Navigating the Academic Job Market in Management

I have been thinking about what I wish I knew before venturing into the academic job market process and wrote down some ideas. This material is based on my own experience and feedback I got from friends, especially John, Lisa, and Sarath. I also tried to think about how this process changes during a pandemic. I hope this material is helpful to PhD students in Management and related fields who might go through the process in the near future. Naturally, this is just my view, and it’s always best to get advice from multiple people. This post was published on July 6th 2020, and is going through numerous iterations. If you have any feedback, I‘d love to hear from you at andreacontigiani2019@gmail.com.

1 — Big Picture

If you find yourself in a PhD studying something broadly related to Management, at some point you might consider getting a job. To do that, you typically have to venture into the so-called Job Market (JM). While there are plenty of interesting opportunities outside academia (more on this below), a common route for PhD students is typically the academic JM.

This blog is largely designed for PhD students doing research in Entrepreneurship. The most standard position you would be looking for is Assistant Professor in Strategic Management. These positions are mostly within Strategy areas\units\departments (like this) or within Strategy groups in larger Management areas\units\departments (like this). Sometimes they are within other areas\units\departments (i.e., Entrepreneurship, Economics, Information Systems, etc). However, a lot of what I write here applies to PhD students in most business-related fields.

Strategy positions are either generalist or focused on a Strategy subfield (i.e., corporate strategy, organization design, innovation, entrepreneurship, international business, non-market strategy, etc). The focus of the position mostly defines what you teach (i.e., teach the Strategy core course or a Strategy-related elective course).

Job announcements are typically circulated in the Summer — roughly a year prior to when the job starts. These positions are advertised primarily through newsletters and boards of academic conferences. The main conference for the Strategy JM is the AOM — most of this post focuses on that. Some positions are also available at related fields’ conferences (especially AEA and INFORMS) — while I don’t talk about them in detail, the process is largely the same, except slightly different timelines. (I interviewed at all three conferences.)

Typically, you have to send applications and then visit schools that are interested in your profile. The product you show during these visits is your job market paper (JMP). This is typically the basis of your job market talk (JMT) at each of the schools you visit.

As a first step, I’d recommend reading this excellent piece by Henning Piezunka — lots of generations of PhD students read this (including me). If you want to read more, I put together my thoughts on how to go through this process. I first provide an overview of the timeline and then discuss each phase in some more detail.

Image from https://hiconsumption.com/best-motorcycle-roads-in-america/

2 — The Ideal Timeline

A business PhD takes 4 to 6 years. If you graduate in Spring of year N, you “go to the JM” in the Summer between year N-1 and year N. In my opinion, the ideal timeline looks as follows:

Figure by Andrea

However, as John wisely points out, during the recent years application deadlines and campus visits have been moving earlier— early Fall rather than mid\late Fall. This trend might continue, so take this timeline with some flexibility.

In the following sections, I discuss each phase in some detail.

3 — Long Before AOM

The preparation for the JM starts long before the AOM. While I personally disagree with that view, some would say the entire PhD is about preparing for the JM. In my opinion, it is useful to start thinking concretely about dissertation and JM in year 3, as you transition from mostly-coursework to mostly-research. Here are some aspects I’d keep in mind early on:

• It is useful to build a research portfolio with some coherence. That gives you a sort of well-defined identity. It helps people remember you. (Plus, it makes sense to build expertise around on thing rather than build no-expertise on lots of things.)
• Choose your dissertation topic smartly. As John mentions, that choice is impactful. It affects how people categorize you in the JM, but also the kind of work you end up doing in the long term. Think it through carefully. (Also, within the topic you choose, emphasizing a current phenomenon or a new technique appears to pay off.)
• While people rarely admit it, having at least one publication in an established journal is important. Sadly, some schools will focus on CVs with a non-empty publication section. On the other hand, as Sarath correctly points out, it is absolutely possible to get a job without a publication. So, if you are early enough in the PhD, plan around having a publication. If you’re close to the end, just focus on your JMP.
• Choose your committee smartly. Your committee members need to help you to 1) learn how to do research and 2) navigate the JM. These skills aren’t necessarily correlated. (Get advice on potential committee members from senior students in your program…)
• Attend lots of events. As we all know, the network plays a massive role on the JM. But it’s hard to build that network during the JM. You need to do that early on. Make sure you go to lots of conferences\events\consortia starting year 1. For a comprehensive list of useful events, take a look at Section 6 in this post. In particular, I’d recommend attending student-led conferences, such as WINDS. (Disclaimer — I co-founded that!)

