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[FirstTimeInterviewee]

I have gone on a small college campus interview for an assist prof job about a month ago and have not heard any news yet.  They told me they would definitely make their decision before the xmas break, so I presume I did not make it.  Would it be ok if I write to one of the nicer profs I met to ask for a feedback?  I don't care so much about why they did not hire me; rather, I’d like to know what I should improve.  Is this done or appropriate?

[%sig%]

[Another Boring Anon]

I'd hold off if I were you.  There are a couple of threads about why asking "why didn't you hire me" is a bad idea, but more importantly, you haven't heard from them that they _didn't_ want you.

Professors on hiring committees are just people--they are out of contact over the holidays, the dean is not available to sign things, the secretary is doing syllabi for the spring and isn't yet sending out the "no" letters.  Plus, their first choice may be bobbing and weaving and stalling to hear from other interviews.  They aren't getting sadistic glee out of making you wait--I was on a committee this summer and wanted to throttle our first choice candidate for jerking us around and making the other candidates wait.  In the end, we end up hiring the second place choice.

If you contact anyone, make it the chair of the committee, and contain yourself to asking about the "status of the search".

[C. L.]

My experience has been that people who want you will call you right away because they want to know if you'll accept it. If you don't get that call, then maybe you'll get a nice letter a month or even months later. Sometimes you get no reply at all.