Academic Job Fall 2010

I have been on a number of faculty search committees and have chaired a couple, so it has been interesting to talk to the graduate students and post-docs here at my sabbatical location.  Several of my lab colleagues have expressed an interest in finding an academic position for Fall 2010, so I thought I would make a few comments on preparing for a academic life from the perspective of the research active but non-research university.  I imagine this will be a reoccurring topic over the next few months.

My tendency is to think long-term.  My advice to students at any stage of their career is to think about where you want to be in future and start doing the things that people who are successful in that career do.  (With the exception of adopting the more annoying personality traits.)  With this in mind, you applicants for 2010 jobs should start working on those things that will ensure your success as a junior faculty member.  One of those things is an independent and externally funded research program that is appropriate to the resources and student body of the institution you are applying to.

By "independent" I mean a project that is not a rehash or slight modification of your prior work in your PhD or Postdoc.  I am not suggesting that there can not be some connection, but if the topics are too close there will be concerns that you don't have your own ideas, and that you will end up competing with your established former mentors, which rarely ends well for the junior person.  

Collaborations are a good thing, and in PUI institutions can facilitate your program's development and help get early funding support.  You must, however, make sure that your contributions in any collaboration stand out as contributions you were uniquely qualified to make.  When you get to the tenure review you don't want someone to suggest that your collaborator is carrying you.  I have known people who were denied tenure because the committee was not convinced that the candidate's contributions to the papers published showed that there was a viable independent research program.  When you engage in collaborations try to also produce some publications on your own to avoid this pitfall.

How do we know if your work has potential for external funding?   You need to have an identifiable bigger picture issue you are addressing in your research.  As students and postdocs it can become easy to focus on making that next compound and lose sight of the larger scientific issues.  I am the first to admit that I have fallen into this trap where I focused on making molecules rather than on a bigger picture of how these synthesis tell is anything useful about the larger science.  This does not preclude you from publishing your work, but it will make it more difficult to find funding.  There may be some utility in another synthesis of Prelog-Djerassi lactone or Oseltamivir, but unless you have a good scientific hook funding will be difficult to find.

So, to use NSF's term make your research "transformative".  It does not have to shake the world, but it must contribute to the field in a way that catches the interest of reviewers.  Again this is not a trivial task when you are working at a PUI, which I will get into in the next post on the Starting an Academic Career theme.