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Jana
Nidiffer (School of Education)
[Often
people forget that the job talk is part] of the job search process.
And maybe thats because it comes relatively late. You worry
about getting the dissertation done. Then you worry about your letters
of application, then your letters of recommendation, and then you
worry about getting called for an interview, and then you worry
about what youre going to do for an interview and after all
of that, its hard to muster up sometimes or to think a lot
in advance about the job talk. And Im glad that Tom and his
staff are making it a separate conversation, because I think my
primary point is to say that they matter. I have seen people essentially
torpedo their candidacy by an inadequate or problematic job talk.
So despite everything that you have to prepare for and it
seems like youre doing all the preparation simultaneously
and its very nerve-wracking its important to
pay attention to the job talk.
Im
going to offer a few thoughts about what I think is a good job talk
or good things to keep in mind as you prepare for your job talk,
but I would also encourage you to know that the best way to prepare
for a job talk is to observe others and practice one for yourself.
If your department or a closely related department is doing any
kind of faculty search while youre a student here, go to as
many of the job talks of faculty in your department as you can.
And then listen to the buzz on the street, whether or not this was
thought to be a good job talk or a problematic one and take the
time to analyze why, what the difference was. So, let me offer a
few thoughts, but please feel free to ask questions or ask for examples.
I
think that one of the most challenging aspects of a job talk is
that you are being judged on three criteria simultaneously, and
that is you are being judged as a scholar, you are being judged
as a future colleague, and youre being judged as a potential
teacher in the department. So, when you think about being judged
as a scholar, I would encourage you to make sure that your job talk
conforms to the norms of your discipline, and I would say that possibly
one of the best models to look at if youre unclear about the
norms of the discipline are either job talks in your faculty or
presentations at professional conferences in your field. And by
paying attention to the norms of your discipline, I mean is it for
example absolutely required for a talk in your discipline that you
spend a great deal of time explaining your methodology. Im
a historian of education and thats not typically as big a
part of my own discipline as it is with some others. We tend to
talk more about what we found and its significance and not spend
much time, in verbal presentations, on our methodology per se. But
thats a norm in my discipline that may be different, so you
should pay attention to your faculty norms.
The
other thing that I would encourage and I think this is very
important only absolutely, under all circumstances
speak on a topic with which you are very familiar. It is
not a good idea to talk about a work in progress or a beginning
line of research. I think particularly for recent Ph.D.s, theres
an expectation that youre going to talk about your dissertation
work, and I think thats fine, but you may in fact as part
of the job talk or in the interview be challenged or questioned
about your presentation and you want to feel on very firm ground
to defend your ideas and describe your intellectual processes.
Now,
most people when they think about a job talk are probably most aware
of being judged as a scholar, and that this is a public presentation
of your intellectual work, but I think its also reasonable
to understand that search committees and the panel before
me may have spoken to this when search committees are interviewing
people, theyre not just interviewing scholars, theyre
interviewing people. And theyre interviewing people that are
going to be in the office down the hall from them for anywhere from
5-7 years and if youre granted tenure for a lifetime. So,
they are interested in someone with whom they feel they can be a
colleague. Someone who would be interesting; someone who will contribute
to the department. So, as youre being judged as a colleague,
make sure you convey a sense that you want to be there. That youre
interested in or invested in the people in the audience getting
to know you. Make it clear that you have read about and come to
understand the university where you are giving the talk, and particularly
the department or the school or whatever unit is supporting your
candidacy.
I
would say that one of the times when I saw a candidate torpedo himself
with a bad job talk was someone who was coming to a school of education
as a historian of education and spoke as though he was in a professional
conference of historians or only historians and he didnt really
know that his audience was going to be ed school faculty, none of
whom were historians. He was going to be the historian of education
in the program, and he didnt take enough time to understand
the school and the department to which he was speaking.
