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[lasquires]

In this recent article on the Advice page, Leonard Cassuto posits two potential job candidates.

Candidate A: finishes her PhD quickly but has little in terms of teaching experience and publications.

Candidate B: takes three more years to finish but walks away having taught a variety of classes and with a couple of pubs in good journals.

Cassuto suggests that A's efforts to finish early are essentially wasted, since she will have to spend 2-3 extra years on the market (possibly unemployed) in order to acquire the credentials of Candidate B.

However, couldn't there be a hypothetical Candidate C who finishes well under the average time to degree for her field, gets some decent teaching experience, and has an article or two accepted by the time she defends?

In other words, is this sort of a false dilemma? Does faster PhD always equal lower overall productivity and vice versa? The subsequent comments suggest that there is a sizable grey area and that the decision between potential and product isn't always as stark as Cassuto presents it. I'm curious what experience SC members here think.

[totoro]

As I commented, we were interviewing a candidate today and the committee raised the issue that they had taken a long time to complete. They are definitely a B type. I was a C type. I was very pragmatic about my dissertation research. I used stuff I already had started for various classes to generate an essay/article based dissertation. This is now the norm in my adopted field and on average it takes 5 or so years to completion in the US. I took 4. I also only took the minimum number of required courses. I had about 5 papers published (quant social science) and had taught one course as instructor and TA-ed labs etc. for one year. I got a university fellowship the first year and a fellowship from a foundation the 3rd year. I also was already a post-doc (outside the US - I did the PhD in the US) in my 4th year (that was my 4th year funding source). So it's possible for very pragmatic candidates who work out how to play the academic game quickly.

At the US university where I was a tenured prof and DGS we really had to finish everyone in 4 years too due to restrictions on completion time, funding etc. And it more or less happened. Here in this country it is a similar story.

[hegemony]

Obviously a C would trump both A and B, all other things being equal.  I think that's clear; what's less clear is who to hire when C has been snagged by a richer university and the SC is left with finalists A and B. 

I have to say that I haven't actually seen too many A's.  The students who publish energetically tend to finish energetically too, and vice versa: the students who write articles slowly also write dissertations slowly, and if they tend not to finish articles, they also tend not to finish dissertations.  So I'm not sure the dilemma comes all that often.  Anyway, in the last SC I was on, no one who hadn't published made the short list, so we weren't faced with any finalists who hadn't published but had finished speedily.

[larryc]

three more years to finish

Three years to teach a couple of courses and put out two articles?!

Then there is Candidate D, who spends a decade in grad school and ends up with a few measly pubs and teaches Survey 101 twenty-seven times. Someone trying to follow the article advice would be far more likely to become D than B.

[lasquires]

That's pretty much what I suspected. Obviously, I'm asking for self-interested reasons. I'm defending pretty well ahead of my grad school cohort, but I like to think I have quite a bit to show for four years past the M.A. in terms research, teaching, and even service. After reading that article, I was wondering what could I possibly accomplish with a few more years in grad school but a little more of the same without the guaranteed support of my department.

On edit: I hear you, larryc. I think I know far more C's and D's than I do A's and B's, but for all I know, my impressions are parochial.

[seniorscholar]

My doctoral students tend to have taught a great deal (we're not generous in funding, but I make sure they have taught not only the intro courses but also advanced classes in the major and in allied interdisciplinary programs while doing the 2 courses per semester they need for their stipends until the final year, when a dissertation fellowship becomes available). Most of them also (again, for financial reasons) teach a summer course or two at other nearby colleges of various types and/or do a lot of placement-test reading and other academic support chores so they can eat during the summer. They usually have an article in a lesser journal by the time they finish the PhD, as well as having the PhD in hand. They complete (MA plus PhD, since we do direct admit to the doctoral program) in 7 years.

