AAA #1: 7 Considerations for the Application Stage of the Academic Job Search

This past year I had the chance to serve on a search committee for a tenure-track position in my department. I learned so much in the process, that I wanted to write a few posts about the experience before I forgot about it.

Thus the start of a new series, American Academia Awesomeness—because, you know, at some point I have to leave my Grad School stage behind.

Whatever I write, as always, is my personal opinion—from my perspective, my department, my college, my university. But if any of this is helpful for people, that would be great.

This post is about the application stage in the academic job search process. I'll write posts about other stages later.

Here are my personal thoughts about how people submit applications to academic job searches—as well as what might go in the content.

1. Submit only the documents that the job post requests. I have no time to read anything extra, and in fact I get a little annoyed when people submit things we didn't even ask for.
2. Submit documents as PDFs. If you have Word files, convert them to PDFs. If you have JPGs or PNGs to submit for some reason, find a way to convert them to PDFs. It annoys me when I have to switch between different apps on my computer to review an applicant's application. (Ha—how many ways can I use the word "app"...?)
3. Make your documents the same size (e.g., all Letter size), if possible. (I know I didn't do this because my teaching evals scanned in a weird way, but still.) Also, try to put them in the same orientation—especially within a single document. It's annoying when I have to keep rotating the page just to read what someone submitted. 
4. Name your PDFs in the same way: e.g., LastName_DocumentType.pdf. There is no need to name files in multiple different ways. I'm happy when I create a folder for an applicant and it's immediately clear what each document in the folder is.
5. Know that some programs actually call your references you list in your CV. Don't put random people you knew from some TAship you had years ago, unless you know that they support your application for that particular position. It's important to have people who can vouch for your research, your teaching, and your personality (or a group of people who can do so collectively). 
6. Ask for letters of recommendation only from people who actually know and support you. Hopefully you have strong relationships with faculty not only in your department but also other departments or even other universities. If you're in a visiting position, it's tricky to ask for a letter from someone who's only known you for a couple of months—so do your part to make sure the letter writers have a clear picture of you as a teacher and a scholar. 
7. Know that not every search committee member reads your writing sample(s). I've encountered committee members that actually read writing samples, and also those that don't. Some people read them for people who make it to the interview, or campus visit, or whatever—and others never do. Keep this in mind throughout the evaluation process—i.e., be prepared to explain your work, both for people who have already read your materials, as well as those who might not be so familiar. 

I guess all this is pretty obvious—but I know that I certainly didn't think about it while on the job market, and it seems not all our applicants do either. Also, I apologize that I sound so jerkish, though I admit I can't really help it... (I did delete a lot of "please's" from this post because it was getting kind of long.) 

Anyway, as we near the beginning of another academic job search season, I wish everyone good luck and good vibes! It's true that being successful on the job market is mostly about luck, but a chunk of it is solid preparation too. (And a sliver of it is about not annoying your search committee...)