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When Your Peers Vote Against You

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By Erika Favor

When I saw the letter from the rank-and-tenure committee at my small university, I smiled in anticipation. Having sailed through my tenure decision, I felt excited as I ripped open the envelope marked "Confidential."

I had to read the enclosed letter three times.

"Although we recognize your significant accomplishments in service, your teaching and publication record do not merit the rank of full professor ..."

As soon as the message sank in, my defenses rose against it. Accomplished only in service? They had to be joking. Didn't being voted "Professor of the Year" count for anything? And what about all those publications I'd hustled to get into print?

Like many other academics who hit a bump on the promotion-and-tenure road, I was shocked, hurt, and angry to learn that a universitywide committee of my peers had voted against me. I was lucky: The administration overturned the committee's decision, and my promotion went through. But before that happened, there were painful weeks of waiting and difficult decisions about how to handle various situations.

Most uncomfortably, I had to figure out how to live with those who had voted "no' on my case. All five members of the committee were, and are, associate professors -- meaning, they were voting on whether to promote me over them. None of them are in my department or otherwise close colleagues of mine, but because we are a small campus, I see all of these people regularly -- at lunch, in meetings, and in the building where most of us have our offices.

As I shared my distress with colleagues at other institutions, I was amazed to find that I was a member of a rather large club of academics whose promotion or tenure cases ran into trouble. In the spirit of sharing what I've learned, I offer here some tips for how to deal with a "no" vote, should it ever happen to you.

Keep Your Mouth Shut

My division chairman, who had survived a surprise "no" vote on his own tenure decision, advised me on this one right away. You'll be tempted to enumerate your virtues -- the number of students advised, committees chaired, books written, he said. You'll be even more tempted to expose the deficiencies of the committee members in these same areas.

Don't. No one likes a poor loser, and that is how you'll be perceived no matter how much you deserved a "yes" vote. Let others express sympathy, support, or outrage on your behalf, and thank them for it while you yourself keep quiet.

The corollary: Drink only with family members. I still regret one outspoken night at the faculty's favorite local dive. Many of those who were present will work together for years to come, and we'll work with members of the promotion-and-tenure committee. Words spoken aloud, even with the excuse of alcohol-lowered inhibitions, can't be taken back. I hope it's not my bitter ones that get remembered.

Use Your Anger

If you shouldn't vent your anger, what can you do with it? An informal survey of colleagues who survived and prospered at institutions where they had initially gotten a "no" vote revealed something surprising: They accomplished more in post-bad-decision years than they had previously -- and more than their colleagues who had no trouble with the tenure process.

Why? Anger. This is where to channel it. Now more than ever, you need to see the bigger picture and to rise above your institution's petty politics. So try getting onto national programs and into publications that matter to you. Apply for grants, preferably those that will take you away from the institution for a time; think NSF and NEH. Use the rejection to push your scholarship in a new direction, somewhere you didn't dare go before because you thought it would put people off. If the politically correct choice didn't work for you pre-tenure, take that as a message to follow your heart. You'll probably do better than ever as a result.

Learned Optimism

During the weeks after my negative decision, I happened on the work of Martin E. Seligman on "learned optimism" and was able to apply his message to my own situation. Seligman maintains that optimists see setbacks as temporary, nonpersonal, and nonpervasive, while pessimists see them as permanent, personal, and pervasive. It's especially worthwhile for dejected academics to learn the optimistic approach.

The setback of a "no" vote during the promotion process seems terribly permanent, but in many cases, grievance boards or higher administrators may overrule the decision. If not, reapplication is sometimes possible. Even if a change of institution is called for, that can turn out to be a change for the better. Remind yourself of this fact and find evidence to support it by checking around to see the vast number of colleagues and friends who have survived tenure trouble.

It's hard not to take a negative vote personally, especially at a small institution. You've laid your professional life out on the line, and you feel scorned. But remind yourself of the many factors in a committee decision that have nothing to do with you. Every institution has political camps; perhaps some of the committee members are in camps at odds with your own. Maybe there was a numbers game going on: If we promote him, we can't afford to promote her. It's also possible that some of the committee members have personal issues, biases, or prejudices that got in the way of their objectivity. Their ignorance is not your fault.

Finally, remind yourself that the "no" vote of a small committee doesn't mean that everyone on your campus feels the same way. I walked around for days thinking that no one respected my work, but when I looked at the evidence I realized it just wasn't so. I had to make myself pay attention to congratulatory notes I had received on recently published articles, telephone calls asking for my opinions on curricular matters, and requests that I represent the university at news-media events. When I did pay attention, I began to believe that the tenure committee's opinion wasn't universal.

It sounds trite, but you really do have to focus on what's going well in your life. Family, friends, community involvement, and recreational interests can remind you that there's more to life than academe. And thank heavens for that.

Heap Burning Coals

When I initially encountered committee members who had voted against me, I wasn't up to the biblical injunction to love my enemies. Besides, how can you love someone who can't meet your eyes?

It was the Book of Proverbs that provided my action plan for dealing with them: "If your enemy is hungry, give him food to eat; if he is thirsty, give him water to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head, and the Lord will reward you."

I found that being extraordinarily nice to these colleagues made me feel better. So I fetched coffee and offered chairs and asked about children and grandchildren. Not because I'm such a great person, but because in a small institution, one has to interact somehow.

I could have acted the way I felt -- angry -- and cemented the awkwardness between us. Instead, cordiality eventually evolved from a challenging acting assignment to a genuine feeling.

In the end, as a wise mentor pointed out, it's up to you how you want to relate to your colleagues. Many an academic feud stems from a promotion-and-tenure committee vote, but I never did admire the Hatfields and McCoys. I don't want to put my energy into hating the committee that voted against me. Maybe someday I'll even be a big enough person not to take pleasure in outranking them.