grad student and didn't even start looking for a job until I had less than a year left. I was also hopeless at networking. After I set my defense date, I posted my resume to monster.com and my CV to a few science specific sites. I used the on campus recruitment office to sign up for screening interviews with industry, sent my resume out to lots of different companies, and signed up at scientific meetings as a job seeker.

I had lots of screening interviews both on campus and at meetings. I had on-site interviews at companies in the semiconductor, pharmaceutical, and chemical/materials industries (oh the stories--industrial hiring is no more efficient than academia in my experience). I still had nothing lined up.

I was invited to interview for the postdoc position I eventually took at National Lab after my future postdoc advisor saw my CV on one of the science sites (that is the dumb luck part). Postdoc Advisor was looking for someone who could do the type of measurements I specialized in on a system completely different from my PhD field. National Lab needed my skills, I was sick of my sub-field and wanted to change research directions, so it was a match.

National Lab flew me out for a 1 day interview. This was similar to how I've seen academic postdoc interviews described--I gave a seminar on my PhD research, interviewed with the PIs of my potential project, and met other postdocs/staff working at the lab. As I later found out a a postdoc/staff member, the other postdocs/staff had veto power, but only for a specific reason. The decision was made almost exclusively by the PIs. I had lunch at the lab, but was on my own after 5 pm. It certainly was less tiring than either the TT or industrial on-sites I went to, and I got to see a lot more of the area, since I had free time the afternoon/evening before and evening after my interview.

A week later, I was offered the job. My offer was contingent on me applying for and receiving a National Research Council Research Associateship, which I did. If you are interested in getting one, I highly, highly suggest you find a mentor and work backwards (like what I did). I know that there are lots of people who cold apply to these programs (after all, the pay is awesome, and the science is hot), but every single postdoc at National Lab had one of these (or something else similar), and every single postdoc I have ever met there was recruited first, and applied second. I have never met a postdoc who applied for a research associateship without getting a mentor first, even at other national labs. I think it is a waste of time to apply first. I can't emphasize that enough (because the application is kind of long and annoying).

After I took the job, National Lab paid for my move. I moved and started working. I worked 10-12 hours a day, but only 5 days a week most weeks, and learned how to work much more efficiently so I could keep my weekends free. About 15-25% of the postdocs at National Lab are offered staff positions at the end (mostly to replace retirements--the average age of employees at National Lab is high). They are really into "try before you buy" because firing someone is very, very hard (this seems to be true everywhere--I know lots of industrial scientists who complain about deadwood). More established people who are beyond the postdoc level are brought in as contractors to make sure it will work out before being offered a staff position, at least at National Lab. I've heard this is pretty common at most national labs, but I only know my lab really well.

After the Offer--Negotiation and the TT

PhD job seeker asked if their is negotiation around a TT job offer, and if so how it is done. This was my experience.

After I received my offers, I was given 2 weeks to accept or decline. During that time, at least one University flew spouse and I out so spouse could see the area upon request. One of the realities of a TT job search is that the candidate applies for many positions, likes some more than others, and is constrained by the varying schedules of different departments. As a candidate, you need to look out for your own interests, because no one else will.

In my case, one department was hiring for multiple positions. They met promptly after my interview, and I received an offer in less than a week (my first!). I was still interviewing at other places, and had at least one department that I was more interested in show an interest. As soon as I had the written offer in hand, I notified all the departments I was still interested in that I had an offer to try to speed up their time tables. In one case, I got an expedited interview. In another, the department still had one more candidate to interview, but I was currently their top choice. They gave me a firm date on which they could give me a decision. A third department had expressed verbal interest, but was dragging their feet on a written offer. My existing offer put their feet to the fire so to speak, and greatly sped up the process.

The offer I had in hand was good. I would have taken it happily if I hadn't decided I would strongly prefer Prodigal U. To give Prodigal U more time, I asked for another week to decide, while negotiating my salary and startup package for the offer I had in hand. Chaining offers like this is a fact of TT job search life, if a candidate is lucky enough to have more than one offer. Some people think it is unethical, but I see nothing wrong with it as long as you would actually take the job. It is a waste of time to negotiate and stall if there is no way you would take the offer. This can make the department lose out on their 2nd and 3rd choice candidate (if they in fact exist--in our searches, that hasn't always been the case). If I thought a job at Offer U was worse than my job at National Lab, I would have turned it down outright.

