one of the things they don’t teach you.

• Thanks to a few key mentors I feel like I was exceptionally well prepared for the job market when I was looking for my first job out of grad school. I’d been put on track to publish a couple of things and to present at the key conferences. I’d been introduced to key players in my subfield. And my mentors looked over my job talk, and helped me prep my statement/letter, and they were really helpful to me when I was negotiating the first time. One of these mentors was particularly helpful and had me send her what I was thinking about asking for. She helped me come up with a list of other important and exciting things I didn’t know I could even ask for. She encouraged me to be a serious negotiator. It worked. I got a great deal at Pitt.
• When I went on the market again, three years later, I talked with her again. She helped me prep for my interview out here UCLA. She listened to me when I was all freaked out about the process, and what if I didn’t like it, and what if I didn’t get it, and what if I got it but realized I didn’t like the people. Fortunately I got the job and I liked the people. She went to UCLA for her graduate program, and she had some really good info on the place. And the guy who was chairing the search committee here, was part of the search committee that first hired her at MSU. It’s all kinds of incestuous. When I got the job offer, she again helped me think through my negotiation, which was especially important because at that time it was pretty clear that California, the UCs and UCLA were not rich.
• Now I’m here and I really like it here. I did well with the negotiations, and I’m happy. But. I’m not rich. I have a limited amount of money to spend on my advisees. I have two I need to keep funding, and I could have 2 new ones next year. And I might have more money soon, but I don’t have it now, and now is when the negotiations begin with the accepted doc students for next year’s cohort.
• Funnily, now I’m in a funny position. There is one student I’m dying to have join my team because the student is about as perfect a match for me on paper and in person as is possible. (We’ve met.) Seriously. It feels a little like a once in a lifetime opportunity to have this kind of match. So. How do I negotiate with this student so I can secure the student for my team…while not going broke on this one? That’s the trick. I’ve already talked to my academic-financial mentor who has helped me so much in the past. She’s still providing some great help and insight. But there’s a catch this time…this student is her former advisee and they’re also doing a lot of talking about the student’s doc program decisions. We’re both being advised by the same person…who is great at giving negotiation advice. This could be an interesting throwdown. The only real advantage I feel like I have is that I can offer the student the best match interest wise for doctoral training…so I suppose I have something that the student wants. And I think that the student is likely to come, but I don’t want to bank on that. I want to win this one. So…maybe I’ll have to spend more than I might actually need to…but I think it’ll be worth it.
• Gah! No one really schooled us (as doc students) about how much of this whole academia thing is really banking, management, and business negotiations.