4 — Spring Before AOM

Lots of students (including me) started to prepare for the JM during the Summer. You should start much earlier. If I were to go back in time, I’d make sure to do all of the following no later than May:

• Finalize your online persona. Most people have an institutional website (i.e., a page on your school’s website), a personal website (i.e., a page where you control all of the information), a Twitter account, and a LinkedIn account. Each of these pieces needs to be polished.
• Finalize your job JMP. Your paper needs to be clean when you start circulating it (via SSRN, ResearchGate, your personal website, etc). Prior to that, make sure to get lots of feedback, but in a private fashion. Openly circulating early drafts is costly in terms of reputation. (I made that mistake.)
• Practice your JMT internally. Most departments organize “official” practice JMTs in the early Fall. While those are important, I highly recommend that you put your talk together and practice it at least once in the Spring. That buffer time is helpful in incorporating feedback. Plus, get somebody to video you — watching yourself talking is dystopian but helpful. If you can, work with a communication coach. (Naturally, all of this becomes even more critical if you — like me — are not a native English speaker. You’ll compete with lots of native English speakers and evaluators rarely take into account while evaluating.)
• Prepare your application package. This generally includes: CV, transcripts, cover letter, research statement, teaching statement, and diversity statement. (Get feedback on committee and friends on each of these. If you want extra feedback, contact me.)
• Identify your target schools. At this point in time, the majority of the institutions hiring via the AOM-based JM are based in North America, Europe, and Asia. Decide which geographies you are interested in, look at all relevant job announcements, create a list of target schools, and discuss it with your committee. (Keep a relatively organized file, with deadlines, links, contacts, and all other information.)
• Practice your 1-minute pitch. Make sure you are able to explain what research you do and what your JMP is about in 1 minute in a clear\intriguing way. (No need to prepare longer pitches. Few people want to listen for more than 1 minute.)
• Attend “pre-market events”. Some conferences — especially AIB, DRUID, and EGOS — typically take place shortly before the AOM, and obviously there are JM-related conversations. Plus, an important event to attend the year of your JM is CCC.
• Reach out to schools. Starting June, you should connect to schools in your list. Some require you to submit some form of application (typically, CV and JMP) prior to AOM. Most importantly, there is a lot of informal communication going on behind the scenes. First, you should (kindly) reach out to your personal contacts in your target schools. Second, you should ask your committee to reach out to people they know in each of those schools. Through these formal and informal channels, you get invited to interviews during AOM. (I want to make this extraordinarily clear — without the informal communication, the JM is substantially more difficult.)

5 — During AOM

You have done all of the work and you get to AOM. This weekend might be a little intense — make sure to arrive early (i.e., Thursday) and consider leaving late (i.e., Wednesday) to avoid any complications. Here are some tactics I’d keep in mind during the weekend:

• All conversations are interviews. European and Asian schools tend to have more formal processes than North American schools. Either way, don’t believe the myth of the informal chat. There are no informal chats. Be prepared at all times. (Again, your 1-minute pitch must be ready.)
• As Lisa smartly suggests, plan your conference carefully. Make sure to register early on and get your badge — you need it to access some locations. Look at the distance between your various meetings and perhaps include some buffer time (i.e., 30 minutes). AOM is large, and not all cities are well-designed — it may take you a while to go from point A to point B. Bring the basics with you — water, food, perhaps some paper copies of your JMP\CV, and whatever else you may need.
• Attend no sessions. Just focus on doing your interviews and be around the rest of the time for potential impromptu meetings. Perhaps attend one pre-conference doctoral event (i.g., the STR Dissertation Consortium). While some might disagree, I think it’s not essential to attend parties — unless you are exceptionally extroverted or your advisor is there to physically introduce you to people, it’s hard to meaningfully connect at these events.
• While not attending sessions, it may be helpful to organize a session. As John suggests, organizing a good PDW\symposium with some well-known speakers gets you visibility and network.
• While this sounds cliche’, find some time to relax. Escape the mass and go back to your room sometimes. (It’s worth to get a room inside the conference hotels during the JM, even if prices are what they are.)
• Be dressed up at all times. A surprisingly large number of people will ask “Are you on the JM?” and that kicks off interesting conversations.

