The Dead Sea Effect In Academia
...what happens is that the more talented and effective IT engineers are the ones most likely to leave -- to evaporate, if you will. They are the ones least likely to put up with the frequent stupidities and workplace problems that plague large organizations; they are also the ones most likely to have other opportunities that they can readily move to.Sadly, this is even more true about academia. "Grateful to have a job" is translated to valuing the university appointment even more than money. You can't really tell someone at a party you make $50k more than other people in your field, but you can tell them you work at Yale. And here's the thing: the fact that you work at a university is actually trivial. It actually has no value at all except to you, as a means of reinforcing (or creating) identity. Your family would actually be better off with the extra $50k
What tends to remain behind is the 'residue' -- the least talented and effective IT engineers. They tend to be grateful they have a job... They tend to entrench themselves, becoming maintenance experts on critical systems...
"...entrench themsleves, becoming maintenance experts..." is translated to a focus not on output, but on process. The death of a university can be reasonably measured by the increasing ratio of assistant and associate professors on committees to number of post docs. I wonder if you can't remove the denominator and still have a reliable gauge.
But the more important result is that academia produces mediocrity. I know people will disagree, but they're wrong. Mediocrity in education is a given; teaching assistants teaching classes; multiple choice exams; grades in general-- they're not there to promote excellence.
And what are those too-busy-to-teach professors doing? Mediocre research. I've said enough about the pointlessness of yet another clinical trial. But even basic science research suffers. It's not that the ideas or goals are mediocre-- it's the approach. Plodding, unfocused-- the mind is on the grant, not the result. "What experiments will the reviewers want me to perform?" The contest between those in academia and those who leave would have well been settled by Celera vs. Human Genome Project, had not President Clinton changed the game.
Henry Kissinger said: university politics is vicious precisely because the stakes are so small. Actually, a number of people said it. Because it's true.
Academia is a trap. It pays you with secure insecurity. You settle in and think, I am never going to leave this. It confuses you, it changes reality. I make only 20% of my income from my university job, yet whenever anyone asks me what I do for a living, I tell them I work at university. Worse-- I actually believe it, it's part of my identity, even though it is factually incorrect. Your focus is not on why you are there, but on how to stay there, or even to advance, in that irrelevant hierarchy.
Academia is like being in an abusive marriage. You know you should go, you get nothing from being there except misery and pain, but leaving is nearly impossible, so much has to go into the decision to leave, so you stay, try to make it work. Maybe it'll get better, it's really not any different anywhere else, maybe it's not him, it's you, if you lost twenty pounds or got a second grant maybe then they'd like you...
Jesus, I'm in an abusive relationship with my job.
I think it may be time for me to go.
Academics are not bad people, obviously, and they have their role in the Matrix. But the real talent, the ones who produce, they all graduated and left-- or never graduated at all.
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April 15, 2008 11:37 PM | Posted by : | Reply
Kinda funny that there is a big ad for the University of Phoenix in the middle of this page... ;-)
April 16, 2008 2:35 AM | Posted by : | Reply
Don't be ashamed. Just because we're against drinking the Kool-Aid doesn't mean we don't take sips from time to time.
Outside of a system, it is easy to maintain a perspective without a value judgment attached: i.e., I decided to go back to school because I wanted to be a therapist, and in order to be a therapist I have to fulfill the requirements of the academic/professional system (i.e., shell out a big ass chunk of money to get a piece of paper that qualifies me to take a test to get another piece of paper that says I'm licensed.)
Now that I'm here, however, I get tangled up in what academia is versus what I think it should be.
I know it sounds like a silly question--and I'm sure to get strung up for asking it--but really? Was academia ever *supposed* to be about excellence? We assume that at some point it was, because that's what we've all been trained to say the manifest function of the academic system is. But what if *that's* the false assumption that's driving the disenchantment? Can we be disappointed in a system that fails to meet a purpose that it was never truly intended to meet?
April 16, 2008 9:44 AM | Posted by : | Reply
There is a fellow who was a tenured law professor at a university in our area.
He actually left that position to become a US magistrate. I saw him in action when I was in his courtroom after getting arrested at a peace demonstration at the local Federal building. Judge X treated everyone with respect, and clearly loved to teach. He behaved as though each traffic citation was the single most interesting case he had ever dealt with. And this judge/former professor refused to accept any plea until he was satisfied that the person was at ease and understood all the options.
Much later, through a friend, I met another law professor and this man said that Judge X was highly unusual. As Professor X put it, 'It is very pleasant and cushy to be a law professor and it is almost unheard of for one to leave and take on the workload and comparatively low pay of being a low ranking judge in the Federal pecking order. Law faculties are full of old guys who just dont leave."
In other words, the Dead Sea Effect.
April 20, 2008 7:53 AM | Posted by : | Reply
Only have academic interests.this is so interesting.these musings.I feel you are all kindreds.
April 25, 2008 1:21 PM | Posted by : | Reply
I was in an abusive marraige which led inexorably to the destruction of my academic career. Ultimately, despite having grants and postdocs etc., I was unable to function. Ironic perhaps, but when the abusive marraige ended, the abusive career ended shortly thereafter. Am I happier now? Yes, but now I have to grapple daily with the ethical shortcomings of employment in the pharmaceutical sector. Just last week, I was let go from a job as a Medical Director at an agency after stating that having no dissent permitted at an advisory board on a pre-registration drug was unethical. Ironic perhaps once again ... I think I'll start working on a novel ... or a maybe a screenplay...
July 5, 2008 2:03 PM | Posted by : | Reply
Sore loser! Academia is the worst place to work except for most of the other places...3 things I loved about academia: June, July, August.
I taught at a college for some 28 years and I loved it. i loved the kids. I loved the subject. sure, bad shit, like other places. But for me it was great and made my life beautiful. So there. Now go forth and show us how grand it is to avoid college. In passing, did you spend 4 years at a college and, if so, why, since it is so bad?
July 25, 2008 3:08 AM | Posted by : | Reply
I wonder if the "Dead Sea Effect" is more accurately applied to certain companies and institutions than to certain careers?
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