Following
on that, just very succinctly, know who your audience is. Understand
them. Many department chairs or deans or whoever is coordinating
your visit to campus, may communicate to you some specifics about
your job talk and it can be buried in the two-and-a-half page letter
that the dean sends to you about this, but do pay attention. Sometimes
they will say, We will ask you to be in a seminar room
or Youre going to be in the something-something auditorium
or whatever. But there might be information in there that will let
you know the setting and some specifics about who the audience will
be. If its only going to be your department, then you can
talk in some ways much more specifically to scholars in your field
than if an entire school or program is likely to be part of the
audience.
The
other thing is that when you get to campus, the job talk is usually
not the very first thing. At some point in time, particularly if
a graduate student in the department is going to offer to give you
a tour, know where youre supposed to give the job talk and
ask to take a look at the room so you have a sense of how formal/informal,
how close to the audience, etc. youll be. And also some expectation
of the size of the crowd.
The
last thing in terms of being judged as a colleague is to communicate
that youre likeable. And I know that can sound silly but how
many times (changes voice to a low monotone) have you ever heard
somebody give a talk where they just seem to talk like this and
they go on and they drone and they really sound like theyre
very nervous and theyre scared and you cant really understand
them and they dont seem to be very happy that theyre
doing it (normal voice) and its very hard to listen to an
hour and fifteen minutes of that so communicate that you are interested
in what youre doing and that you are an interesting person.
You can contribute to the scholarly discourse and you would be someone
that it would be interesting to have an office across the hall from.
Now,
most job talks are relatively formal presentations not always,
but its been my experience that most are. And so it is sometimes
difficult to imagine how you might communicate your skills as a
teacher in a job talk particularly if your teaching style is not
this formal presentation style. However, you are going to be judged
on your facility as a communicator and therefore as a potential
teacher. Now, we all know that particularly if you are going
for a job in a research-oriented university one of the primary
interests is going to be your scholarship, but other kinds of institutions
may be just as interested in your skills as a teacher. And even
research universities are becoming more and more interested in the
teaching skills of the recent Ph.D.s that theyre interviewing
for new faculty jobs. So its important to remember that youre
being looked upon as a future teacher.
Now,
the first thing, of course, that you want to do then is to be understood.
Because if you cant be understood, then they may wonder how
students will understand you. So speak clearly, speak logically
and all that youve ever learned about a good presentation
is important to have in this job talk. I think its perfectly
acceptable particularly if its a norm in your discipline
if you have a couple of overheads to make points clear, even
a handout or two. I think that anything that makes it seem like
you were prepared and invested and that you want people to understand
you is perfectly reasonable. Again, that may be more of a social
science norm, so you should pay attention to the norms in your own
discipline.
It
might be appropriate, depending on the department or the school,
to even have a slightly more teacher-oriented job talk and again
this is where you would need to be very savvy about listening to
the signals that youre getting from the department chair or
the dean or whomever is inviting you to speak. By teacher-oriented,
I mean something a little less formal, something that might more
closely match your teaching style. Again, probably at a research
one university this would not be a good choice, but there are institutions
where this might be something that you would feel was appropriate.
And it would help to communicate to them your interest in being
a good teacher.
And
the last thing about communicating your skills as a teacher: even
if it is a very formal presentation, you can sometimes bring in
issues of teaching into the formal presentation. For example, if
you devote some time not the majority of time, but a small
amount of time to some issues of teaching related to the
work that you just presented in the content. Like for example if
you talk about what are the ideas and concepts in your field or
discipline that are difficult to teach to undergraduates, for example,
if thats going to be your primary teaching responsibility.
You might also talk about somewhere in your job talk, the relationship
of your ongoing research agenda with your teaching. In other words,
how you were using your scholarship in your classroom and vice versa.
And
my last point before I pass the microphone on. Absolutely stay within
the time limits. No exceptions. If they say 40 minutes, speak for
38. If they say an hour, speak for 55 or less. The last thing you
want to see people doing in your job talk is looking at their watches
and shuffling in their seats. So thats telling people that
you read what they provided for you, and its also telling
people that you respect their time. Theyve come to give you
this hour, or this two hours, or whatever the cultural norm is for
that institution and you respect that and youre not going
to hold them longer than that.
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