A peek into search committees

I have been a candidate, talked to a lot of candidates, and served on search committees. I am pretty confident that the number one misunderstanding is overestimating how much time we spend looking at your application package. The anonymous nature of this blog allows me to be a little more candid. The answer is not much until later stages.

Let's do some math. A reasonably attractive job can easily get 500+ applications. Suppose the search committee wants 2-3 people to look at each application. That means every minute spent opening, looking at, and evaluating each application works out to 15-25 person hours. Clearly there aren't going to be that many of those minutes until you get on to a short list.

My basic goal during the application review stage is to as quickly as possible sort you on or off a manageable sized short list. I am trying to do it well, but I am ok with a certain error rate in both directions. Both because others on the search committee might offset my mistake, and because an error isn't the end of the world. There are plenty of good candidates, so I am not terrified of falsely excluding one of them. And if a weak candidate sneaks through, they will be caught in a later stage.

To do this, I start with the CV. That's probably the only document you know we are reading. And I make a lot of calls based on the CV. If you are on the bubble, I make look at something else. Cover Letter, JMP abstract, teaching documents, reference letters. Probably not too many of these, and which of them depends on why I think you are on the bubble.

And I like specific metrics. Personally, I don't have any auto reject rules, but I am mentally going through easily quantifiable and comparable factors. Pub/R&R vs no pub. Taught classes vs TAed vs no teaching. Indicated specific interest in cover letter. Roughly speaking, as soon as you miss enough of these, you are rejected.

What can you do to put your best foot forward at this stage?

1. Make sure all of the quick factual check marks you should get are clearly visible on your CV. E.g. If you have taught multiple classes and are applying to a teaching school, do not think to yourself "as soon as they flip to my teaching portfolio, they will see my extensive teaching experience." We won't look carefully at your teaching portfolio until you reach a short list. And there is a better chance that happens if your teaching is clear on your CV.
2. Be aware that you are likely getting tossed quickly for things like "not the field we are searching for". They probably aren't giving you a chance to be heard out about how you actually a re a good fit and that is a school top of your list. I'm not going to say don't bother with out of field applications, because they don't do any harm. 
3. There is a high value on easily quantified accomplishments, like getting a pub or teaching a class.
4. Use your paper titles. You may need to pass an initial screen where that is the only thing we look at research-wise.
5. Think about ways of adding information you really want people to see to your CV. A 2-3 sentence abstract of your papers. Key details about your teaching.
6. It's a good idea to add something personalized to your cover letters for schools where you have something to say. But be brief.

Stage 2 involves looking more closely at the short listed candidates. This rolls into stage 2.5, interview prep, so I will treat them as one. A typical interview slate these days is 20-30 candidates per position. The shortlist may be double that. So again, if you do the math, we aren't putting hours in to reading every word of your package. In addition to cover letter and CV, we will take a take a quick look at your teaching portfolio (at a job where teaching is valued), reference letters, and maybe your research statement. For your JMP, we are definitely reading your abstract, some will read the introduction, and some will flip through the paper. (Rarely a careful read!) 

What can you do to put your best foot forward at this stage?

1. Make things organized! We are looking to flip through quickly to find the things we want to find. Make that easy for us. You never want us to give up looking for something we wanted to see. Give you files clear names, upload them in the correct places on the submission platform, etc. Provide all the documents an employer asks for, but be careful about squeezing in stuff they didn't ask for.
2. Organize your teaching portfolio. The modal thing uploaded for evidence of teaching effectiveness is a document dump of course evaluations, syllabi, and other information. Often dozens of pages of this. Make it easy to use. Things like a table of content, main takeaways up front, with complete supporting documents to follow.
3. There is a real benefit to having the good (and standard) organization to your JMP for those of us who want to flip through it for 5 minutes and get the most out of it. The usual ordering of sections, use of clearly titled sections and sub-sections, tables that are self contained and easily readable for someone who has not read your paper in detail, etc.
4. At the interview stage, you will talk to people who have spent very different amounts of time with your application package. From never opened to spent an hour reading the major documents with decent care. Often within the same room. Be conscious about navigating that. Do not assume anyone knows anything. Act appreciative of people who seem to have looked carefully but don't be dismissive of those who haven't. Don't go off on tangents with someone who has read your paper without bringing the rest of the room along, etc.

Stage 3 is the post-interview to flyout stage. This is where a lot of people actually will read your application package in the way you are probably picture. But not everyone will, particularly those not on the search committee. So again, when you are meeting people on your flyout, do not make assumptions about what they know about you. There will almost certainly be a wide range within any given school, and you want everyone in the range to approve of you.

In order to land a job, you will be scrutinized at varying degrees. It will begin with 2 minutes, and will end with multiple hours. And there will be a couple intermediate levels as well. You need to do well at all those levels of scrutiny, so think about this consciously.