6 — Immediately After AOM

After enjoying your AOM weekend, you head back to your headquarters. Now it is time to send the formal applications to the schools in your list (whether or not you interviewed with them). Here are some things to keep in mind during this phase:

• Submit all applications ASAP. Your full-time job in this phase is to send applications — don’t get distracted by other things (e.g., your JMP, other papers, etc). Most deadlines are between late August and late October. But you don’t need to wait. There are economies of scope in sending all applications early on. (Plus, I heard stories of schools looking at applications long before the deadline.)
• Make sure your committee submits the letters. This is painful, but you have no choice. (I heard stories of people not being considered in some schools because their advisors forgot to submit their letters.) Having an organized file and sharing it with your committee might make this process slightly smoother. Lots of schools use a (very unfriendly) tool called Interfolio — most of your applications and letters go through that.
• Optimize your JMT. I highly recommend that you practice your JMT with an external audience — there are psychological elements that emerge when you present to people you don’t know. In the ideal scenario, a nearby school is open to have you do a brown-bag talk. If you don’t have that option, treat your first campus visit as an experiment — make sure to schedule that early. Plus, as John suggests, it is also useful to present to people in different-but-related fields (i.e., Finance or Organizational Behavior) — getting feedback from a different angle can be educational. In addition, as Lisa points out, your slide deck must be absolutely polished and error-free — you might consider getting some help by somebody with presentation experience (i.e., most likely not an academic, we are terrible with presentations).
• Keep in mind that, in this phase of the process, little is under your control. Whether your application translates into a campus visit or not is largely a function of luck, politics, and lots of other noise. It is critical that your committee “markets” you, but not everyone has that luxury. Either way, just accept this and maximize the opportunities you get.

7 — Fall After AOM

In early September you should start getting invitations to campus visits. Typically, European and Asian schools move early, while North American schools a bit later. Here is how how I would think about campus visits:

• Be ready for potential phone interviews. As Lisa mentions, some schools interview candidates via phone before making invitations for campus visits. This might happen shortly after AOM or later in the Fall.
• Attend SMS. As Sarath suggests, there is some JM activity also at the SMS (usually taking place in the early Fall). Those meetings are often more targeted, because by then there is more clarity on which positions are available and what profiles schools are looking for. Make sure you attend (even if it is weirdly expensive) and be prepared.
• Plan campus visits wisely. A campus visit takes 1 to 2 days and typically includes a dinner with 1-4 faculty members, a JMT, and a series of one-to-one meetings — it’s fun but relatively demanding. So, strategize on the order. Don’t put the top-priority ones too early (when you are still experimenting) or too late (when you might be burned out). Try to arrive at the location a couple of days before the visit — you hedge against travel delays, have time to relax, and take a look at the city. Cluster visits geographically — you save time, they save money.
• Don’t get obsessed with refining your JMP\JMT after each campus visit. Instead, write the feedback down, and make sure you have answers if those questions come back.
• Invest a finite amount of time in preparing for campus visits. Read the CVs of the people you meet. Prepare a list of questions to ask. Know a bit of the story of the department\school\university. Do the basics, but not much more. (In my opinion, one day is more than enough to prepare for a campus visit.)
• Follow up after campus visits. As Lisa mentions, it is a social norm to follow up after campus visits. Obviously, make sure to send some genuine content, not just copy-and-paste emails.
• Keep in mind that, once you get a campus invitation, a little more is under your control. While certainly not 100% (luck and politics are still in the game), the way you do your JMT and the one-to-one meetings play a role in the probability of getting an offer. Schools look at what you know, but also how you talk, behave, interact, and so on. (You’ll hear this sentence a million times: “We look for a good colleague, not just a good researcher and a good teacher.”)
• Once you start getting offers, take the time you need to decide. This is an important decision — path-dependencies are huge, these investments are largely-irreversible, you mostly likely only have one life. There is a lot of variation in the time schools give you to decide — it goes from 24 hours to infinity. If they (sadly) give you “exploding offers”, ask for more time. However, once you are almost-sure that you are not interested in an offer, let them know.

