Angry at the Clueless Lecturing the Experienced

wolfangel posts on the recent First Person article at the Chronicle. It is the latest in the series by a happy-go-lucky young academic couple seeking two positions in the same institution. As this latest piece cheerily relates, they found them!

"I can't quite explain my irritation with this story," says wolfangel, which prompted me to ask myself the same question: why is this piece so irritating?

I think what it boils down to is that is is more of the same pap provided in their earlier pieces: they are terribly naive about how the academic job market typically works, they subscribe strongly to the faith in hard work as a way to get a job, and all negative comments directed their way were "condescending" or "caustic." Well, how about a few more?

How about this passage: "Our good fortune should not be considered typical, expected, or easily acquired. We got to this point only after a lengthy and worrisome period of submitting applications, waiting (followed by more waiting), interviewing, and taking chances."

They say this like the process they went through was unusual. Everyone submits, waits, interviews and takes chances. This is not the secret to success. It's merely how the process works.

The male side of the couple is "impressed" by his interviewing experiences. I'm glad he enjoyed them, and I can understand his pride in feeling that he did well and that earlier preparations paid off. But (a) he shows absolutely no awareness that this is unusual for the vast majority of first-time job seekers, and then, (b) he writes, "It abruptly dawned on me that academic job candidates who are made offers early on must often make critical decisions before all job searches are completed."

Hello! This not news!

It is therefore very hard to come away from his section believing that he had any real awareness of the odds he faced. I don't doubt that he worked hard for his offer. What I resent is his utterly clueless belief that his experience is typical, or available simply if you work hard and prepare.

So... on to her section.

Initially, she shows a bit of awareness that her situation is not typical, nor guaranteed of success. Good for her... but, wait:

She writes that "The only bleak moment came when I was informed that other candidates were being interviewed for the position I had applied for. My spirits were crushed, but only briefly."

Let's get this straight: she is "crushed" when she learns that there are other candidates for the position? Puh-leez.

They wait nervously, then, halloo, they get the jobs! Good for them. If they left it here, and simply admitted that they were lucky, it'd be fine. But then they conclude:

"To all of those skeptics, we say: Call us lucky. Call us charmed. Call us assistant professors.

"For those couples out there seeking two faculty positions in the same department, realize that it is a tremendously competitive market. You need very thick skin (and even with that your feelings will undoubtedly still get hurt), the right qualifications, and complete dedication if you hope to prevail.

"If you and your partner work in the same academic field, we suggest that you try to develop and promote yourselves as experts in two distinct subdisciplines. Your dream may be difficult to achieve but it's not impossible. Take it from us: We're here, we're dual-academic career, and we're getting used to it."

The tone of smug self-congratulation is nauseating. It also reveals that they still have not learned that luck did indeed play a large part in their success, despite the lip service they give to it, nor that others' failures are often result of a lack of "very thick skin... the right qualifications, and complete dedication."

In fact, it's more than nauseating. It's insulting. It implies that anyone who didn't succeed the way they did on the first try isn't working hard enough, or qualified enough, or stalwart enough. Moreover, their own representation of events -- their surprise at normal events, their tender feelings being hurt by typical developments, their calm acceptance of special treatment as their due -- reveals that they have little clue about what the market is for the vast majority of academic job seekers.

How DARE they presume to offer the keys to success? They were friggin' lucky! Yeah, they worked hard, and were qualified. But so are many, many fine people who are still looking for a tenured position of any kind, let alone one in their field or two!

FEH!

Comments

[wolfangel]

Oh, good, you put it much better than I did. I knew it had something to do with the tone.

I wondered what they thought -- that they wouldn't have to wait? They'd send in their applications, the committee would see them and be so impressed they'd phone on the spot to offer them jobs? I also am curious what chances they took.

Again I am missing IA and the comments. There would have been such good comments.

[wolfangel]

I am also incredibly curious: did they ever read the thread(s?) about them at IA?

[Rana]

I can't recall. It'd be interesting to know, though, wouldn't it?

[Mila]

How about:
Some search committees had not yet reviewed their applications, some informed me that my application was not being considered any further (why couldn't they have notified me of that before?)
Fancy that: they did not send him a rejection letter the minute they made their decision!
I guess many of those sent to me last year must have gotten lost in the mail, since I never heard anything back from almost half my applications.
"To all of those skeptics, we say: Call us lucky. Call us charmed. Call us assistant professors."
I think I'll just call them smug and irritating, will that do?

