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How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tenure-track-faculty Life

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Re: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tenure-track-faculty Life

#21

Post by impendia »

rogerchucker wrote: post #6
jforman wrote: post #3

This strategy would quickly lose its merit outside of Harvard. Failing to gain tenure at Harvard is the expected outcome, so a) the sense of rejection is less, and b) your remaining job prospects are good because this is generally recognized (and it's Harvard). Asking somebody at a high-tenure-rate, second-tier school to treat their tenure track position as an extended post-doc is essentially asking them to have a fa…

Agreed - would love to see this coming from a second-tier grad school faculty.

Okay, that's me.

I more or less endorse the article. Seven years is a lot of time. I'd only give someone new a little bit of advice.

(1) Do a good job of your teaching, but economize on the effort you put into it. (2) Be civil to everyone, from the department head on down to the janitor. (3) Do your service/committee work as asked, and do it cheerfully, but for the most part don't go the extra mile. (And when you do go the extra mile, do so because you believe it's important, not because you believe it will win you brownie points.)

But above all:

(4) Kick ass in your scholarship.

There are plenty of sources that purport to break down and explain (4), some of which are worth reading, especially if caught in a rut -- but if you are successfully kicking ass, and paying at least minimal attention to career advice when it comes your way -- then I'd only worry about continuing to kick ass.

That is my perspective anyway.

Re: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tenure-track-faculty Life

#22

Post by startupstella »

This article is great because the author has an authentic voice and explains how she achieved a measure of success without succumbing to outside pressures or norms.

It's a good framework for thinking about any high stress, competitive career track. Ultimately, stress/pressure greatly affect performance and peoples' perceptions of you, both of which are paramount in ascending hierarchies.

Re: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tenure-track-faculty Life

#23

Post by dkrich »

jpatokal wrote: post #19
dkrich wrote: post #11

Not to sound overly critical, but is it just me or does this come off as a somewhat selfish point of view? My father was a tenured professor and growing up I heard enough horror stories from his department to know that a career as a professor at a research university is no easy career. But at the same time, isn't a major part of your job instructing students? I understand the importance of grants, conducting research…

Uhh -- the article is mostly about not jumping through hoops to get tenure, and instead considering postdoc a 7-year job and an end to itself.

I'm not suggesting that there isn't merit to what she says, I'm just saying that it came off to me as an article explaining "how I learned to bide my time in this place for 7 years and eschew the typical advice aimed for those who are content to struggle towards tenure."

I've spent a lot of time in academia myself. I was a TA in computer science and have taught undergrads so I was exposed to the political battles and stresses that go on. Perhaps I am misinterpreting what she is saying and she is really just speaking of dealing with all the BS that comes with working at a research university and the importance of teaching is a given. The part about writing out every day that she only has to be there for 7 years is a bit unsettling for a professor though. If I were a freshman CS student it wouldn't instill a lot of confidence that my professor wrote down that she was only going to have to be there for a set period of time in order to get amped up to come in and teach my class.

Re: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tenure-track-faculty Life

#24

Post by stevenbedrick »

opminion wrote: post #17
dkrich wrote: post #11

Not to sound overly critical, but is it just me or does this come off as a somewhat selfish point of view? My father was a tenured professor and growing up I heard enough horror stories from his department to know that a career as a professor at a research university is no easy career. But at the same time, isn't a major part of your job instructing students? I understand the importance of grants, conducting research…

She doesn't mention any teaching, but I wouldn't take that as not caring about teaching. She discusses the things that she needs to assign a priority to, and risk creeping in (or out). Not knowing any particulars I would guess that teaching, albeit time consuming, does not pose that risk.

She actually does mention teaching- she lists sub-par problem sets as a contributing factor to a particular month being difficult, and she groups teaching in with research as her non-quota-having activities. But I suspect that your analysis is fundamentally correct.

Re: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tenure-track-faculty Life

#25

Post by dnautics »

It's unbelievably easy and condescending for someone who has a tenure-track junior faculty position at harvard to call it a "seven-year postdoc". However, the advice is generally good.

I do however take issue with this: "I guess my hope is to add one more option to the list, which is covering your ears and making up your own rules." No... That shouldn't be a hope. You should just do it.

Re: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tenure-track-faculty Life

#26

Post by dnautics »

eykanal wrote: post #10

Awesome. On the "stop taking advice" idea: when I was a grad student (and postdoc), I kept notes in a personal wiki. I had a page entitled "Things Other People Have Suggested I Do". I didn't do most of them. Even more so, it was such a liberating feeling to look at it and tell myself, "I don't have to do any of that crap, I have my own research plan."

