Starting the PhD off on the Right Foot
Advice I Wish I’d had from Day 1 of the PhD
Almost every deadline is actually 2 weeks earlier than advertised.
Any time you require a letter of recommendation, the effective deadline for your materials is two weeks earlier than the advertised deadline. This is because, for almost every competition, you have to send your finalized materials to your letter writers at least two weeks in advance so they can prepare their letters. Moreover, you should let your letter writers know about deadlines and letters even earlier if possible. This is courteous and demonstrates that you are organized.
Be strategic about your writing.
My husband, a professor in statistics who is years ahead of me in academia, once told me while I was still a PhD student: “Be strategic about your writing. Never write anything that isn’t directly related to your academic profile or that you can’t repurpose for a future publication.”
This was great advice. There are so many reasons to be strategic when you are a graduate student and junior scholar. For one, if you are serious about staying in academia, you must recognize that the job market is saturated, so there isn’t a lot of flexibilty to “waste” time on projects that don’t build your academic profile. There are also many ways of being strategic. For instance, I encourage my PhD advisees to think about their future dissertation when writing course papers. If an entire paper can be shifted into a chapter or the contextual info from a piece can be used in the introduction, that makes writing the dissertation less onerous and will decrease your time-to-degree. If something can’t be used for the dissertation, then try to revise it for a peer-reviewed publication. This applies to course papers, grant applications, and conference presentations.
Embrace cynicism.
This relates to the above piece of advice on strategic writing. You should think strategically about how you spend your time, what activities you become involved in, what service you say “yes” to, where you present papers and who you present with, etc. It may seem craven to think of every aspect of your university experience as contributing to your academic profile. However, I would ask: if you aren’t here to build an academic profile and eventually get a job (then tenure, then promotion, etc.), then what are you doing?
The most important parts of the PhD have nothing to do with program requirements.
Attending talks, working on a journal, grabbing a post-seminar beer with your classmates, taking a visiting scholar on a campus tour, organizing a graduate student symposium, presenting at a conference, attending a weekly reading group, moderating a film screening… none of these activities appear on any document related to degree requirements, however, in my experience, they are the most formative elements of a graduate degree. This is not only due to the utilitarian benefit of “networking” (although it is that, too!), but more importantly, it relates to learning about different methodologies, bouncing your ideas off your cohort and colleagues, seeing how projects are developed in different fields, getting to know people outside of your department, etc. These activities and experiences are gratifying and challenging, and you will have the opportunity to pick up new skills and develop broader ways of thinking and analyzing material. There are other enormous benefits that cannot be foreseen or quantified. For instance, you might identify a letter writer from outside of your field, meet a professor whose work intersects with your own and be offered an RAship that relates to your project, land a position that helps you identify alt-ac careers that interest you, pick up a new skill that enhances your CV, etc. Some of the most important growth of a well-rounded PhD journey should take place outside of your department.
Publications and letters of recommendation are the most important elements of job applications
If your goal is to land a tenure-track position after the PhD, then there are two elements of your future job materials that are more important than all of the rest: the letters of recommendation your mentors will write you and the “Publications” section of your CV. There are other important components, of course. For instance, you should spend lots of time on writing a polished cover letter (which will get your foot in the door so that search committees will read the rest of your materials) and have a tight research statement that shows that you have projects and thoughts beyond the dissertation. However, having a publication or two in recognized, respected journals demonstrates that you know how to play the academic game and will give search committees confidence that you will get tenured. In terms of the letters of recommendation, your mentors will speak to myriad aspects of you as a future colleague and researcher. They will attest to your research potential, vouch for your generosity and collegiality, speak to your teaching and mentoring abilities and potential, and remark on elements of your profile that you won’t even think of. These testimonies are incredibly important for piquing the interest of the committee and instilling confidence that you will be a productive, non-toxic potential colleague.
Do note that having strong letters of recommendation should, hopefully, not require anything wildly out of the ordinary from you. If you are in a PhD program, you no doubt are driven, deeply interested in your field, intelligent, and willing to go through a lot of metaphorical pain for a degree (long hours, meeting tight deadlines, tackling challenging readings, putting time into important extracurriculars, etc.). Given your mentorship relationship with your letter writers, they will know all about your academic and extracurricular activities, and they will be able to articulate these in their letters of support. Finally, needing strong letters of recommendation does NOT mean you need to grovel or put up with an abusive or toxic advisor. The relationship with your advisor should provide a safe, constructive mentorship dynamic. No letter of recommendation is worth being mistreated.