The Compleat Academic: A Career Guide

This new and expanded volume of The Compleat Academic is filled with practical and valuable advice to help new academics set the best course for a lasting and vibrant career.

A new career in academia can be a challenge. While academia’s formal rules are published in faculty handbooks, its implicit rules are often difficult to discern. This volume guides readers through academia’s informal rules and describes the problems beginning social scientists will face. With humor and insight, leading academics share the lessons they have learned through their own hard experience. Individual chapters present the ins and outs of the hiring process; the advantages of a postdoctoral fellowship; expert strategies for managing a teaching load; insider and applicant advice for winning a research grant; detailed instructions for writing and publishing a journal article; and a straightforward explanation about intellectual property issues. The book also addresses the latter stages of a career. It offers thoughtful suggestions for keeping one’s career dynamic. Chapters that provide specific information for minorities, women, and clinical psychologists are also included. The volume even presents options for working outside of academia.

John McConnon Darley, PhD, received his bachelor’s degree from Swarthmore College in 1960. He did his graduate work in the Department of Social Relations at Harvard University and received his doctoral degree in 1964. Dr. Darley was then appointed assistant professor in the Department of Psychology at New York University (NYU), where he taught from 1964 to 1968. He later left NYU to become an associate professor of social psychology at Princeton University. Dr. Darley was made professor in 1972, and from 1980 to 1985 served as chairman of the Department of Psychology. In 1989, he was named Dorman T. Warren Professor of Psychology.