I don't know what "letter of the alphabet" that is, but virtually all of them quickly achieve TT positions at smaller, non-elite liberal arts colleges, regional state universities, or other teaching-centered places. The students of a  colleague who takes pride in protecting students from teaching through various RA positions, sneers at adjuncting at other types of college, and "expects" immediate publication (often co-publications with colleague) has had perhaps two students over the past two decades with positions at R-1 schools . . . and some who are freeway-flyer adjuncts doing composition courses everywhere 6 or 7 years beyond the Ph.D.

Now note: we are a mid-ranked program in English, so our odds of producing people whose degree impresses star universities are not high. My belief is that the people who behave like star faculty at the big-name universities they themselves attended are generally deluding themselves and their students. Those of us who prepare them for teaching + moderate publication over the years are more likely, fifteen years later, to have graduates who are tenured (and sometimes department chairs) in decent but no-name schools, and by now also have a book to their name.

[oldfullprof]

Generally no one notices how long you took-- unless it's embarrassingly long.

[johnr]

three more years to finish

Three years to teach a couple of courses and put out two articles?!

Then there is Candidate D, who spends a decade in grad school and ends up with a few measly pubs and teaches Survey 101 twenty-seven times.

Ouch.  Poor Survey 101 teachers, never get any respect.

[readandwept]

Generally no one notices how long you took-- unless it's embarrassingly long.

At what point does it become "embarrassing" in your field?

It seems like on the margin, the choice is rarely between taking three extra years to do a ton more things, but whether to take one additional year to do a more ambitious dissertation and/or get out more publications. I'm interested to know at what point one has been in school long enough that this becomes risky.

[merinoblue]

Generally no one notices how long you took-- unless it's embarrassingly long.

At what point does it become "embarrassing" in your field?

It seems like on the margin, the choice is rarely between taking three extra years to do a ton more things, but whether to take one additional year to do a more ambitious dissertation and/or get out more publications. I'm interested to know at what point one has been in school long enough that this becomes risky.

I'm curious, too.  It's potentially problematic if you've had an interruption that's extended your PhD past the norm, but of course, you can't indicate this in the application.

[voxprincipalis]

Generally no one notices how long you took-- unless it's embarrassingly long.

Or embarrassingly short. Oh, wait, we're talking about PhDs, aren't we? Forget I said that.

I think that anyone who is truly the Candidate A type has mistaken "finishing the degree" with "being ready to get a job." There is more to being employable than having PhD in hand, as demonstrated not only by the many PhDs who don't end up with jobs but also by the ABDs who do.

VP

[oldfullprof]

At what point does it become "embarrassing" in your field?

The 10-15 year people.  Often people know who they are, or may be able to figure it out from the vita.

[bluezebracat]

I was having a discussion with a senior person in my sub-field, and he thought that 4-6 would be suspicious, while 8-10 (including masters) is the norm.  10-12 is not uncommon. 12+ looks odd, unless the topic is horrendously complicated, in which case, why didn't the advisor nip it in the bud.

I would say: depends on your field.

[lyndonparker]

+1. Some disciplines, such as anthropology, require extended fieldwork that makes a quicker exit improbable. When I have been on SCs I only noticed when someone seemed to take an extraordinary amount of time to finish.

[octoprof]

In other words, is this sort of a false dilemma? Does faster PhD always equal lower overall productivity and vice versa? The subsequent comments suggest that there is a sizable grey area and that the decision between potential and product isn't always as stark as Cassuto presents it. I'm curious what experience SC members here think.

Yes, it's a false dilemma. How can we assume that any quick finisher is also not going to get teaching experience and publish?  The quick finisher as someone else mentioned might just be a more efficient worker who does more with his or her time.

I was a quick finisher (under 4 years to PhD) with publications (very unusual in my field back then) and teaching experience (we all got plenty of that).

Of course, the other thing to consider is these things will matter more to SC in overcrowded fields and less to SCs in fields with shortages.  AS bluezebract says, it's field dependent.

I would think the high research bar schools would be wary of any slow finisher even if he or she had some pubs.  The more teaching oriented schools might be wary of someone with no teaching experience (Can you get a PhD without teaching? That would be pretty rare in my field.).

Fast isn't always better but slow is often worse.