I have to say, that my graduate degree was salvaged because I took the advice of a grad student, a postdoc, and an assistant professor (and totally blew off my advisors/committee). So, not all advice is bad.

Re: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tenure-track-faculty Life

#27

Post by spartango »

bobbles wrote: post #16
dkrich wrote: post #11

Not to sound overly critical, but is it just me or does this come off as a somewhat selfish point of view? My father was a tenured professor and growing up I heard enough horror stories from his department to know that a career as a professor at a research university is no easy career. But at the same time, isn't a major part of your job instructing students? I understand the importance of grants, conducting research…

Thanks for my first laugh out loud moment for today. Out of the 20-30 or so lecturers I can remember from my degree in computer science, there was only maybe two I can think of that had any interest at all in actually communicating ideas and teaching students. The vast majority of the lecturers were objviously focused on their research and even student questions about assignments / exams / any issue at all were direc…

Harvard is somewhat peculiar in the way it selects and impresses upon faculty the importance of teaching. That's not to say that all Harvard professors are great teachers, but there's certainly an emphasis on it that is less common.

Re: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tenure-track-faculty Life

#28

Post by spartango »

mdwelsh wrote: post #5

The author of this article is a friend and former colleague (I had the office next door to hers at Harvard, when I was on the faculty there). Many of the reasons she cites for being "miserable" as a faculty member reflect why I left a tenured faculty job for industry. Nearly all junior faculty I know describe it as a survival process. Given this I fail to understand why being a professor remains such an attractive ca…

What's scary is that this represents a fairly luxurious set of pain-points relative to the ones I've seen junior faculty members in the biological sciences exposed to at Harvard.

The conveniences and cultural differences of the CS community are a stark contrast to academic biology. Considering the author's observations:

First, the opt-out options are often fewer and further between; making the jump between basic science work and industrial biotech/pharma can be very difficult depending on your area of interest.

Then, as a biologist, it can be incredibly difficult to restrict your working hours, as experimental (e.g. cell culture) work can operate with delays or intervals. Stepping out at the wrong time means your cells die.

Beyond the unpredictable timing, there's more uncertainty around whether experiments will physically work, and it can be nigh impossible engineer your way out of certain failures.

Further, the benchmarks for "contribution to the field" in biology can be extremely unforgiving; publishing papers in journals outside of Nature, Science, or Cell fails to paint a compelling picture.

These things are added on to the things pointed out in the piece. Extra hurdles.

That's not to say that biological science fields are evil or that faculty paths are never worth considering. But having worked in the lab of a junior faculty member, you can see the pressure and challenges.

Re: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tenure-track-faculty Life

#29

Post by dnautics »

jamesaguilar wrote: post #15
dkrich wrote: post #11

Not to sound overly critical, but is it just me or does this come off as a somewhat selfish point of view? My father was a tenured professor and growing up I heard enough horror stories from his department to know that a career as a professor at a research university is no easy career. But at the same time, isn't a major part of your job instructing students? I understand the importance of grants, conducting research…

People optimize for the metrics they are set. To the degree teaching is rewarded, they will focus on teaching. I know a number of PhDs with aspirations of tenure. Not one has said they went into it to teach.

I was a PhD with an aspiration of tenure, AND I went into it to teach, I am actually quite a good teacher, but I happen to be much better at research, and enjoy doing research, and I enjoy leading researchers. However, much better is not quite good enough in light of that maybe being good at research is not what is selected for in the faculty search. I missed every single one of my attempts to get a position, two years running, so I'm giving up on academia and its stupid politics, and starting an independent nonprofit research institute. Since there will be no students, there will be no teaching, so in doing so I will effectively be giving up what I wanted to go into academia for in the first place.

Re: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tenure-track-faculty Life

#30

Post by rwallace »

electronous wrote: post #20

Another thing to take away from this article: people with kids have less time to spend doing their jobs.

Another thing to take away from that: hire someone with kids if you have the option. Maximum output of intellectual work is achieved with a 30-40 hour working week. The author settled on a 50+ hour working week, which is higher than optimum, enough to degrade her judgment and productivity - but only somewhat, not catastrophically; she was still able to get good work done. It's clear that without children, she would have settled on a substantially longer working week, probably enough to destroy her judgment and the quality of her work.
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