In my previous entry, I responded to questions asked by a commenter on a yet earlier entry about this year’s searches at my university.
I left one question for this time: What would we do with an “otherwise stellar candidate who seemed lukewarm about the position or institution?” This is a complex question, because it depends on the context of the search involved. It’s also one that a lot of institutions are going to need to answer more often, as long as academic-job market remains terrible, since more candidates will feel compelled to apply to institutions they might previously have ignored.
First of all, it’s important to note that we don’t particularly want to hire people who are lukewarm about the position or the institution. Being a faculty member anywhere is hard. Being a faculty member at a place you don’t like, or in a job that doesn’t suit your priorities, makes the job doubly hard. And faculty members who are finding the job especially hard for such reasons are not likely to perform at their highest level. Worse, depending on temperament, they are not likely to make much of a positive contribution to the campus atmosphere, either.
However, despite those issues, we may well pursue such a “stellar” candidate for other reasons. We’d look at a number of questions, the most important of which are how critical the hire in question is to the operation of our programs, and how good the pool is or appears likely to become should we extend the search. If the downside of pursuing the candidate is less than letting the position go unfilled, then we probably will keep pursuing. If it looks as though we have a range of options to cover the courses for another year, we’re likely to do that instead.
This whole dilemma is one of the factors that argue for systematic, thorough,, on-campus interviews. The search committee and others can respond to the signals a candidate sends about his or her interest, and can judge just how much of a problem a lack of enthusiasm may become.
The institution’s duty is to find the best possible person to fill whatever needs it is seeking to fill. One of those needs is always to bring in someone who can function effectively in the context of the givens of the open position. If a candidate’s lack of enthusiasm is so palpable as to indicate that such functioning isn’t likely, it’s almost always better to start over again with the search.
Follow On Hiring through your favorite RSS reader:
13 Responses to The Stellar but Unenthusiastic Candidate
jovanevery - March 18, 2010 at 11:14 am
As a follow up question, in cases where you decide to bring in the less than enthusiastic candidate for an on-campus interview, what do you do, as a hiring committee, to identify and address the issues underlying the candidate’s lack of enthusiasm.It seems that many grad students are going into a job search without a lot of knowledge about the pros and cons of different kinds of academic jobs. And they are not being encouraged to research them either, but rather to treat the whole system as a heirarchy in which one would only take a job at certain institutions as a “last resort”. (I exaggerate but hope you get the point.)In ideal circumstances, the hiring institution would not have to deal with this but would simply hire those who had done their research and were enthusiastic, but clearly this is not always possible (or no one would have asked the question you address).
la_profesora - March 18, 2010 at 12:38 pm
It occurs to me that it is not good practice to evaluate candidates on totally subjective, even nebulous things like “enthusiasm.” Some people have more naturally ebullient personalities than others, and it would be a mistake to interpret that as not wanting the gig. It reminds me of a social situation in which I was asked by a nervous hostess about a mutual friend, “Is X having a good time? I can’t tell.” To which I replied, “Oh, he’s doing fine. It’s just that X having a good time looks pretty much the same as X not having a good time.” It is asking quite a lot when you want someone to be a top-notch teacher and scholar AND have a bubbly personality!
sinatra - March 18, 2010 at 12:42 pm
I think another thing to take into consideration regarding a “lukewarm” candidate is the time of day when the interview is conducted. I once did a phone interview for a position at 6:00 p.m. The committee was calling me from two time zones away, so for them it was still the work day. I doubt that I could have been anything but lukewarm after a full day of classes, office hours, advising, and paperwork. From the other end of the table, after a full day of interviewing, we don’t press candidates in the final session of the day too hard because we understand that the interview gauntlet is a lot to endure. That’s why I agree with one of your earlier columns about the need to think seriously about schedules when putting campus interviews together. I think something similar should be said about scheduling phone interviews. No one should strive to put a “stellar” candidate–or any candidate–in a situation where s/he would be talking with a make-or-break constituency and be anything less than “fresh.”
rneedles - March 18, 2010 at 1:53 pm
Sinatra, good points. Situational factors can impede the perceived enthusiasm of a candidate. Most higher education interviewers say to be the first candidate in the morning to be interviewed for a potential job opportunity. The last three jobs I have interviewed for in higher education, could have been conducted by “are you smarter than a fifth grader.” Questions like; will this job be a challenge for you? What do you have a passion for? Well that is obvious, if you read my CV, teaching in higher education. The whole interview thing on the phone is quite unprofessional. I do not like being subjectively guaged by someone on the phone? Too much lack of transparency and good old politics in higher education. I have really become disillusioned with the whole teaching process. Not to mention the lack of equitable pay, no benefits, and lack of advancement for adjunct faculty members.
honore - March 19, 2010 at 8:35 am
Yet another reason that phone interviews are worthless, give incomplete and inaccurate “insight” into the candidate. I will usually do 1 phone interview, but when the institution asks for a 2nd I hang-up. Nothing says “less-than-entusiastic” on the part of an institution than endless phone interviews conducted by “less-than-enthusiastic” SC lackeys who would rather be trolling boutiques on 5th Avenue. Are you listing Parsons?
