Job-Market Boot Camp, Part 26: common mistakes with research statements

Our recent discussions of cover letters and teaching statements got me thinking it might be a good idea to add a few threads to the Cocoon's Job-Market Boot Camp from several years ago. Although that series examined cover letters, teaching statements, teaching portfolios, research statements, CV's, writing samples, and letters of recommendation, I thought it might be a good idea to focus some new posts on common problems (or 'mistakes') with each. That, at any rate, is what my next several posts adding to the series will aim to discuss. As with the rest of the series, I don't imagine that everything that I say is correct. I will just report my own sense of things, and then open things up to other people who have served on search-committees to say whether they agree, disagree, or have other ideas. My hope is that simply having these kinds of discussions will give current and future job-candidates a better idea of what search-committee members think constitute 'mistakes' in various materials. 

Let us begin, then, with research statements. What are some common 'mistakes' candidates make with them, at least from a search-committee member's point-of-view? Here, in my experience, are some potential mistakes:

Potential Mistake #1 - Overly technical research-statements pitched toward specialists: If you are applying to R1 jobs, then there may be search-committee members in your AOS who are really concerned with technical details of your work. However, for many jobs chances are most of the people reading your file will have little or even no experience with the literature in your AOS. If your research statement is super-dense and full of jargon and technical details, it's possible that the statement will leave those readers dumbfounded or even frustrated. Whether or not it's intentional, this may make you look like you don't know how to communicate the nature and value of your work to anyone outside of the sub-literature you work in. My sense, then, is that it can be very important for a research-statement in particular to be accessible, erring on the side of using ordinary language rather than jargon. The way I see it, your task in the research statement is to interest people in your research--to lead them to want to read more: namely, your writing sample, published work, and so on. Assuming that your work itself may be technical, this seems to me the obvious way to get through to the most people: have a research statement that isn't technical (to get through to non-specialists), but a writing sample that is appropriately technical (so as to appeal to any specialists reading your file). Of course, I think it may also make sense to try to select an 'accessible' writing sample too--but we can leave that for discussion in a future post.

Potential Mistake #2 - Focusing too much on the past: Some research statements read like a 'greatest hits' album in music. They summarize things the candidate has already published, trying to convince the reader that the candidate's past work is interesting and important. However, while giving your reader some idea of what your work has done to date is fine, my sense is that search-committee members (for obvious reasons) tend to care more about the future--that is, on where your research is going. The reasons for this, I think, can be several. First, hiring committees for tenure-track jobs are typically interested in whether you are a good bet for tenure--and, to get tenure, you are going to need more than the publications you already have: you are going to need to publish consistently after you are hired. So, you need to show this in your research statement, giving your reader some clear reason to think that your current work and future research plans are going to be fruitful. Second, and relatedly, I think there can be some implicit concern among search-committee members about whether a candidate recently out of grad school is going to be research-productive without graduate supervision. It's one thing to publish work when you are supervised in grad school by Super-Famous Person. It's another thing to continue publishing effectively when you are in a full-time tenure-track position without supervision (and full teaching and services load to boot). Making it clear in your research-statement that you have a clear plan on where your research will go over the next five or so years can be crucial to convincing search-committee members that you would be a "good bet" as a new hire. I know, I know: if you're just finishing up your dissertation, it may seem hard to say where your research will go beyond your dissertation. As an aside, I think this may put recent-PhD's in general at something a disadvantage compared to people who have been out on the market a bit longer and have developed more of a long-term research program. Still, it surely has to be possible to think through where your research might go beyond your dissertation. Dissertations aren't supposed to be ends: they are supposed to be beginnings. So, I say, try to frame them that way in your research statement. Tell your reader what your dissertation is about--but also try to think through, in some relatively clear and convincing way, where you see the project leading!

