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[txgalprof]

OK, I go to a campus interview on Monday. This is for the *perfect* job... a really good match for what I want to be doing, in a great location, blah, blah, blah.

After hours of deliberation about topic, focus, etc for the research talk, I am ready to start writing out my notes and putting together the presentation.

The problem is, every time I begin to work, I start to second guess myself. I can come up with all of the weaknesses of the methodology. Every negative comment from reviewers comes back to me. And... I have trouble moving forward.

Anyone have any words of advice?

I've been to interviews before, and I currently have a TT position, so this is somewhat old hat for me. I think the problem is that I REALLY want this job, more so than other jobs in the past.

[username2]

Think of it this way, if they hated your methods, would you be getting an interview? Even if not friendly, there must be something in your work that is of interest to them. Focus on that thought.

[shrek]

Keep It Simple Stupid-- this should be your mantra esp. for more senior folks. Sometimes, those who've been doing research for a while and have several lines of research have a hard time keeping things simple enough for everyone to understand and follow.

[txgalprof]

Thanks for the advice, I spent the whole day sludging through it... but now I have my presentations put together.

One more question-- do you think handouts are advisable? I am in the social sciences. My research has a lot of data/tables/etc that I am putting into the power point, but should I also provide hard copies of these?

[not_a_gradstudent1]

Thanks for the advice, I spent the whole day sludging through it... but now I have my presentations put together.

One more question-- do you think handouts are advisable? I am in the social sciences. My research has a lot of data/tables/etc that I am putting into the power point, but should I also provide hard copies of these?

I wouldn't. When people (especially social scientists) have a bunch of data tables in their hands, they tend to focus on over-analyzing those rather than on what you're saying.

[mleok]

A job talk should ideally be pitched towards the majority of the department which are not in your particular subfield, since those faculty in your subfield are already on your side, otherwise you would not have been shortlisted. In particular, you will have ample opportunity to wow your prospective colleagues in your subfield with your technical brilliance during your one-on-one meeting with them.

I would actually avoid tables whenever possible in a job talk, try to present the material in easier to digest form, say graphs, scatter plots, etc. Txgal, you should most definitely provide much more motivation and high level overview in a job talk than say in a seminar talk.

In particular, as a mathematician, I would say that a job talk is much more like a colloquium than a seminar talk. To get a sense of the difference, look at the following article:

http://www.ams.org/profession/leaders/workshops/gcoll.pdf

Not all the advice is relevant, but the general idea of making your talk broadly accessible is important.

[username2]

But have those slides with tables ready somewhere, outside the main presentation, in case you get someone asking a question about specific interactions. No need to have it in the main presentation, but you look good when you can bust those out during Q&A.

[abdbcb]

txgal, I am in a slightly similar situation, though in humanities. My work is interdisciplinary, and I have a few talks more or less ready to go. Nonetheless I am tweaking and reworking things to no end. This is in part because while I have secured a number of great VAPs, I have yet to get a TT position, and am paranoid, of course, that it is because the talk is not 'good enough'. Everyday as I am making changes to the presentation I am thinking in the back of my head, maybe I should be giving the other one, or rewriting this some other way,etc. I am convinced this is mostly just because I REALLY want this job, but still... my remedy has been to set up a number of rehearsals with colleagues so that I can practice it well and also get some feedback. Hopefully will feel better after that happens.
Good luck to you!!

[txgalprof]

Thanks for all of the advice. I am going to rework my slides to make them less technical.

Should it make a difference that I know that a significant portion of the audience/search comm are methodologists?

ABDBCB-- Good luck to you as well! I'll keep my fingers crossed for you!

[helpful]

Should it make a difference that I know that a significant portion of the audience/search comm are methodologists?

Then the content of your research is important, but even more important is your description of your methodology.

[txgalprof]

Should it make a difference that I know that a significant portion of the audience/search comm are methodologists?

Then the content of your research is important, but even more important is your description of your methodology.

So the theory would be to attempt to explain the (somewhat complex and specialized) methodology in a way in which graduate students would be able to understand it?

[mleok]

Should it make a difference that I know that a significant portion of the audience/search comm are methodologists?

Then the content of your research is important, but even more important is your description of your methodology.

So the theory would be to attempt to explain the (somewhat complex and specialized) methodology in a way in which graduate students would be able to understand it?

In my department, the search committee decides on the short list, but the entire department votes on the short listed candidates, so I wouldn't pitch the talk solely to the search committee. In particular, if there isn't a separate teaching demonstration, then many of the faculty outside your specific subfield are looking to the job talk to get a sense of your teaching ability, and the potential collaboration opportunities.

While it is difficult to make a highly technical topic accessible to everyone, make sure to come up for air regularly, so that people are not left totally behind. If you discuss a deeply technical aspect, after doing so reiterate at a more general level why that result is significant, and contextualize it at a broader level.

[abdbcb]

yes in my situation when I asked the SC for a list of the committee, I was told that the entire department faculty votes so that list no longer matters. Trying to keep it engaging for non-specialists, while demonstrating sophistication to the specialist crowd...

[helpful]

I agree with the others' responses. One consideration, though, is from an experience we have had. A candidate explained hu's methodology in their job talk and then a highly technical (and incomprehensible to the rest of us) question was asked by a department member. The candidate's response factored heavily in the department vote on the candidate because the dept. member in question was consulted later as to what the answer meant in terms of the candidate's research and explanation skills. So even though you might be peeved at such questions, your answer and how you answer it will be important. (it didn't matter in our case that most of us didn't understand either the question or the answer; what mattered was how the dept. member who asked the question felt about the answer).

[zyzzx]

I'm going to revive this. I'm in the same tweaking mode, and while the interview isn't for a while, I just got asked for a title and abstract, so I need to settle on a general direction. My problem is that my research interests are quite broad (in STEM), and I'm working on several different projects that don't have much relation to each other and span two different areas, X and Y. I feel like both areas are more or less equally important in defining me as a researcher, and both are areas I plan to continue working in.
I have department-seminar style talks prepared for area X and area Y, as well as a very overview-y talk that takes a brief look at different projects in both X and Y. I'm happy with how the overview talk flows, and it does have a bit of progression from X to Y, but there's not really time to get into any details or a huge amount of background. It's still pretty accessible - the problems are easy to understand, and I'm not a methodology person, so my techniques aren't new.
It's a small department, and they expressed interest in both sides of me during my phone interview, so I am leaning towards the overview talk, but I don't want to shoot myself in the foot if they are looking for depth.

I guess I'm just looking for some perspective/reassurance from the other side. Is it ok to give a more touristy talk where the goal is for the audience to learn as much as possible about my research agenda, rather than a department seminar style talk where the goal is for the audience to learn something about the topic?