The main reason I am attending the AAA this year, besides than the Savage Minds party, is for job interviews. Other than the obvious (researching the place you might be working), what advice do Savage Mind readers have for a job interview?
A while back we had a discussion about the “What is your greatest weakness?” question. What other standard questions might one be expected to be asked? What questions do you wish you had been better prepared for at your last interview? What questions do you ask when they ask if you have any questions to ask them?
How about proper attire? It seems to me that people dress much more formally at the AAA now than they did a few years ago. Is it enough to dress as if I was going to give a talk (sweater or jacket, but no tie), or does one need an extra level of formality (i.e. a tie) for an interview?
UPDATE: I found a useful list of questions one can anticipate here. And some questions you might wish to ask of the interviewers here. More advice here, here, and here.
I’m not sure about university jobs but one thing that might be relevant to be able to answer or even to bring up yourself is teaching strategies and types of assesment tasks. I guess it depends on how much that particular institution actually focusses on pedagogy but if they have this concern, it might be good to show that this is something that you have dwelled upon. A statement of teaching philosophy might help as well.
You may also want to be prepared to do a “micro-teaching” lesson of about 10-15 minutes. I know a colleague who was asked to do that, but then again that was college level.
In terms of asking them questions, I guess I would want to know what kinds of criteria they have for course outlines (ie: does everyone teaching the same course have to have a common evaluation scheme?), who is involved in the selection of books, etc. A big oen for me would be to find out about how open they are to innovative and alternative teaching strategies.
Speaking from a corporate perspective and recalling my own now-distant efforts to pursue academic jobs, I speculate that my biggest mistake was focusing on what I wanted instead of what my potential employers needed. If I were doing it over again, I would prepare by becoming as familiar as possible with the members of the departments I was interviewing with, the work they have done, the ideas they’ve advanced, etc. Instead of focusing on “This is what I do,” I’d be sure to include “This is what I bring to your program,” backed up by at least a few specifics on how my work complements the course offerings/research of the people who already belong to the department.
I have yet to actually get any of the cliche questions. Most questions are ‘what do you do?’ ‘what do you think we do?’ ‘what will you teach, what can you teach?’ and everything else that is fairly centrally located around the idea of being a professor. nothing like ‘what is your greatest weakness?’ or the like, that I’ve only had in professional job interviews.