How does a professor get selected - Universiteit Hasselt · •Using social media to build …...
Transcript of How does a professor get selected - Universiteit Hasselt · •Using social media to build …...
How does a professor get selected
How to pursue an academic career in life sciences?
Brussels, September 11th, 2014
Peter Marynen
Departement of Human Genetics
How does a professor get selected
Program:
• … highly relevant research questions
• How to publish …
• … the importance and side-effects of mobility
• Using social media to build …
• Research strategy & management
• The importance of international collaborations
Insights in the institutional point of view
How a professor gets appointed
Open position
Publication/search
Advices
Decision
Government commissioner
Open procedure
Documentation of advice
Arguments
Documentation of advice
Arguments
• Department
• Research unit
• Institution
• Department
• Research unit
• Faculty
• Group
• Institution
• Group
• Institution
How a professor gets appointed
Open position
• Budget • Based on facts an strategy (ZAP – BOFZAP)
• Departmental board – talk to the head of the department
• Institution
• Content • Academic position: multidimensional
• Life Sciences: emphasis on research
• Increasingly based on departmental long term strategy • No ‘successors’
Talk to the research units
• research
• teaching
• service to society
How a professor gets appointed
Publication/search
• It is a competition
• no appointment of single candidates
A lot of places are looking for talent
Look around – outside of your intitution
Develop/use an international network
How a professor gets appointed
Advices (formal)
• Who? • ZAP: Advisory Committee
• Level: Group of Faculty
• BOFZAP: Research Council • Level: Institution
Advisory Committee
• Based on: • Your application
• A seminar/presentation
• Evaluation by external experts/department head/search committee
• What? • Research/research potential
• Didactic potential
• Leadership potential
How a professor gets appointed
Criteria - general
• Evaluation by interdisciplinary panels, at the level of the faculty or
higher
• Objectivity/same standards across the institution
• Committees use proxys (publications, citations, projects, international
experience ...) but look for competences/traits
• No criteria are written in stone, numbers and facts are interpreted
• Career duration is taken into account
How a professor gets appointed
Publications: more than numbers
• Quality:
• Conceptual innovation, methodological breaktrough,
interesting/relevant question,...
• Scope of publication list ...
• Lucky shot?
• Contribution of applicant
• Author order is important and domain dependent
• ‘Contributing sciences’ (bioinformatics, pathology, imaging, ...):
also first author methodological papers
• Publications with different authors/groups
‘5 most relevant contributions’ : focus on the above
How a professor gets appointed
Internationalization: more than distance, but …
• Mobility: a key element • Independence
• Networking
• Starting a new field
• Acquiring new technologies
• Different models are possible • e.g. several short stays
• Intellectual distance is the issue • Publications (different authors)
• Fellowships, grants
• Quality • being accepted in a top institution can be a quality label
How a professor doesn’t get appointed
Irritant • Sloppy applications
• Unnecessary long applications (what is important?)
• Window dressing
• Boring presentations (didactic qualities)
Yellow flags • Unexplained gaps in the career/unnecessary long careers
• Incomplete reference lists
• References writing about lack of team spirit
- be independent, but work in a team -
Killers • False information (however small …)
• Deadlines
Follow the
instructions
How a professor gets appointed
Decision
• Advisory Committee (and Research Council) provide a classification
(or a score) for the applicants, together with a written justification
• The decision is a two step proces
• Extended Executive Commitee of the Group makes a proposal
• Institutional policy can play a role, but it needs to be justified
by objective arguments, checked by the Governement
Commissioner
• The Academic Council takes the decision, which becomes final
after the government Commissioner approved the whole
procedure.
Finally: Key factors for success
• Its is your career – your choice
• Plan ahead
• Your interests are not necessarily those of your research unit: look for a
balance
• Focus on
• research - scientific output will follow
• professional skill development
• Think independently – work in a research unit
• Networking
• Explore new territories
• New questions, approaches, technologies
Good luck with one of the nicest careers possible