physicsprof - March 19, 2010 at 12:35 pm
I do not know much about humanities, but in sciences those institutions that want phone interviews are really places you would like to stay away from (of course unless you really NEED a job and cannot get anything better, in which case you grab whatever is available). Phone interview is a signature of an inferiority complex in a typically mediocre institution that fools itself on being able to screen out “lukewarm candidates” or “bad fits”. At the end of the day they screen out all but those who can lie most convincingly (that they dreamed for the whole life to live 20 miles from a shopping mall in a place filled with such outstanding world-renowned scholars). The rules of a good search are very simple actually:– invite candidates with best records– but know your place in the academic food chain and don’t play Harvard if you are not– strive to give offers to people who are better than your current faculty — don’t look out too much for “enthusiastic candidates”, their enthusiasm will be even more visible during an interview at a better institution
rneedles - March 19, 2010 at 2:50 pm
I neglected to mention, the over over exuberant candidate. This retired gentlemen (Ph.D) I work out at the gym with once told me he lost a job (administration) because he showed too much excitement for the position at the interview. This was the answer he received after the interview process. His friend was part of the hiring committee. It is subjective perception. Recently, I had an interview with Exxon-Mobil for a process technician (maintenance) job. Essential job functions were; high school diploma, some experience (I have 13 years) and pass an assessment test. Went to the interview and the first question the inteviewer states is; we see that you have a MBA, do you know what this job entails? I did not get the job, starting at $70,000 a year. I believe in some interviewing processes, people get intimiadated, fell insecure, question their own self-worth, and imagine the person they are interviewing could be thier own boss someday if they get hired. It happens, you can be discriminated against in many different forms.
aandsdean - March 19, 2010 at 8:25 pm
Physics prof, your rules are fine, maybe, for a research institution where you don’t mind if you on occasion hire dysfunctional trolls who spend all their time in the lab compiling stellar research records, but in an institution where teaching is more important, and where you’re NOT an Ivy, you don’t really know who the best candidate is (even who’s better than your current faculty) without talking to more than the 2 or 3 you’re going to bring to campus.It’s really not terribly hard to screen out candidates who don’t want the job. They use phrases like “mediocre institution” and “academic food chain.”
physicsprof - March 19, 2010 at 10:46 pm
Aandsdean,Why do you think that “talking to more than the 2 or 3 you’re going to bring to campus” on the phone will help you to figure out who the best candidate is? You might think that you really can (by subtle clues overheard over the phone), but in all honesty this is just an illusion. If you are looking for a competent teacher rather than researcher, all the better, still look at her teaching records, read evaluations, ask for practice lectures, but by all means do not confuse “lukewarmness” with teaching abilities. You don’t seriously believe that good but lukewarm teacher will teach badly because he does not like the institution, do you? First, people good at something take pride in doing that well. Second, somebody who is looking for a way out from an institution is especially interested in keeping up impressive academic cretentials.But at the end it is a matter of taste. I would rather prefer a strong but lukewarm colleague who will leave in a few years than a weaker enthusiastic one who will stay in one place for the entire career because no one wants him. You might disagree.
aandsdean - March 20, 2010 at 3:19 pm
Physicsprof, the big issue is that one is not merely looking for enthusiasm in a phone interview. There are a number of things one might discuss. And, you should know since you’re in the sciences, that a lot of new Ph.D.s or people just emerging from postdocs don’t have very much (or any) real teaching experience and therefore can’t produce a portfolio of materials of the type you describe.So: can someone articulate some sense of how s/he would approach issue X in the classroom? What is the candidate’s interest in collaborative research and/or mentoring with students? Can the candidate speak lucidly and intelligently about his/her research? Can the candidate articulate a philosophy of undergrad science education? Can the candidate think on his or her feet?When you get 100 or so applications and 50 or so of those are from well-qualified applicants, I utterly defy you to identify the most promising three from that pile. You can pretty easily narrow the list to ten or a dozen. So you talk to them. The ones who do best on the phone (and again, this is not all or even mostly about their “enthusiasm”) are the ones you invite to campus. And you’re flatly in errof that “somebody who is looking for a way out from an institution” is going to spend time on teaching. Somebody who is looking for a way out of an institution is going to spend time and energy on what will get that person out of the institution, and strong teaching isn’t it. Which is why you want to try to hire the strongest possible person who’s most likely as well to be interested in the institution’s kind of work. Which is why you can’t just hire someone from paper, because in general, a lot of this kind of issue doesn’t leave many traces on paper.
ansleyv - March 21, 2010 at 11:46 am
I might add that someone might be apprehensive or lukewarm in a phone interview because they are not sure if the institution is a good fit for whatever reason. However, upon visiting the campus might have a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT reaction and immediately fall in love with the place.As more institutional websites look the same, and college promotional materials feel the same, it is very difficult for a candidate to gauge if a place would be good for him/her, their family and so on. Reputation alone makes a difference–but there are plenty would be happy teaching some place if it feels right.Search committees should remember that they are recruiting the candidate as much as they are vetting him/her. The old adversarial model (let’s see how they perform under pressure) may not yield the best new colleague.
ansleyv - March 21, 2010 at 11:49 am
And I need to proofread more carefully: Reputation makes a difference–but there are plenty who would be happy teaching some place if it feels right.
john_drake - March 22, 2010 at 10:10 am
Here’s a thought: at the on campus interview, find out how much the candidate knows about your institution and how much thought she or he put into figuring out how he or she will make a contribution there. A person who gets to the on campus stage but doesn’t take the time to learn anything about the place isn’t likely to be a good fit or care about your department or hesitate before going back on the job market.