I eventually got an offer from Prodigal U. At this point, I had declined one offer and had another offer in hand (for more money!). This greatly strengthened my negotiating position, as did the fact that I already had a permanent job I liked. However, even if you receive 1 offer and your postdoc funding ends tomorrow, it is worth negotiating, especially for things that will help you be successful. Keep in mind, though, that a counteroffer technically declines the original offer, so be careful!

I asked for a much higher salary than my initial offer, which was scary (see above statement about counteroffers!). To justify the increased salary, I compared my current salary to the offer, I mentioned my higher offer elsewhere (but did not ask for a match--I definitely did not want to give the impression that I was all about the money, and my other offer was in an Engineering department, which generally pay better than a Science department like the one at Prodigal U). I also brought up my track record in competing for funding relative to a typical fresh postdoc (that's where being at a National Lab was a huge benefit). I was able to negotiate my starting salary up 15%, which is a pretty big deal, and definitely due to the fact that I was more experienced than a typical new TT hire. All future raises come as a percentage of base salary, so it is important to start out at a decent salary. I did take a pay cut from National Lab, though.

The major things I negotiated for were actually not salary related at all. Some other things I asked for: extra startup funds to cover user fees until I could buy my own equipment, 3 years of summer salary, support for 2 students for 2 years, doing my teaching in the Fall (when I would be ordering stuff) rather than in the Spring (when all the stuff would hopefully arrive) my first year, separate sample prep and instrument space, a spot in on campus daycare, a specific instrument lab location due to environmental issues impacting measurements, etc. This depends on your research needs. It was nerve-wracking to ask for stuff, and I hated it. I kept it professional and provided justifications for the things I was asking for, rather than trying to extract every last drop from my new department. Some things I got (extra startup for user fees, wet/dry labs), some things I didn't (daycare spot).

Something to remember is that in the cases I saw, the Chair was negotiating with the Dean on my behalf. It is to the Chair's and department's benefit to have the new TT member be successful. I got some good advice on things to ask for from some of the places I was interviewing at/negotiating with!

Interviewing (from the perspective of a faculty member)

I meant to post this as a followup to this post sooner, but got distracted by other issues.

Although I am a new faculty member, this year I have interviewed 14 candidates for 3 positions in 2 departments. Interviews at Prodigal U take 2 days. On both days, most of the time is reserved for 1-on-1 or small group discussions. On day 1, the candidate gives an open seminar to the department. On day 2, the candidate gives a closed talk/has a detailed discussion about their research plans. This depends on how the search is being run. In one department, the search committee makes a recommendation, but the whole faculty discusses each candidate and votes on whether to make an offer. In this case, the research plan is a very informal talk given to the department members. In the other department, the search committee decides who to make an offer to, and the department is not directly involved, other than to submit comments. In addition, our candidates are usually hosted for 2 lunches and 2 dinners as well.

As a faculty member, and member of two search committees, I can say that searching is very time consuming for the department. Everyone takes this very seriously, since making a bad choice can potentially have repercussions for 30+ years. So what are we looking for?

By the interview stage, all of the candidates are well-qualified on paper. Once we invite someone to campus, we want them to wow us. We are already impressed with the candidates' accomplishments, now we want to see their polish. They have all had research success in the past, and all have some interesting ideas for the future.

The first thing we want to see is that the candidate "walks the walk, not just talks the talk". We all know people who have been carried along by a successful PI and/or research group who have great hands in the lab, but lack that creative spark required for a good research plan. Thus, it is really important that the candidate demonstrate their creativity/scientific thinking as well as their breadth and depth of knowledge. Giving a good seminar is critically important. However, it is also important that the candidate can discuss their work coherently, and not just in the context of their job talk. We give a fair bit of importance to how the candidate answers questions and to how they discuss science in the interview meetings.

In discussion of the planned research we want to see short, medium, and long term plans. These plans should be differentiated from the work done as a PhD student or postdoc. The candidate should have some idea of how big their ideal group would be, and also to know what they absolutely need equipment-wise to be successful. Better still is a list of big ticket items and an estimated cost. Especially for candidates coming from large and well-funded labs with access to unusual equipment, it is important to know what infrastructure the planned research requires. If Prodigal U doesn't have it, there is no point in coming here. Two questions that commonly get asked in these sessions are "who else is working in this area?" and "what is your angle that makes your work unique/different?"

