Update on job prospects

[thalidar]

Something cool that just happened is that someone from Texas A&M contacted me to make sure that I was applying for their faculty position. Evidently they've been hearing good things about me through various conversation and think I might be a good fit for what they are looking for in their new faculty. I had already sent in my application materials

Comments

[thalidar]

Thanks.

[kowari]

Well that sounds positive.
Blow em out of the water mike!

[thalidar]

It is positive. But until I get an invitation to interview I'm not going to get my hopes up. :o)

[branna]

Good luck!

signed, another sufferer on the job market

[thalidar]

Yeah, the market sucks this year. It is especially bad for me, because there are two other post docs from my experiment who are going out this year, and have more "leadership" experience because they have held convenerships for physics/analysis groups. While it is certainly important, outside of the experiment, it doesn't really count for much, but for senior letter writers inside the experiment, they rate it highly, so when I'm compared against them by my letter writers, I end up lacking, and they've applied to most of the same places I applied.

So at this stage, I'm just concentrating on getting the second postdoc, where there seems to be a lot of interest so shouldn't be a problem, and then next cycle, my nemeses will be gone, I'll have a few more publications, and I'll be sure to get a convenership on at least a sub-group. Then I'll compare better.