I’m doing a new thing from this week! I’m adding in a regular post about ACADEMIC career actions. I’m doing this because it’s June and folks are looking ahead to their Fall academic job search, which starts in August. Of course academia is in an unprecedented state of turmoil and there’s no guarantee of what jobs will be advertised, or if you’d even want one of them (Red state university, anyone?) But as always, I know that the academic job is the most obvious use of a PhD, if not the easiest or most common, and I want to acknowledge that.

This advice in the 52 weeks series will, however, depart from my regular advice, which has filled hundreds of posts and a very long book! (the 2026 update is over 500 pages!) Find the new update here on bookshop.org and PLEASE mark Outliers Books as your chosen bookstore! Outliers is Kel’s and my new bookstore here in Eugene! Choosing us allows us to receive the revenue from your purchase.

<———- Make sure you purchase the copy that has the gold “Revised and Updated” mark!

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So, the genre of advice on the academic job search that you’ll find in the 52 weeks series will be more about the thinking part, kind of akin to developmental editing. That is, it’s not advice about what to write in your cover letter, or how to write it, but rather, how to think about writing it. So, I’ll have exercises and provocations to look at your record in new and interesting ways.

But please don’t misunderstand. ALL of my regular and VERY FIRM writing advice about how to construct your letter in terms of its (8 or 9) paragraph structure and required content, remains the same! Find that advice on this blog, and in my book, and follow it! If anything I write here seems to deviate, follow the book. That’s the gold standard.

OK, let’s proceed.

One of the most damaging myths in the academic job search is that cover letters are mysterious documents infused with personality, passion, and scholarly destiny. As delightful as that sounds, they are not. A cover letter is a strategic argument, and like all successful arguments, it is tailored to its audience.

This week’s task is to practice writing a fully tailored cover letter for your dream position. Why? Because it’s hard, and the most common mistake I see in cover letters, aside from hyper-emotionalism, is lack of tailoring. This includes both the overt tailoring in the final paragraph, and the implicit tailoring throughout.

When I review job letters, I routinely see candidates using a single master letter and changing only a few sentences from application to application. The result is predictable; the candidate spends a page describing their dissertation, another page discussing teaching, and signs off. Nothing in the letter demonstrates a clear understanding of what the department actually needs.

But think:  departments do not hire dissertations, departments hire colleagues.

Your task this week is to stop writing about yourself in isolation and start writing about yourself in relation to a specific institutional context.

First of all, imagine a dream job. It should be a position that genuinely excites you. It can be a recently posted faculty position or a past position from a department you admire. A hypothetical opening at your ideal institution or a position outside academia if that aligns with your goals.

The key is specificity – you need enough information to analyze the department’s priorities. If it’s an existing position read the advertisement carefully, then read it again. Print it out if that is helpful. Highlight every requirement, qualification, preference, and institutional value statement. These are not filler words, they are instructions. Academic job postings, to their credit, are quite literal. They are not filled with hyperbole and gaslighting to the degree of many corporate job postings.

If it’s a hypothetical position then use an adjacent advertisement to create a similar one, and then do the same work.

Next reverse engineer the job search. Ask yourself: what problem is this department trying to solve? Are they seeking:

• A scholar in a specific subfield?
• Someone who can teach introductory courses?
• A researcher likely to secure grants?
• A colleague who will contribute to diversity initiatives?
• A faculty member who can collaborate across disciplines?

Of course it will be a combination of the above, and many others. Most candidates focus on what they want, but successful candidates focus on what the institution wants and how they are ready to provide it. The difference is enormous.This is NOT done through abject desperation, by the way. I don’t mean a line like, “I’ll teach any class you need! or “I will serve on all your committees!”  No, I mean, maintaining the proper “academic” tone of reserve and foundation in EVIDENCE, link your actual experience/ability to departmental priorities.

So create a simple chart. In the left column, list the job requirements. In the right column, list concrete evidence from your record.

For example:

Requirement: Ability to teach large introductory courses.

Evidence: Designed and taught Introduction to Sociology with 120 students across three semesters.

Or:

Requirement: Commitment to interdisciplinary collaboration.

Evidence: Co-authored publications with faculty in public health and environmental studies.

Do not write until every requirement has corresponding evidence. If you cannot identify evidence, that gap is important information.

The next step is to get rid of unnecessary autobiography. Many unsuccessful letters read like memoirs which begin with origin stories, go on to describe intellectual journeys and explain how the candidate became fascinated by a topic. Search committees rarely need this information; instead what they need is confidence (by which I mean evidence) that you can perform the job.

Instead of:

“I have long been passionate about questions of migration and identity.”

Try:

“My research program examines migration and identity through mixed-methods analysis of immigrant community networks, resulting in three peer-reviewed publications and a forthcoming book manuscript.”

One statement communicates feelings, the other communicates professional value. I bet you can guess which one is more effective.

(I’ll pause to say that there is nothing untoward about this awareness. You are not capitulating to neoliberal logic, etc etc by using straightforward evidence based language. Conversely, you are not resisting neoliberal logic by filling your letter with weepy sentimentality about passion, eagerness, and humility. This is a false dichotomy based on poor information. Academics are overworked and impatient. They don’t have time to translate emotion language into alleged skills, nor should they have to. No skills should be “alleged.” They should be demonstrated with evidence.)

After completing your draft, ask yourself: could this letter be submitted to ten different institutions without major changes? If the answer is yes, you have not tailored it enough. A truly tailored letter should be inseparable from the position. Readers should immediately recognize that the document was written specifically for them.

Yes, I know that this is grueling work when you are applying to many jobs. Unfortunately, there simply is no shortcut.

So this week’s task, using the steps above, is to write a complete cover letter for your dream position. Then evaluate it using these questions:

1. Does every major paragraph connect directly to the position?
2. Have I addressed the department’s stated priorities?
3. Do I provide evidence instead of claims?
4. Have I eliminated unnecessary autobiography?
5. Would a committee immediately see me as a colleague rather than a student?

If you can answer yes to all five questions, you have completed the exercise successfully. More importantly, you have learned one of the most valuable skills in the academic job market, that the strongest cover letters are not expressions of passion, they are demonstrations of fit.