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[itried]

We need to give the untenured the chance to blossom, not to collapse under the weight of poorly-written minutes and unnecessary task force agenda items! Overloading Assistant Profs with too much service is the best and most efficient way to lose them before they have the chance to impress us...

Yes, this is my point. The President of my uni appoints young faculty to all the heavy service committees. As I posted on another thread, our current Strategic Planning Steering Committee is made up of all 40-ish faculty members who are busting their buns in new leadership roles in their departments. This was the President's idea, which is one of many reasons his judgment is not widely respected across campus.

[usukprof]

Perhaps senior faculty should explain to him that this should change, unless service is weighed more heavily than research and teaching at your institution.

[itried]

The President of my university doesn't listen to anyone. We tried for years to talk with him, and finally we all threw up our hands. Now we just resort to b!tching about him behind his back whenever the latest idiotic, unilateral decision comes down the pike.

[octoprof]

I <3 larryc. I am not ashamed.

The higher up you go, the higher the expectations are that you are going to contribute, in a significant way, beyond teaching and publishing - at least it's that way at most universities.  Being the full prof means you have to take your turn on THAT HORRID COMMITTEE that you'd never saddle a junior faculty member with. It also means one of you full profs in the department/school will have to be on the tenure/promotions committee, and one on the IRB, and so on and so forth. If your department/school isn't full of full profs, that means the few have to serve the most.

Dr. O, who sits cloaked through many a committee so my junior colleagues don't have to

[systeme_d_]

The President of my university doesn't listen to anyone. We tried for years to talk with him, and finally we all threw up our hands. Now we just resort to b!tching about him behind his back whenever the latest idiotic, unilateral decision comes down the pike.

I used to work there!  How is the old butthead?

[seething_sock]

Ours is a$$-backward.

Our department head has put associate profs as division leaders and assistant profs in committees which have charges for far-reaching changes in the department. The rationale appears to be to let junior faculty feel invested in their department and be enthusiastic about bringing changes into play that they will see in ensuing years as they move up the ranks - that is, assuming that rank-up-moving is possible with a throttled research program.

It's kind of like we're being given something to nurture. In an ideal world, we're given flowers. In reality, we're given roach farms.

Worse, our roaches have to be cute enough for senior faculty to want to pet them and give them treats.

[traductio]

Ours is a$$-backward.

Our department head has put associate profs as division leaders and assistant profs in committees which have charges for far-reaching changes in the department. The rationale appears to be to let junior faculty feel invested in their department and be enthusiastic about bringing changes into play that they will see in ensuing years as they move up the ranks - that is, assuming that rank-up-moving is possible with a throttled research program.

It's kind of like we're being given something to nurture. In an ideal world, we're given flowers. In reality, we're given roach farms.

Worse, our roaches have to be cute enough for senior faculty to want to pet them and give them treats.

[bitter, angry post sympathetic to your situation redacted]

[robert_smithson]

Being the full prof means you have to take your turn on THAT HORRID COMMITTEE that you'd never saddle a junior faculty member with.

Gawd, no kidding. It's called service: you gotta serve whether you like it or not! That thing you get to choose--where personal interests are the only thing that matters--that is called research. Another thing to consider: if there's a committee no one wants to be on and you hold on to your place on the easy one because, well, you are a self-centered and coddled academic who can do that, it means another one of us has to continue our time on the crappy one(s). And maybe we'll go to the chair and b*tch about you (unprofessionally, of course).

[usukprof]

Being the full prof means you have to take your turn on THAT HORRID COMMITTEE that you'd never saddle a junior faculty member with.

Gawd, no kidding. It's called service: you gotta serve whether you like it or not! That thing you get to choose--where personal interests are the only thing that matters--that is called research. Another thing to consider: if there's a committee no one wants to be on and you hold on to your place on the easy one because, well, you are a self-centered and coddled academic who can do that, it means another one of us has to continue our time on the crappy one(s). And maybe we'll go to the chair and b*tch about you (unprofessionally, of course).

It ought to be a little better than this.  Our chair attempts to match people to committees based on interest and expertise, and take requests from people.  For example, I am on the school library committee.  While it is relatively low effort, it is one that both matches my interests and has import to express the needs of the department to the school.

Sure there will still be a set of high-work awful committees on which nobody wants to work.

[polly_mer]

Being the full prof means you have to take your turn on THAT HORRID COMMITTEE that you'd never saddle a junior faculty member with.

Gawd, no kidding. It's called service: you gotta serve whether you like it or not! That thing you get to choose--where personal interests are the only thing that matters--that is called research. Another thing to consider: if there's a committee no one wants to be on and you hold on to your place on the easy one because, well, you are a self-centered and coddled academic who can do that, it means another one of us has to continue our time on the crappy one(s). And maybe we'll go to the chair and b*tch about you (unprofessionally, of course).

