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[qrypt]

With us normal criteria for L=>Sl are exellence in at least two out of: research
teaching
administration.

So just research is not enough. Promotion to reader can be based on research excellence alone. Promotion to full needs to be based on all three.

This is what we are told. The reality recently has been that an 'excellent' for research trumps 'poor' in teaching and service but 'excellent's in teaching and service will not get you promoted with a 'performing at the required level' for research.

Unless you work at a place with corrupt/power-hungry high-level administrators who are willing to reward admin hacks who have no research record to speak of.  A certain Faculty DTL I used to know got promoted to professor despite 1. no PhD 2. no single-authored publications 3. a massively annoying personality.  She was a quality-assurance genius (which is to say, a complete idiot), and that (probably in combination with sexual favors, though this would have had to work for someone whose ideas of attractiveness are vastly different from my own) got her a chair. 

Locally, of course, it gets her no respect, because everyone knows what she really is. 

Good teaching alone will never get you promoted.  But for universities that have embraced the managerial HR culture, "service" is sometimes rewarded. 

[bobavakian]

I'd much rather have someone in my dept who contributes to the dept than someone who publishes yet doesn't contribute.

With the risk of offending the guy who hates Americans...

I'd love to see a system where Research, Teaching, and Service are used in the UK for promotion.

I don't see how "contribution" can be done if an academic is not doing research. It's not either/or it's both. Someone who does not do research is, by definition, doing lousy teaching as they cannot be up with their field. They might be able to do the entertaining bit with the students and/or give them easy marks (the general hallmarks of so-called "excellent teachers" who just don't happen to do any other work), but if it is based on 5-10 year old material, they are cheating the students.

And let us look at this RAE. It demands four piece of work in seven years. I'll say again, four pieces of work in SEVEN YEARS. If there is someone who cannot produce this very very basic amount of research in that timeframe then they are clearly not fit to be hired by a university. And who cares if they are good at committee work. Heck, if I didn't do research I would also have plenty of time to finesse my skills at dragging out mindnumbing and meaningless meetings. But we could also hire a chimp to do that - and it would be a lot more entertaining.

At my place, we have four hours a week contact time with the kiddies. If someone is not spending the rest of the time researching and publishing then they have not got a job - they have a hobby and, given that all unis in the UK are public-funded (except Bucks) then they are, as far as I am concerned, stealing money from the  taxpayer.

The only downside of the RAE is that we all not individually ranked and the results published (and posted on our office doors and on the websites of each university dept). I've got nothing to hide. The freeriders and timewasters however, clearly have. And you'll generally find they are the ones who hate the RAE.

Funny that!

[science_expat]

The only downside of the RAE is that we all not individually ranked and the results published (and posted on our office doors and on the websites of each university dept).

This results from the promotion process.