In terms of fit, we want the candidates to be reasonably pleasant and polite (berating the departmental administrators is not a good idea), to have given some thought as to how their future work will fit in with current research in the department, and to refrain from outright sexist/racist/homophobic/anti-Semitic/etc. comments and behaviors (this should go without saying, but you would be surprised). We look at candidates energy level--are they excited by their work, or is it just something they do. We are looking for someone we wouldn't mind having in the office next door.

The fit thing cuts two ways. We want there to be enough overlap in research interests that the candidate can find collaborators in the department, but not so much that there is direct competition for students and funding. This can be a fine line. The optimal amount of overlap can vary from person to person. I enjoy collaborating with my colleagues, so I am fairly tolerant of research overlap. One of my colleagues is more territorial, and would prefer to have almost none. At the same time, we don't want to hire someone whose research is very far from everyone else in the department, as lack of sharable equipment and difficulty attracting students can be fatal to a new lab.

Of the 14 candidates I saw, 5 performed "below the bar" and would not have been hired under any circumstances. I've been told this is not atypical. For 3 of them, their research talk was awful (hey maybe that was me in year 1 of my search!) The other 2 did not have convincing or realistic research plans. Another 1 who was above the bar prompted questions because the proposed research was incredibly similar to work done in their PhD and postdoctoral groups.

For the remaining candidates, there is nothing they did wrong. It is just "right place/right time" luck that gets them the job or not. Of the other 8 candidates, 3 accepted offers elsewhere and 2 accepted offers here. The remaining 3 candidates were ranked below the 2 that we hired. 1 search went unfilled (and will be redone next year).

Interviewing (from the perspective of a job seeker)

My first year on the market, I had 2 interviews. In my field, interviews are 2 day affairs that consist of a research seminar, individual meetings with faculty in the department, a presentation of research plans (sometimes formal, sometimes not), and several meals. Sometimes there are meetings with students, sometimes not. I had ABSOLUTELY no idea of what to expect on my first interview. I went in armed only with my schedule and zero pre-knowledge of what to expect and what to do. Coming from outside academia, this was a major disadvantage.

The interviews themselves were completely exhausting. After, I was really, really tired (and had to burn all my vacation to interview). You can find general interview tips all over. My main one is to drink something every time someone offers you something--you will dehydrate quickly with all the talking you are doing. My minor one is to remember that most academics are not trained in how to interview. Because of this, they may not know what to do other than to talk about their science. You don't want to have awkward silences. Think about things you want to know about working at the department, and ask. Most people are happy to answer questions. You can (and sometimes it is instructive to) ask the same question of everyone. If all else fails, ask about their research or their group.

I didn't get either job. Against the received wisdom, I asked the search committee chairs for feedback, and I actually got lots of very specific advice that really helped me out in my next job season. So how did that happen?

1. Ask for feedback on how to improve/advice on how to be a better candidate. DO NOT ask why you didn't get the job or anything about the deliberations or the other candidate.

2. Do not put the SCC on the spot. I asked for feedback via email, and was invited to call both SCC chairs to talk about it later.

3. Be sincere. If you are angry, annoyed, or can't take constructive criticism well don't bother.

What did I learn? The best piece of advice was a reminder NOT to make sarcastic or ironic offhand remarks. I did this once, and it came up when I was discussed as a candidate. This was totally a rookie mistake, but it is a common one!

Most important to me, I got good feedback on how a job talk should be organized and presented. This is one bit of mentoring I really lacked, since it is hard to do without face to face contact. I found out that I had prepared my research talk too narrowly. I highlighted one really important story from my research experience. This was not enough. You need to show depth AND breadth. This was the biggest change I made in my next go-round. Another issue was that I came across as inexperienced in running a lab and in understanding how much things cost because my wishlist for startup seemed incomplete. I did a complete overhaul my second time on the market. Last, I did not have enough details worked out for some of my proposed projects. This I definitely fixed!

Things I wasted time on:

1. Spending lots of time preparing to discuss teaching. This was absolutely not an issue. Later on, someone told me that the teaching evaluation at a research school is the job talk. If you can give a good one, you can teach.

2. Trying to learn about the research interests of everyone in the department in advance. Everyone likes to talk about their work, and no one who is far from your area of expertise expects you to know theirs. The Internet made me paranoid about this one. Don't bother.