It ought to be a little better than this.  Our chair attempts to match people to committees based on interest and expertise, and take requests from people. 

That's great in a place that has enough people to fill the necessary committees.  I'm starting a TT position in the fall and I will be assigned to committees on the basis of "we need someone and you have no current assignments".  After a few years, perhaps, interest will matter, but right now, a probably-trainable body in a slot is more important to a small place.

[octoprof]

Being the full prof means you have to take your turn on THAT HORRID COMMITTEE that you'd never saddle a junior faculty member with.

Gawd, no kidding. It's called service: you gotta serve whether you like it or not! That thing you get to choose--where personal interests are the only thing that matters--that is called research. Another thing to consider: if there's a committee no one wants to be on and you hold on to your place on the easy one because, well, you are a self-centered and coddled academic who can do that, it means another one of us has to continue our time on the crappy one(s). And maybe we'll go to the chair and b*tch about you (unprofessionally, of course).

It ought to be a little better than this.  Our chair attempts to match people to committees based on interest and expertise, and take requests from people. 

That's great in a place that has enough people to fill the necessary committees.  I'm starting a TT position in the fall and I will be assigned to committees on the basis of "we need someone and you have no current assignments".  After a few years, perhaps, interest will matter, but right now, a probably-trainable body in a slot is more important to a small place.

Interests and expertise are good, but many committee assignments and faculty do not meet in the middle. I'm on THAT Committee because I have the most expertise at THAT but I detest THAT Committee with a purpose passion. I'm hoping I can do my three years and run away forever.

Another issue is for certain university committees including THAT Committee and others such as Tenure/Promotion, many schools/depts prefer to send a full professor. If the faculty is not heavily weighted toward full profs (as ours is not) then that means the full profs take on a higher percentage of those university committees while also, at least in many cases I've experienced, sitting on and or chairing many college level committees.

[robert_smithson]

Ours is a$$-backward.

Our department head has put associate profs as division leaders and assistant profs in committees which have charges for far-reaching changes in the department. The rationale appears to be to let junior faculty feel invested in their department and be enthusiastic about bringing changes into play that they will see in ensuing years as they move up the ranks - that is, assuming that rank-up-moving is possible with a throttled research program.

It's kind of like we're being given something to nurture. In an ideal world, we're given flowers. In reality, we're given roach farms.

Worse, our roaches have to be cute enough for senior faculty to want to pet them and give them treats.

I'm familiar with this game. In reality, what you're being given is the work of the department by on-their-way-out-deadwood who don't want to be bothered. Seen too much of that in my day. Heard recently: "I'm going to retire soon, and this program [that has to be run to do the committee assignment] seems like kind of an investment."  

[larryc]

Whatever happened to LightningStrike? Hey, LS, please come back and tell us that you are not as bad a colleague as you seem here.

[usukprof]

Being the full prof means you have to take your turn on THAT HORRID COMMITTEE that you'd never saddle a junior faculty member with.

Gawd, no kidding. It's called service: you gotta serve whether you like it or not! That thing you get to choose--where personal interests are the only thing that matters--that is called research. Another thing to consider: if there's a committee no one wants to be on and you hold on to your place on the easy one because, well, you are a self-centered and coddled academic who can do that, it means another one of us has to continue our time on the crappy one(s). And maybe we'll go to the chair and b*tch about you (unprofessionally, of course).

It ought to be a little better than this.  Our chair attempts to match people to committees based on interest and expertise, and take requests from people. 

That's great in a place that has enough people to fill the necessary committees.  I'm starting a TT position in the fall and I will be assigned to committees on the basis of "we need someone and you have no current assignments".  After a few years, perhaps, interest will matter, but right now, a probably-trainable body in a slot is more important to a small place.

I guess size matters; my R1 department is big enough that there is some flexibility, and we try to match even the most junior folk to their interests, and give them the easiest committee positions so they've got departmental service on their CV with the minimum amount of time sucked.  We'd prefer that they go after program committee and editorial board positions that will advance their career than spend time in campus meetings.

[itried]

My uni is small enough that we can have some input into which committees we'd like to serve on, based upon our interests and strengths. The difficulty comes when the President appoints faculty to certain committees based upon his view of how that committee should be populated. Although I recognize that it's the President's prerogative to make unilateral decisions, we become resentful of unilateral decisions about committee service when we look around the room and see an imbalance of faculty rank (e.g., all early- and mid-career faculty). At our uni, it would be fairly easy for our President to approach each Chair (we don't have many - we're a SLAC) to ask which faculty would be appropriate to serve on X committee, based on that faculty member's interests, expertise, and workload. In fact, as Chair, I've asked the President to approach me first before directly approaching my faculty for uni-level committee service, so I can protect faculty who need to be protected, and request service work from faculty who have time and inclination, and who need to pull more weight. In some cases, the President has honored my request; in other cases, he has not.