The Value of the Interview Bootcamp, by Kellee
Today’s post is by Kellee Weinhold, who shares her insights after taking over the Interview Bootcamps in November. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ After a few weeks of interview bootcamps,...
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Do Your Homework! A Live Report From a Job Search
Sometimes readers send me “reports from the front” of the job searches in their departments. Last week I got this report from a former client who wanted to tell me about how a young ABD candidate...
View ArticleHow Do I Ask If There Is An Inside Candidate?
You do not ask if there is an inside candidate. I don’t care if you strongly suspect that there is, and have good reason to believe the whole damned search is a completely pointless charade because...
View ArticleHow Do I Address Search Committee Members?
I am hereby answering the question of the hour/day/year: how should you address search committee members in an interview? You know of course that I am continually railing against job candidates acting...
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What You’ll Learn in the Campus Visit Webinar
I’m sending out this extra blog post this week to let you know about the new Campus Visit Webinar tomorrow, Wednesday 1/16 at 2 PM Pacific/5 PM EST/22:00 GMT. I’m really excited about this new webinar,...
View ArticleThe Weepy Teaching Statement: Just Say No
A while back I wrote a post called “The Worst Job Letter Ever Written (Not Really).” Today I want to share with you a similarly awful teaching statement (with kind permission of the writer, discipline...
View ArticleStop Negotiating Like a Girl
This post comes from an email exchange this week, with a client who is working with me on Negotiating Assistance. Discipline, institution, etc. all excised. She has more than one offer, and drafted an...
View ArticleGerund Addiction and Word Repetition–Two More Scourges
Faithful readers know that I have several posts on different kinds of writing tics that plague many academic writers. These include list addiction, dyad addiction, and cheap adjectives. There are two...
View ArticleNobody Cares What You’re Interested In
One very common error that writers of job documents make is going on and on about what they are interested in. It’s often quite a writing tic. “I am interested in…. and I am particularly interested...
View ArticleWhy Have I No Power? Thoughts on Negotiating the Tenure Track Offer
I was working with a Negotiating Assistance client last week, and about halfway through our work, as I said for the fourth time or so, “you can’t really ask for ALL of that; you’ll have to pick and...
View ArticleFor North Americans: the peculiar British interview process (A Guest Post)
This wonderful post on the British academic interview process is written by Kean Birch, an Assistant Professor in the Department of Social Science at York University in Canada. It was originally...
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Three New Webinars, and Campus Visit Thank You Etiquette
Today I want to answer an urgent query from readers that I am asked at least once a week, about the etiquette of thanking a department that has hosted you on a campus visit. And then tell you about...
View ArticleHow To Write a Journal Article Submission Cover Letter
Today’s post is a special request post for several clients who have written to inquire how to write a cover letter for the submission of an article manuscript to a journal. ****Addendum (4/29/13):...
View ArticleOf Cover Letters and Magic (A Follow-up Post)
There is some advice I give that I believe in fiercely and will defend to the death (ref: Should I Do an Edited Collection?). And then there is some advice I give that I am very willing to concede...
View ArticleHow To Identify Yourself as a Diversity Hire
One of the most important things a job document can do is communicate an applicant’s status with regard to diversity hiring. If you qualify as a diversity hire, you must make sure the committee knows...
View ArticleThe Six Ways You’re Acting Like a Grad Student (And how that’s killing you on...
For the next few months I will be posting the “best of the best” Professor is in blog posts on the job market, for the benefit of all those girding their loins for the 2013-2014 market....
View ArticleWhy Your Job Cover Letter Sucks (and what you can do to fix it)
For the next few months I will be posting the “best of the best” Professor is in blog posts on the job market, for the benefit of all those girding their loins for the 2013-2014 market. Today’s post...
View ArticleWhy You Don’t Need ExtenZe®
Sorry, I couldn’t resist. What I am actually here to speak about today is why you don’t need “extends.” What is “extends”? “Extends” is what practically every single one of you says that your research...
View ArticleTeaching: Not When and Where but What and How
When discussing teaching in the teaching paragraph of your letter, one of the temptations is to tell a chronological tale of how you taught as an adjunct here and an adjunct there, and taught this...
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Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road? Topic vs. Contribution
When writing job letters clients often struggle to understand the distinction between their dissertation TOPIC and their dissertation CONTRIBUTION. In the first dissertation paragraph you talk about...
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