I thought I wanted to be a professor, then I served on a hiring committee (2021)
At a large university in Texas, I had two professors - one amazing in everyway, the other not. The amazing professor published great research, wrote well, and had great teaching skills. The other professor gave lackluster classes, published research that was routine, and shocked me that they could be teaching at this level (inspiring in a pessimistic way).<p>Both up for tenure - the amazing professor was passed on because the other had a more desirable background. Both women. As a grad student, I understood the difficult of hiring, but this was honestly incredible.<p>I thought of this when I read the following from the article: "I was startled to learn that academic achievements were not always what mattered most." and "only to fall short of securing a faculty position due to factors outside my control."<p>Just a different story from academia.