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Awkward Accommodations

March 2, 2011, 2:39 pm

By Gene C. Fant Jr.

I once overheard a candidate talking about his campus visit. He was picked up at the airport and driven on a quick tour of campus before heading to his overnight accommodations … in the department chair’s guest room.

After a homey meal with the chair’s family, there was some chitchat and then the candidate was offered the option to turn in. The remainder of the evening was spent listening to the chair’s family ending their day and to the sound of the family dog clattering around on the house’s hardwood floors.

The candidate stated that he had felt like he was being interviewed through the entire stay. He worried about his snoring, his bathroom use, making the bed before he left, and how he buttered his toast in the morning. He felt oddly flattered and included by the graciousness of his host, but he felt totally put on the spot by the lack of privacy during an important event in his life.

I thought about this when I recently heard an administrator ponder whether his institution could save money on searches by using faculty guest rooms or potluck meals during the on-campus interview process. I felt like it would be unwise for any number of reasons. I know that $100 for a hotel is real money, but I would be hard pressed to find an upside in this kind of arrangement aside from a financial one.

I have to say that my experiences with accommodations have run quite the range. My current institution put me up in the nicest hotel in town during my interview, a fact that did not go unnoticed. I felt wanted from the time the clerk gave me the warm fresh-baked cookie along with my room key to the time I checked out and merely had to sign a receipt that was charged to the university (no reimbursement to my own credit-card account). That was a sharp contrast with one institution that put me up in an on-campus room that had a rat trap in the corner of the closet. As I walked around campus that evening, I saw why the device was there.

What would you think about a campus that used faculty homes/potlucks for its on-campus candidate visits?

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  • avclark

    Absolutely not! Actually, the two most pleasant experiences I had were at B&Bs, which meant that I didn’t have to see the committee until after breakfast (and coffee). The impulse to be a good host is terrific, but the candidate/guest needs some down time as well.

  • jffoster

    Normally I don’t comment on this blog but since I had two similar such experiences, I will. When I was on the job market way back in the Good Old Days of 1968- ’69– a period known to Anthropology as the Paleoterrific, I was invited for interviews to two colleges where I stayed in faculty homes. One was a small college in a somewhat remote area and staying in faculty home seemed reasonable — and I was invited to dinner in two other faculty homes—was there 3 days. I was treated quite graciously and didn’t feel at all ill at ease.

    The other case was a large university in a city, so hotel accommodations would have been easily available. But the department head offerred his house, and after having taken me to dinner at an outstanding Austro-Hungarian restaurant (I told you all it was the Good OLD Days!), I spent the night and breakfast in the department head’s home — again treated quite graciously and put at ease.

    So it can work. BTW I took the job offer at the latter place, the university, but both were equally kind, effective, efficient, and gracious hosts. (And no, the urban location wasn’t the reason — indeed, that was actually a consideration favoring the job I didn;t take.)

  • queeracademic

    A potluck (i.e., ONE – not for every meal) could be a nice time to socialize in a more casual setting than the nicest restaurant in town. Presumably, there would be a lot of people there and you could have different conversations with different people, instead of a dinner with only 2-3 people from the dept. But I would absolutely not feel comfortable staying in someone’s home. I agree that there is a need for private down time.

  • totoro

    I’d pay for the hotel myself rather than stay at a faculty member house I think. Potluck dinner is fine though. I remember at one interview they sent a grad student to pick me up in her small car that contained a giant dog (great dane or something). I’m scared of dogs. I said sorry, no thanks, and took a taxi….

  • dbcarr

    Faculty guest rooms? No. The on-campus interview is a horribly stressful experience as it is. In theory, it should reproduce some of the conditions a candidate would face on the job: talking with administrators; working with senior colleagues and graduate students; interacting with undergraduates. On the real job, you get to go home and unwind in the privacy of your abode as you think about the day and prepare for the next. You don’t go to a colleague’s house and sleep over, as a rule.

    The same is true for a job search. The candidate needs to have some down time to process what has occurred. Without that down time, a candidate who is highly sought after may be disinclined to accept. It sends a signal about the way the job will be: no down time; relentless colleagues; no chance to be both an excellent teacher-scholar and *human*.

    Pot lucks are acceptable. The only risk is that a candidate may very well find herself disliking a potential colleague’s cooking. That could be awkward. That’s a risk worth taking if there is simply no money for an expensive meal or catering.

  • hgoerdel

    Completely unprofessional. Forced intimacy is tacky no matter the situation.

  • http://whytheology.wordpress.com/ Trey Medley

    Regarding sending a grad student to pick up a job candidate. When I was a Masters student I was (more or less) volunteered to drop off the job candidates. Yes that’s plural. Although they had been picked up seperately, the university was interviewing the top two candidates simultaneously on campus. In fact, aside from their individual interviews with the search committee and associate dean, they were always together (though they did have seperate hotel rooms). Anyway, as they were both interviewing for a single job, needless to say the drive to the airport was more than a little awkward. Especially because one candidate was a little too opinionated (i.e. in an attempt to fill the awkward silence, as they weren’t really chatting, I turned on the radio, which was set on NPR (I thought who could object to NPR). Candidate A (who was in the front seat) announced, “I don’t listen to that garbage” and turned my radio off. What a great way to make an awkward drive even more awkward.)

  • oldphilprof

    What would I think of such an institution? Not much!

  • oldphilprof

    I realize it’s too late to do anything about it now, but I still hope you recounted that candidate’s conduct to the search committee. I have found that what a candidate does outside the standard venues often reveals his/her character more truly. For example, if at all possible, I like a candidate to encounter the dept. secretary before meeting ANYONE else. If she is treated well and courteously, that tells me something about the candidate. If she is treated dismissively, rudely, as a peon, the candidate might as well pack it in and leave.

  • jaded58

    I stayed at the Chair’s house during one interview in the 90′s. He did not have a guest room so I had to stay in his teen son’s bedroom. Frankly it was really a nasty exexperince. By the time I got on the plane I had a horrible migraine. If I was ever put in that situation again, I would pay for the hotel room myself.

    A Potluck would be fine. I never liked those stuffy dinners.

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