Is this at all about intelligence?

[makesnosense]

Watching my friends and acquaintances on the market was a really disconcerting experience for me this year. I've seen some very talented and hardworking people get no bites, while some rather unimpressive (dull-minded) candidates get picked up by exceptional schools. Their success appears to have very little to do with intelligence... and everything to do with the prestige of their program, adviser, sexiness of the topic, luck, blind confidence, and maybe a couple other factors.

Sorry if this sounds like old news. I guess it's difficult to evaluate how smart someone is, but it's really discouraging to see some brilliant people being left out...

[well]

Choosing/getting into the right (i.e., prestigious) program, choosing the right (i.e., famous) advisor, and choosing the right (i.e., sexy, hot, interesting) topic might reflect well on these 'dull' peoples' intelligence scores...

[well]

I know some really smart people who suck at playing the academic game. Gotta play the game to get a good position, plain and simple. One could argue that picking the right program, chair, and topic is all part of playing the game...

[drbearjew]

I know this has been hashed and rehashed in multiple threads this year and prior, but...

Do you REALLY think that we have that much control in the programs we get into? There are largely 10-12 programs which represent the vast majority of hires in R1s, regardless of ranking (of course, there are a few exceptions). Obviously they cannot accept every single applicant, and have to make cuts somewhere and somehow. The differences between candidates who get into these programs and those who do not is most likely not all that great - I know in my own program the difference between who gets in and who does not comes down to a few otherwise minor details (a few points difference in the GRE; .01 difference in GPA; one more extra-curricular activity). And my program is NOT one of the top 10-12.

Couple that with small differences in personal statements, some of which are attributed to better mentoring structures and opportunities at certain undergraduate programs than others (which, also, have their own selection criteria); the ever-important aspect of mentor-networks; and, of course, individual achievements, even the latter of which as sociologists we should be trained to see as predicated in part on social forces beyond our control.

Point being, the idea that people who are getting jobs this year or other years because they made better choices is, well, stupid. There are a ton of other factors at play here - at least be honest and acknowledge them (whether you think they apply to you or not).

[rrr]

Well, there are structural factors, such as limited program spots, but if one realizes that one is deficient in this or that, the smart thing to do would to be to take steps to remedy the area. That is intelligent. However, even smart people do not always see the areas in which their programs or training are deficient, which we could call blind spots. Hard to fix something you don't know about.

OK, that is a bit circular, but my point is that once they recognize a deficiency, smart people work to remedy it. So it is good to consider what your strengths and weaknesses might be. In this market, it is also wise to have solid plan B options just in case.

[drbearjew]

I guess I'm referring to things a bit bigger - like, the process of getting into Grad school; the place one is coming from in undergrad; the choosing of an undergraduate program; students who must work and go to school full time rather than filling up their resume with Chemistry Club, Glee Club, and other academic-social organizations.

But yes, at some point you have to be reflexive. Interestingly, though, students with good teachers/advisers often have these deficiencies pointed out to them, rather than discovering them through moments of reflection in between 600pgs of readng/week plus trying to publish

[nonsense]

I am from a Top 20 program and landed an R1 job in a lower ranked department. Truly, there is not nearly so wide a gulf between students at the department I came from and the one that I am in now, except that the benefit that I got from my grad school department's name on my CV when applying here likely would not be the same if one of our students applied to my grad department. (Okay, maybe they'd make an exception if I was able to advocate, but even then, the dean might not go for it.) Yes, my former department has more resources than the one that I am at, but our students present, co-publish and solo publish; we just don't have the large collection of big names to attach to their letters. (As an aside, I am trying to counter this by introducing them to big names from around the country and maybe including them as 3rd author so that the notables can contribute letters for them at the application stage.)

I will say that this business of "Well, choose the right department!" is silly, in part because every level of reckoning in the academic process depends on evaluation of the preceding level, such that coming from a strong undergrad department often means that one came from a good college, which means one came from a good high school, which means one came from a good elementary and junior high school system, etc. We are who we choose to be only to the degree that we are permitted to choose; as sociologists, this should be obvious.

[unclekarl]

I'm from a top 10, & have found some programs not even ranked to have more rigorous quant training than I received as a grad program. I've certainly seen some 'lousy' graduates from programs of all ranks, while some places I had not heard of as a grad student produce individuals who publish amazing work. I view any link between 'school rank' and 'school quality' to have a LOT of variance.

Similarly, when looking at individuals, an association between 'intelligence' and 'output' has a lot of variation. Some people who may 'just' be average in brilliance can have a work ethic and standards that result in an incredible amount of good research being produced. I agree about choosing topics and advisers as important. One last thing is just plain LUCK. Some combination of timing, topic, and being in the right place may result in accidental discoveries, getting an article published in ASR/AJS, or having a paper become a citation classic. Sure, it takes hard work, but given that most sociologists are doing this, trends within the discipline and broader culture may, all things being equal, lead one person to have a nice career at a good R2, while another becomes a leading figure in the discipline with tons of grants and awards.

[Arrogant]

Perhaps those grad students who think they're really intelligent are also arrogant and maybe some programs would like to avoid creating toxic work environments by hiring folks who think so much of themselves.

[anotherway]

Let me take this in another direction and talk about fields and cutting edge work instead of individuals and ranks. I think it is surprising how much academia rewards "normal science" versus cutting edge work. Getting published doing work that is merely an application of an existing theory to a different case/dataset is a lot easier than doing cutting edge work that advances theories, and it seems to me that the rewards for each do not recognize this. More plainly, I see a lot of people publishing random "I tested X theory using this methods in this case and it worked" and getting good jobs than people who actually publish good new ideas. Not to turn this into a discussion of journals, but the former is actually most of what I see published in social forces, for example.

People who try to test Bourdie's cultural capital using a new dataset, or who try to do another historical example of DiMaggio's isomorphism, or a case study of X social movement that just applies the theory end up publishing a lot faster than the person who gets bogged down ironing out the details of a new idea, and then when it comes to hiring/tenure/etc. people end up counting the former like the latter.