3. Worrying about details I couldn't or wouldn't change in my personal life. I was really worried about what to do if people asked about my family, whether to talk about it at all, etc. What I found is that people talked about science (mostly) in the one on one meetings, but talked about the local area and/or small talk about life in general at the meals. To avoid discussion of my personal life would have been stilted and impossible for me (I am not very good at redirection). Above all, I failed to remember that I was interviewing them as much as they were interviewing me. After I didn't get both jobs the first time around, I wondered about whether any of this made a difference. But then I decided I didn't care. If I wouldn't have been hired if the department knew I was married, I don't want the job. It isn't like I am going to hide my personal life forever once I arrive!

In year 2, I had 10 interviews (declined 1) and received 3.5 offers (one was verbal, but I pulled out before any written offer arrived) before I accepted a job. I still don't know why I got so many more interviews the second time around after making only small revisions to my application package. I am assuming it was a right place/right time thing. That said, I definitely nailed the interviews the second time around, mostly due to having more experience and getting good feedback on how to improve.

I will admit that I sometimes surf on over to the departments that didn't hire me to see how "my competition" is doing. I find myself doing a lot less of this now that my own lab is up and running.

Next topic: Interviewing (from the perspective of a search committee member)

Search committee math, or what does it mean to have 200 applicants for a position?

Hiring has been on my mind, inspired by the wide ranging discussion of spousal hires. Although I am an academic neophyte, seeing three searches in two departments this year (I was on two of the committees as well) has really opened my eyes as to how searches work. Here's how we did it this year:

210 applications. First of all, for all three searches, we had 200+ applications. Initial evaluation and grading is done by each member of the committee independently. Then, we come together to make a "long list" and then after more consideration, a "short list". We can throw away at least 1/3 of them right away due to lack of qualifications (no PhD, no postdoc*, wrong field, wrong sub-field*, or application incomplete). I should note that we do keep applications in the no postdoc or wrong sub-field if they are SUPER AMAZING, but that is not most of them. When we write the ad, we have some type of expertise in mind that we are looking for to fill out the department, move into a new area, or cover a needed area of teaching. Sometimes we will hand off applications to another (more suitable) department that has an opening. As for postdocs, we generally require at least one. In the past (before my time), the department has hired someone with a deferred start so they can complete a postdoc first, so it isn't a total waste of time to apply without one, if you have something good lined up. This is very, very rare though. A surprising number of applications are not complete. The most common missing thing is one or more reference letters (we ask for three). We will often over look one missing letter (we assume the writer flaked out), and contact the listed writer if we need more information. If more than one letter is missing, we assume it is the candidate.

140 applications. We score all the remaining applications in A, B, or C. Applications scored C are removed from consideration. Applications scored B are (briefly) reviewed a second time in case we missed something, especially if the decision was not unanimous. Usually, the A's can pretty clearly be separated from the B's and C's. This cut is made mostly on CV and letters of reference. We look primarily at publication record--we like to see first author papers from both PhD and postdoc. We also like to see some signs of collaborations (like non-first author papers). We look at where the candidate is publishing (Nature/Science papers are not required, but 17 publications in Joe's Journal of Microscopy won't cut it). In the searches I saw, I'd say around half of the remainder were C's.

70 applications. Now it gets tougher. We need to separate the A's from the B's. At this point, we consider the proposed research plan, as well as previous track record. We are looking for a colleague who can 1) be successful in our department and 2) bring something to improve the department. If the research plan is completely unrealistic ("I'll cure cancer in 5 years!" or "I need the entire contents of my massively successful advisor's lab to get started") or incomprehensible, the applicant is a B, no matter how great their CV is. If the applicant can't write a decent research plan, we have grave doubts they will be able to write a decent grant proposal. When I am scoring the applicants, I look a little at citations, especially for publications more than a year old, but only with a super-quick citation search (definitely not comprehensive in any way). This is just to get an idea of how relevant the prior research is, particularly for sub-fields I don't know that well. We don't generally care too much about where the applicant did their PhD/postdoc as long as the productivity is good. It helps to have at least one recommender who is known someone on the committee by reputation, if nothing else. Admittedly this is harder if someone is coming from a less well-known university, but that is where conference networking comes in. We don't consider teaching experience at all at this point. If there are any weirdnesses (no letter from advisor, unusually long postdoc, gap in CV, etc) we expect them to be addressed in the cover letter or by one of the reference letters. The ratio varies, but let's say the applications are split 50-50 between A's and B's (not too unusual these days with so many people chasing so few jobs).