[Michelle]

I'm not quite there yet but gimme a year and I'll probably on the bitter bandwagon. My BF has a cousin who teaches college German and she and her husband (I forget what he teaches) both obtained jobs at a 4-yr U, although i confess I know no details. I confess, I wonder if they are the poster-childs for possibility, held up for reverence and proof by the Chronicle. What other purpose would the article serve? Another student contracted to teach grammar classes 2x per week (adjunct) at a vo-tech to kids who scored under 19 on the ACT. For $1650 per class per semester. What rot. I'm determined not to wind up in the corporate world again. Listen to me complaining before it's even time to complain. And I don't have a Phd! I don't even have room to complain here! Just trying to be supportive in my own way. ;).

[Rana]

Oh, complain away. That's what we're here for. ;)

Good to "see" you, Michelle!

[wolfangel]

Hey Michelle,

If I can complain about it when I dropped out, you can complain about it, too.

Nice to see you in comments again.

[yami]

And no one's muttered "hiring one to get the other" yet? Does that ever happen in the humanities?

[LiL]

I was just thinking the same thing about "hiring one to get the other." Another thing that struck me was the several job openings she mentions in the department her husband applied to. THAT never happens in the humanities either. And how on earth is one person qualified for several positions that have opened up? Also, if you spend as much energy on sucking up (oops!) being "political" towards your potential hirers as this couple describes, you do raise the odds that they'll want you around to fawn on them some more. Yet in the end, will a "political" person's scholarship, teaching and contribution to their department and the store of knowledge in the world (I mean, what are we doing here if not that?) really be as valuable as their fawning? That'll wear off, and the department will be left with two people who have demonstrated they'll pretty much do anything to get what they want. I don't think they're naive at all. Simply cruel to those they've just one-upped by not entirely honest means.

[Claire]

Marry a plumber. It's much easier.

[wolfangel]

Hiring one to get the other happens in the humanities, but I've never seen creating one (or three) tenure-track positions to get the other, just choosing someone who wasn't your first choice (or, sometimes, shortlisted).

[yami]

I've seen a plausible case of creating a whole new humanities-esque program (or at least upgrading the status of one they were planning to start anyway) to get the other in the sciences, and many many wives in administrative positions... but this was at an institution that doesn't particularly flinch at offering million-dollar signing bonuses if it's dead-set on someone so I wasn't sure how typical this kind of thing might be.

[Jay]

I'm not going to argue about the tone of the piece. I agree with Rana and, furthermore, I think it is irresponsible of the Chronicle to pass it off as representative.

But I'm coming from the science side (mathematics) and from here there are a bunch of things that didn't pass the smell test. Two biologists getting job offer(s) without *any* postdoctoral experience? Almost any biology program that expects its faculty to conduct research will require one and maybe two postdoctoral positions before considering an applicant for a TT job. As they should, because newly minted PhDs in the hard sciences are almost always ill-equipped to set up a lab and secure outside funding.

Also, being allowed a month to make his decision? That's really, *really* strange. Usually a program wouldn't do that unless the applicant was the only reasonable fit for the position. Is he really such a superstar (without any postdoctoral experience, no less) that he can command this kind of respect?

I do know several two body problem couples who have successfully concluded job searches, including one in the humanities, but most of their stories don't sound anything like this. Like I said above, I suspect there is more to this than meets the eye.

[Timothy Burke]

I'm with Jay--there's something here that doesn't add up.

[Rana]

If so, that makes this piece even more disingenuous. Perhaps a letter to the Chronicle's editors is in order?

[wolfangel]

If you check out the zoology department of the university they both got their PhDs at, some of the recent hires did not have postdocs (some did). And the husband seems to have been a postdoc this year at that department. I don't know how representative that zoology department is, but it might not be as crazy as all that. I don't have the background to decide how good their publication records are -- it seems like low publication, though, because most people I knew in the sciences got dumped on every publication their lab came out with from the day they entered, which was often quite a few a year. Again, I'm lacking knowldege of that specific field.

Though it's odd that they give their real names and field, but not the name of the school where they got jobs.