8 — Less Common Routes

So far I have talked about how to get a standard Assistant Professor position through the AOM. There is a lot more than that.

You could get a job through the AEA or INFORMS. In particular, people studying innovation-related topics might find opportunities in economics-oriented Strategy departments via AEA or Operations departments via INFORMS.

You could get a postdoc. Historically, postdocs were not common in Strategy, but they are increasingly so. The postdoc is a great opportunity to focus on your research without the stress of the PhD or the teaching demands of the Assistant Professor. While lots of postdocs are informal and not-largely-advertised, some semi-regular opportunities include:

• NBER postdocs in Entrepreneurship, Digitization, and Innovation Policy
• LISH posdocs in Innovation

Finally, if you are open to leaving academia, I’d recommend seriously looking into the private sector. There are lots of interesting jobs where you can use the research skills you developed in your PhD. The main routes are the following:

• Data Science. Surprisingly accessible route to most empiricists. Read this excellent book by Emily.
• Strategy Consulting. Read this piece on how science PhDs can get into consulting — much of it applies to you as well.
• Corporate Strategy positions in large companies. If you did corporate strategy, this might be a great fit.
• Government agencies. Somewhat less common for Strategy PhD students, but still a good route to keep in mind.

9 — Overlooked Practical Tips

Through the JM, you will have to deal with number of relatively mundane challenges. Here are some practical tips to keep in mind:

• Manage information smartly. A senior professor once told me “assume that everything is common knowledge.” In other words, don’t give out information for free. But, when you are asked, be candid.
• Keep a Q&A running document. Write down all of the questions you get and the answers you should give. Make it a rule.
• Do NOT look at the “Excel sheet” which every year some mysterious figure posts somewhere. That information is unhealthy, rarely-up-to-date, and mostly useless in your strategizing. Just ignore it.
• Stay in touch with your PhD friends in other schools. While competition is no fun at times, that network is important. (Plus, I got some great friendships through that process.)
• As Lisa mentions, make sure to travel smartly. Don’t check in your luggage — it will get lost during the trip to your top-priority school. Make sure to have a valid passport and ID card . If you can, get things like TSA Pre-Check and Global Entry. Get a credit card through which you accumulate miles.
• Stay healthy and wealthy. While this is of course unpredictable, try your best to minimize any healthcare-related issue— unless strictly necessary, postpone surgeries, procedures, and the like. Plus, make sure you have enough cash and\or credit cards — you will have lots of expenses and want to avoid worrying about money.
• It goes without saying, be kind to everyone when you visit schools. It might benefit you — everyone has strong opinions in this business, you’ll be surprised. But most importantly, it’s just a universally good thing to do. (Yes, it’s tough sometimes — we are humans. But try your best.)
• Minimize non-core decision-making. Decide how to dress, what to put in your suitcase, what to always have with you (i.e., clicker, USB key, phone charger, etc), how to prepare, and how to follow-up. While you don’t want to look like an automata, you want to automate these processes.

10 — The Job Market during a Pandemic

At time of writing this post, it is a bit of a special time out there. So I wanted to think about how I would approach the process if I were to go the JM during this pandemic. (Disclaimer — as I have not done that myself, this is pure speculation.)

As a first step, read this open letter by Damon Phillips. This piece is incredibly inspiring.

