How Big is the Tenure Carrot?

First it’s “graduating”, then it’s “finding a job”, then it’s “get tenure”, and on and on…  While the goalposts may shift over the course of our career, it’s clear that some of them are more important than others, at least to some people…

In the academic world, tenure is a major accomplishment.  A job for life – now that’s the kind of stability that would lower the stress in an economy like we’ve experienced recently.  But we also know that the more prestigious the institution, the more difficult it is to a) get hired and b) not go crazy as an assistant professor.  Some schools (who shall remain nameless, but you know who you are) are notoriously stingy in promoting assistant professors and seem to work more along the “grind up, spit out” mentality when it comes to their labor force.  Yet despite the low percentage chance of getting tenure, these schools remain swamped by applicants who would be honored to say they were a professor there in 2003.

So what if we were faced with a situation in which the hire and tenure decisions became mutually exclusive – which one would you rather have?

In the first situation- what if every time you applied for a job, regardless of the institution, you were hired.  However, as part of the deal you would be turned down for tenure, without review of your accomplishments or progress, and asked to leave.  You could then move on the the next place, where the same rules of hiring would be enforced.

Or, as in the second situation, would you be more interested in getting tenure upon hire despite the fact that it’s at a place you really don’t like.  (And no, for the sake of this discussion, you can’t just get tenure then transfer it over to the place you really want to be…)  Whether it’s the faculty, the administration or the location that has you peeved, the important part is that this place was low on your priority list of places to work.

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