[Rana]

That's an interesting question, wolfangel. Perhaps they were worried about confidentiality issues? But, no, they used their real names. Don't they know about Google? Or is it that they don't care, but wanted their story to have the feel of Everyman and Everywoman interviewing at Any Great University and achieving Success?

[Rana]

If they did read the thread about them at IA, they didn't comment on it.

I am struck by the generosity of IA's last comment in the thread -- alas, IA, they have not proved worthy of your chagrin.

[Jay]

Wolfangel -- postdoctoral experience in your own department counts only towards beefing up your publications. Aside from that, it is a small strike against you on the job market if it is anything at all. In the sciences one would initially wonder why he didn't get a real postdoc, but "waiting for my wife to finish" would be an acceptable excuse to explain it away.

And they achieved all this while one of them was still ABD.

[wolfangel]

I'm just trying to be somewhat sympathetic to them. I mean, they can't be lying about this; it's too easy to check up on. So they must have gotten tenure-track jobs in the same department.

Random sampling of a few other US zoology departments (the first few that came up when I googled zoology) suggests that postdoc experience is not necessary, and that just under half of people who got their PhD in the past ten years didn't have postdoc experience.

Jay, what else do people do postdocs for, if not to increase their research output? (Well, that and to have access to people at a certain university.) Maybe I'm coming from it from the wrong field -- ones where you don't need a huge lab.

Maybe these people were just very lucky (being not anonymous in your First Person column might have helped) and just obnoxious about it? Because although it all sounds really odd, it just seems impossible to have lied about any of it.

[Rana]

My sense of what may be "off" is not so much that they've lied, as omitted. As you point out, writing for the Chronicle may have increased their visibility (his c.v. suggests prior experience with popular writing; this would confirm it for search committees). They may also have had friends or colleagues able to pull some strings, etc.

So why didn't they mention these possibilities? Because it would get in the way of their narrative about the virtues of pluck and hard work? (The uncharitable interpretation.) Because they genuinely don't understand how lucky they were and how unusual the situation, thus never thought to explore deeper?

It is worth comparing their piece to that written by Jon Coleman, noted above: while not hiding his light under a bushel, he is very aware that other factors may be in play and openly speculates on their possible effects on the success of his job search.

[Jay]

Jay, what else do people do postdocs for, if not to increase their research output? (Well, that and to have access to people at a certain university.) Maybe I'm coming from it from the wrong field -- ones where you don't need a huge lab.

Well, doing research is a part of it. But doing new research with new people is much better (from a career point of view) than hanging out for a year in your advisor's lab extending your thesis. And when application time comes around, having had a postdoc prophesizes your talent in a self-fulfilling way, in that if you had one you must be good and if you didn't...

I do have to confess ignorance of the distictions between branches of biology. There are fields like molecular genetics or cell where labs are expensive and labor-intensive and you need to have a postdoc in order to be allowed to set your own up. Zoology might be less demanding in that regard.

But I stand by my original sentiment that there were crucial details omitted from their story. Not having a postdoc on his part and still being allowed to string the hiring committee along for a month; my instinct is that there's something else going on there which would, as Rana puts it, make their job search about more than just luck and hard work.

Of course, it could be something innocent. One thing that occurred to me is the quality of the department itself. The job situation in the sciences in nowhere near as desperate as it is in the humanities and when I was on the market in math there were jobs that nobody in their right minds, however desperate for an academic job, would touch with a nine foot cattle prod. I look forward to googling them in the fall and seeing how the search turned out.

[Timothy Burke]

I guess what I'm wondering is, "Where did they get their jobs, and what kind of jobs did they get, exactly?" I just re-read it and unless I missed it, it's not clear if both or either job was a tenure-track position. If both or either of them got contract jobs, it's not such a big deal. Also, to be blunt, it makes something of a difference if it's East Nowheresville Univ in terms of the relative probability of the event.

I'm also totally puzzled as I re-read the descriptions of his interview. "What qualifications do you have for this position?" and "Why do you want to work here?" are very uncharacteristically "unacademic" questions, especially the former. Perhaps he's only redacting more indirect questions.

[Michelle Palmer]

Yes, but even if it's "East Bowheresville Univ" and they're all hip-hop-happy, isn't that OK? I just thought at the time, they're poster-children for academia. Aside from the Chronicle's objectives, isn't it nice and good and warm and fuzzy for them?