The search is over....at least for the position for which I'm on the search committee. The interviewees have come, the interviewees have gone, and decisions have been made. Now, we wait....and wait....and wait.
When I was on the other side of this---when I was the candidate---not so long ago, I didn't understand the sense of urgency some schools had after extending an offer. Why were they so eager for me to give them an answer? Why can't they understand that I need time to think about this, that this is a big decision that I can't make lightly or in under a week? Now I understand---I want our choice to decide instantaneously, to say that s/he loves us as much as we love him/her, to say that s/he'd love to be our colleague. I want the waiting to be over. I just want to know, right now, who our new colleague will be.
This morning I woke up completely convinced that our first choice person had turned down our offer. I could not remember anything about any dreams I had last night, so I don't know if this was part of my dream or if this is just a really bad premonition. But it spooked me, and I've had this uneasy feeling all day that I just can't shake. There are some good reasons why this dream/premonition/whatever it is has put me on edge, which I promise to blog about when this process is all over. (Hopefully, with a happy ending.)
To continue the dating metaphor that New Kid mentioned, and to (badly) paraphrase the movie "When Harry Met Sally", when you find a job candidate that you would like to be your colleague for the rest of your life, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible. Or something like that. Hmmm, that sounded much better in my mind than it does in writing......
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Indeed. Totally frustrating when you have to wait for an answer. We finish with our last candidate on Monday-Tuesday, and then we have a meeting on Wednesday. I have to say I'm actually a little worried that the search committee won't be in total agreement, but I feel strongly that we must put up a united front to the faculty. Frankly, I want the more junior candidate even though the more senior one is great too. But whatever the outcome, we'd better end this year with a new faculty member for next year, or I'm going to be seriously pissed off...
We meet today about our candidates too. Am SO hoping there's a consensus (or at least an overwhelming majority!). It was funny b/c last year I was interviewing here from another job, and so when I got the offer I needed to take a certain amount of time b/c I felt obligated to give my current job the chance to make some kind of counter-offer. And this occurred with spring break intervening. This year, I was talking to one of my new colleagues who said, "You made us wait a long time - we were really worried!" Well, it was the last time I will probably feel that powerful for a while... ;-)
Post a Comment