Now, let’s consider how the pandemic changes the process:

• Fewer academic positions. Most universities are suffering in terms of revenues. Lots of them have “frozen” their hiring processes.
• Unclear timeline. As schools find out over time whether or not they may be hiring, they make post positions later than usual. Some say the JM for start in Summer 2021 will be in Spring 2021.
• No in-person networking. AOM and most other conferences will be virtual. So, networking will be harder.
• No in-person interviews\visits. Even for universities that are hiring, the hiring process will likely be virtual. Again, this might make it harder, at least for those who enjoy human interaction.
• Online teaching is a valuable skill. While teaching isn’t generally a key feature on the JM, having some online teaching experience might now be helpful. Nobody knows if online teaching is just a transitory trend or a permanent shock — ceteris paribus, it may make sense to hire people with some experience in that domain.
• Fewer private-sector jobs. While above I mention that there are lots of good opportunities outside academia, during the upcoming recession some of those opportunities will be unavailable.

With this in mind, here are some tactics I’d think about, if I were to go to the JM during this pandemic:

• Seriously consider if it makes sense to actually go to the JM this year. Personally, I’d choose the uncertainty of a possibly-bad-market next year to the certainty of a bad-market this year. However, some disagree with this view. First, you may or may not have the institutional\financial\personal flexibility to wait. Second, as lots of people postpone, the next JM will be more competitive. And possibly the supply of PhDs will still exceed the demand, as the economy may still be weak and not all schools may return to hiring. Third, as John suggests, if this extra year is unlikely to substantially improve your work (i.e., get a R&R or a publication), you might just end up into a possibly-more-competitive market without a stronger product. It’s a tricky and largely personal decision — I’d just recommend you make it carefully.
• Attend all possible online events. While not everybody loves Zoom, you really have to attend these events. The STR Division is organizing a number of interesting initiatives this Summer\Fall. CCC is organizing a Virtual Visiting PhD Student Program. A lot more will be happening over the Fall.
• Proactively create online events. Reach out to people you know and ask for a quick Zoom chat. It is OK to do that, as it was OK to ask for meetings at the AOM. Your competitors are doing that right now, do that too.
• Set up a good Zoom station at home. This might sound trivial, but it isn’t. As it is important to have a good home office, you want to have a good Zoom station, where you can do all your virtual interviews\talks. (Plus, you want to look professional and avoid this.)

And here are some strategies I would keep in mind if I were in the middle of my PhD and suspected the pandemic would last until my time to go to the JM:

• Develop your online teaching capabilities. As mentioned above, online teaching might become a valuable skill. So, make a little investment in that — for example, take a TA position in an entirely-online class in your school. Here are some useful resources on how to teach online: How to move to online teaching fast (by Maciej), Moving Your Classroom Online (by HBP Education), Lessons learned from organising our first virtual conference (by TJN), this Twitter thread (by Emilio Calvano).
• Consider questions that matter in this new world. While I agree with those who don’t like the opportunistic strategy of writing (trivial) papers about COVID-19, it might may make sense to think broadly about how Strategy changes in a world with little traveling, de-globalization, and so on. If I were at the the point of choosing a dissertation topic, I’d consider going this route. (If you have chosen a dissertation topic however, stay committed on that — adaptation is costly.)

11 — Final Advice

The system is (perhaps unintentionally) designed to get you stressed out about the JM. But, in reality, the JM is not that bad. Even if it doesn’t work out the way you want it to, it is important to remember that the world is much larger than this.

One of my smartest colleagues puts it this way:

The whole academia-focused PhD experience is designed to make you feel like your performance on the job market is a reflection of your worth as a person. This makes no sense. This is just one more step, it is part of the game, and life goes on.

So, my main piece of advice is to just stay relaxed. In the grand scheme of things, this is just a game. It is hard to believe this before the JM (I didn’t believe it), but I promise it is true.

von Jawlensky, 1918, Meditation

Thank you for reading all the way through here. I hope this information was helpful. If I can be of any help through this process, please reach out at andreacontigiani2019@gmail.com. Avanti tutta!