Episode #216

Publishing for Promotion

In this episode, I discuss publishing for promotion within academia. As you navigate and plan your academic career, it’s essential to understand how publishing intersects with each stage of a professorship. From the early years leading up to the first promotion to the later stages of tenure and beyond, strategic publishing plays a crucial role in shaping our professional trajectory.

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I emphasize the importance of cultivating a mindset that prioritizes quality over quantity in our publications. Rather than succumbing to a scarcity mindset, where the focus is solely on churning out papers, I advocate for a curated approach by publishing work that aligns closely with our academic mission and long-term goals.

Throughout the episode, I provide practical strategies to help you navigate publishing for promotion. From reverse engineering publishing timelines to crafting a compelling narrative around your publications, I offer actionable insights to support your academic growth.

By aligning your publishing efforts with your academic mission, you can make meaningful contributions to your field while advancing your professional goals on your own terms. So, take ownership of your academic career and leave a lasting legacy beyond promotion requirements!

Publishing for Promotion – Quality Over Quantity

Professors’ default thought process for promotion is to publish anything and everything because the focus is on the numbers. The culture of academia fosters a scarcity mindset. There are usually publication milestones or quantity requirements to go from assistant to associate professor, but every time you choose to publish, there is an opportunity cost.

A better method is to follow a curated project pipeline that aligns with an academic mission statement. You can leverage that mission statement to discern publication projects, creating a very clear narrative of the trajectory of your career. Focusing on quality over quantity will not only be more fulfilling for you, but it will make getting promotion easier.

Reverse Engineering Publishing for Promotion

Plan your publication journey by creating a timeline that spans the semesters leading up to your promotion. This includes scheduling research, setting draft deadlines, and determining publication dates. This proactive approach will help you maintain a curated list of publications and a long-term schedule, keeping you on track.

By reverse engineering publishing for promotion, getting promotion isn’t a driving factor in your career. Instead, your career desires and mission drive publications, and your promotion comes naturally.

Mid-Career to Tenure: Publishing for Promotion

The jump from associate to tenure professor looks different from the promotion from assistant professor. While proving how indispensable and needed you are at the institution in your field is essential, securing a tenure position is much more than replaceability.

The promotion to tenure professor is about establishing your legacy and figuring out how to go from being the only one doing the work to influencing people to create things beyond you. So, instead of reverse engineering the publication journey, think about what you want your entire body of work to look like when you go up for tenure.

“One thing that can backfire when publishing for promotion and when you have a scarcity mindset is that you just try to publish anything and everything. Things that you shouldn’t be spending time on end up taking a lot of your time. Whenever you choose to publish something there’s like an opportunity cost. So do not resuscitate an old paper just to boost numbers. You’re wasting the opportunity of publishing when you could be doing something better, something more aligned with and more indicative of who you are and where you want to go. The curated pipeline is the way to go.”

“You get to decide what your career is like. You get to decide what drives it. You don’t have to have a career that responds to promotion requirements. You can build a career that meets those requirements and creates what you want it to create.”

We’ve opened the waitlist for our next cohort of Navigate: Your Writing Roadmap®. Check out the program details and get on the waitlist here.

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Our 12-week Navigate: Your Writing Roadmap® program helps tenure-track womxn and nonbinary professors to publish their backlog of papers so that their voice can have the impact they know is possible. Get on the waitlist here!
Cathy’s book, Making Time to Write: How to Resist the Patriarchy and Take Control of Your Academic Career Through Writing is available in print! Learn how to build your career around your writing practice while shattering the myths of writing every day, accountability, and motivation, doing mindset work that’s going to reshape your writing, and changing academic culture one womxn and nonbinary professor at a time. Get your print copy today or order it for a friend here!
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