35 applications. These are the people we are considering for invitations to interview (the "long list"). If any are missing letters, we contact the listed recommenders. At this point, we are considering everything we asked for in the application, but most important is research experience and research fit with the department. On the committees I was on, at the first meeting(s), we went down the whole list, and graded every candidate as A,B,C, or F. At the next meeting, we considered if we should promote any of the B's and worked on a rank order for the A's. We now make the "short list" after much debate. At this point, most/all of the candidates are well qualified, and the distinctions are based on research fit, and how much people like the research proposals. This is where the luck part comes in. We'd probably have a great pool if we invited any of these 35 candidates, but we can only invite 5. So being in the right place at the right time is important. If we already have a great person who studies widgets, we are not going to interview another person who does really similar research, no matter how great they are when we have so many other great choices available.

At this discussion, we will also think about whether the number of women (as determined by name, generally--we don't see the EE cards) on the list is representative of the pool to make sure we didn't accidentally overlook anyone. If we could identify other underrepresented minorities, we would do the same, but that is pretty much impossible from the applications. This is NOT AA. We are doing this to make sure we didn't overlook a file due to unconscious bias (as has been shown by many, many studies and anecdotes). In both searches where I was on the committee, this was not a problem.

We rank all of the A's and decide who to invite to campus. This was not too contentious, which I found pretty surprising. In both cases, we converged on a list of 10 or so, and then spend the most time whittling that down to 5. We generally picked the "best" person (on paper) doing a particular technique or studying a particular subject, and in general, only one person from a given research group is invited out. This does help prune a little bit.

5 applications. These are the people we bring to campus. At least one of them will bomb. We hope that one or more will dazzle us and make the choice difficult. The ranks start out fresh, and we let the candidates place themselves. I'll talk about interviews in a future post or two. We do not notify anyone else of their status, in case we need to revisit the pool.

Spousal Hiring In and Out of Academia

The past few days, there has been lots of discussion of spousal hires, apparently prompted by an article in Chronicle of Higher Ed. There is an interesting split--those with TT jobs (with and without academic spouses) seem to be in favor of it, while those still trying for TT positions are vehemently opposed. I've seen spousal hires, both inside and outside academia (research heavy schools only), and I am generally in favor (with caveats). The whole thing seems to me to be part of the problem of disillusion on the part of some that academia is not a "pure meritocracy", whatever that would look like.

Maybe this is a drinking the Kool-Aid kind of thing, but having been involved in 3 searches in 2 departments this year, I can say that my understanding of how searches work is exponentially higher than it was while I was searching myself. Now that I have seen how it all works, I understand much more about how and why things happen the way they do, which makes me less of a conspiracy theorist. And after all, help with finding a spouse a job, up to and including spousal hires is a standard recruiting tool in many industries.

In my experience, most spousal hires are eminently qualified for the TT--no department I know of wants to hire an incompetent person, no matter how much of the salary the Dean will kick in. Addition by subtraction is a painful reality most in the working world have faced, and they have no desire to volunteer for such a scenario. Furthermore, at the research heavy universities I am familiar with, the spouse's position is a new line and does not prevent new hires through more traditional search process. Given that once someone is over the line in quality for a TT position, it is mostly right place/right time that gets them a position, I don't really oppose spousal hires in this type of situation, and I see how it can be really beneficial to a University that can't afford to shell out 6 or 7 figure startups every few years to fill one position.

I am strongly opposed to the type of spousal hire described by Dr. Crazy:

So, for example, let's say that we made Candidate A an offer. Candidate A, whether male or female, had a spouse who is an academic. (Note that I say spouse here. This is crucial. We are not talking about partners - we are talking about legally married people.) Historically, if we really wanted the candidate, the chair might agree to "find something" for the spouse, and that "something" would be something off the tenure track. Then, once some time passed, a hiring line would open up in the department. An ad would be written to fit the trailing spouse, as long as the couple had played nicely and sucked up to the right people. And then, under the auspices of an open search, the trailing spouse would be hired into a tenure-track position, regardless of the coverage needs of the department and regardless of the quality of other candidates being interviewed for the position.