Potential Mistake #3 - Assuming readers should find your topic interesting: In my experience, this can be one of the more interesting 'mistakes' candidates can make in research-statements. As I expect more than a few people will tell you, sometimes when you come across debates in areas of philosophy outside of your own area it can seem a bit perplexing what 'all of the fuss is about.' That is, people in a given sub-area may think that issue X is a really important philosophical issue--yet, to an outsider, X may seem rather banal--or worse, an overly-specialized debate dealing with 'epicycles upon epicycles'. I don't mean to say that this sort of reaction by outsiders is justified. I am merely observing that it can happen. And I think it can happen when reading research statements. Remember, you want your research statement to excite readers about your work--even readers well-outside of your area. However, in order to excite someone, it can be helpful to not only demonstrate that your work is good, but that your good work is on an exciting philosophical issue of some clear importance. Consequently, my sense is that one common mistake in research statements is to not motivate the area of debate one is involved in as an important or interesting one. A good research statement, I think, should do two things: excite people about the topic, and then excite them about your work on it.

Potential Mistake #4 - Telling rather than showing: As I've mentioned many times before, my sense is that this probably the biggest mistake people make in their dossier materials in general. Don't tell people that your topic is important or that your work in the area is original (viz. "My topic is widely regarded as important in my sub-field" or "My dissertation provides a new perspective on X", "I have published in the best journals in my field"). What you need to do is to show that your topic is important and how your work contributes something new and important (viz. "An increasingly influential view in ethics today is that normative reasons are primitive, or irreducible to anything else such as desire-satisfaction. My dissertation provides a new argument that reasons cannot be primitive, and that this has the following important upshots for ethics:..."). Generally speaking, I'm inclined to think a good research statement (A) outlines a problem in down-to-earth terms (e.g. many thinking normative reasons are primitive), explaining why it is interesting, (B) concisely explains in down-to-earth terms precisely how one's research provides a novel and interesting resolution to that problem, while (C) providing a clear picture of where one's research is heading in the future (viz. the next problems one intends to address, why they are interesting, and so on). 

Anyway, I'm sure I'm forgetting something (and if I think of anything more I may update this post), but for now these are just a few potential mistakes I think can be made in research-statements. What do other search-committee members think? Am I right that these are 'mistakes'? Are there any other mistakes you think are important to be aware of?

Comments

[Amanda]

I am just curious if others have noticed what I have, and that is less and less places are asking for research statements. I think my last year on the market it was maybe 1/2. My thought would be if you are applying to a school that does not require a research statement, then you should say more about research in your cover letter.

[another postdoc]

I don't think I've noticed that trend, Amanda, but it might depend on the type of jobs. The strategy you recommend is something I followed, to some effect. I had different 'research paragraphs' for my cover letter template depending on type of school but also whether the application had a research statement or not (same for my teaching paragraphs). Without the statement I had more detail; with the statement I had less detail but also explicit pointers to the statement about details I filled out there.

Just wanted to say that, last year especially, I took the advice of this Job Market Bootcamp series extremely seriously, especially regarding constructing materials for the applications, and it seems that the advice certainly helped me (at least by eliminating some common errors, but I think more as well, by getting clear on what the purpose of the materials and my goals in writing them). It was advice I wasn't really getting elsewhere, and I got more interviews and eventually a dream TT job this year, so I encourage job marketeers to use the bootcamp well!

[Amanda]

Congrats on the job, postdoc! Dream jobs in philosophy are amazing!

[Marcus Arvan]

Another postdoc: that’s so awesome to hear - congratulations!!

[JobMarketeer]

May I ask, when will the Job Market Bootcamp start up?

[Michel]

Just to chime in on Amanda's point: last year I applied to around 80 jobs, and I'd say that only around 5-10 asked for a separate research statement.

[Nicolas]

Something I’ve found difficult is to write a concise statement that still provides enough background and detail. I’ve learned here that shorter is better, but this meant not elaborating much on papers and projects. It’s even worse when a statement is not required and all you get to write is a research paragraph or two in the cover letter. Remember that SCs have very little time to dedicate to each application. This year on a SC I was struck how much detail some candidates give. Sure that’s much more meaningful than the sort of statements I wrote but needless to say I wasn’t able to read them all fully, sadly.

[another postdoc]

Thanks, Amanda and Marcus!

JobMarketeer, all I meant was the ongoing series of numbered posts labeled as the Bootcamp. Although the Cocoon also has the mentoring thing going on, if that's what you're asking about.