"Fake" searches are a HUGE waste of everyone's time. If a department wants to hire someone (a spouse or inside candidate), they should just get on with it and not try to pretend there is a search, unless the spouse/inside candidate is on the same footing at the other candidates.

I was more interested in Dr. Crazy's comments about spousal hires being "1 for the price of 2" rather than "2 for the price of 1". In my experience, spousal hires are just as collegial as anyone else. After a few years, it is usually impossible to figure out who was the leading spouse and who was the trailing spouse, assuming they started at the same level. In my department, there is a married couple with kids, but they, like all TT parents are expected to contribute to service outside work hours (along with everyone else), though most people understand that they need some advance notice to arrange childcare. In the department as a whole, there are slackers (of course, like with anything else), but the level of slackerness seems independent of family status.

At my old National Lab there were a few spouses who worked together. That was a lot messier, since there was more of a hierarchy, and the potential for political minefields was HUGE. Sometimes things looked really fishy from the outside (though I can't have known details) about one spouse having an impact on the annual reviews of people who worked under the other spouse due to personality conflicts or perceived offenses. The situation was far dodgier than anything I have seen in academia, where the semi-flat structure ameliorates some of this problem, given that the problem of improper career boosting or killing based on spousal input would exist independently of whether the couple worked at the same University.

It is good to have this type of discussion in the open, especially since many scientists marry other scientists or engineers, and have career conflicts due to location issues.

UPDATED: Fixed URL and formatting.

Looking for a job

So you know where I am coming from, I just finished my first year at my TT position. I was on 2 search committees during that year, so I have 2 seasons of academic job hunting, plus one year on the other side for two departments under my belt. My first year on the market, I had 2 interviews and received no offers. My second year on the market, I went on 10 interviews, turned 1 down, and received 3 written and 1 verbal offer. All of my interviews were at more highly ranked schools in my field. Why the difference?

The (somewhat painful) truth is that I don't know. I changed one letter writer, and polished my materials a little more, but it seems mostly about being in the right place at the right time. My second year on the market, there were more ads that targeted my subfield. That is pretty much the only explanation i can think of.

So that leads me to advice for the National Lab job applicant. First your strengths. If you've been successful at your lab, you have been a PI. You have experience competing for funding, directing research, writing proposals, and planning out a research program. You've been getting at least 2 papers a year, so your CV looks strong. You've been attending 2 or more meetings, so you have been getting your name out there and keeping track of your field. You have a pretty good job, so you can afford to be choosy, both about applying and accepting a position.

You also have some weaknesses. For one thing, you don't have an academic mentor who can show you the ropes (unless you have been keeping in strong contact with your PhD advisor--more on that later). Your postdoc supervisor and/or current supervisor may not be familiar with academic letter writing. You probably don't have an NIH grant (in an NIH field) and definitely not an NSF (in an NSF field). You may not have a track record with external funding agencies. You don't have teaching/mentoring experience. You will probably have to leave all of your current work behind, unlike an academic postdoc.

So what to do?

1. Ask your PhD advisor for advice. Mine was happy to help when he could, even though he is now emeritus, and we weren't in close contact.

2. Have an academic friend look over your application materials. This was BY FAR, the most helpful thing I did.

3. Put word out that you are looking when you are at meetings. I was asked to apply to a couple of places my second year on the market. This is no guarantee, but you may hear of job details (like preferred subfield) that aren't in the published ad.

4. Talk to your academic friends and colleagues about your search, and about making the transition. Most of them will be happy to tell you about their search and give startup advice.

5. If you are applying to R1s, don't worry about your lack of teaching experience DO think about how you will mentor grad students and how you plan to grow your group. DO think about what you would like to teach. You will probably be asked for both at interviews.

6. Make a reasonable list of requirements for your research. You should have a must have section and a really wanted section. This is really, really important. You will have a lot less opportunity to have access to equipment than at a National Lab--most people in academia don't have unused stuff just lying around. It is much, much harder to get equipment buying money in academia. You should also know about how much this will cost. Don't skimp! If you don't ask for what you need, you won't be successful.

7. Keep your search (mostly) to yourself in case it is unsuccessful. Do tell your supervisor--he/she might offer you nice perks to stay, and he/she will certainly be contacted by committees who are interested in you. If for no other reason than to see if there are any strings on your proposed research.