Well Prepared: from Application to Appointment for Professorship

  • This workshop serves as an overview of how to prepare systematically and purposefully for applications for professorships at universities in Germany (and other European countries upon request). Participants will receive concrete information on the legal basis, the procedure and the individual elements of appointment procedures as well as tips on how to best prepare for an application and how to design written application documents.

    Note: This workshop comes with the option of feedback on your application documents by the trainer after the workshop (individual coaching approx. 20 min.)
Report by Dr. Dominic Bresser , Vector Foundation and Dr. Ulrich W. Paetzold, Helmholtz Young Investigator Group (2017)

Young group leaders are at an exciting, but critical stage in their career. They have established successful, independent research groups, but next face an application process for appointment as professor which is in some ways mysterious and certainly different from all previous career steps. Therefore, the workshop From the ‘Application to the Appointment Procedure’ provides insightful and hands-on information.

We started off with an overview on the entire process, ranging from the careful preparation of application documents, over the job talk and the interview, to the negotiation itself. In regard of the application, especially the potential requirement of including a teaching plan was intensively discussed – presumably, as young group leaders are usually dealing less often with this. Moreover, we were made aware to that particular care has to be taken, if there is already a well-defined teaching concept and the curriculum in place. This part was finally closed with a check of the present application documents of the participants, critically discussing how to further improve them – not least in consideration of the guidelines and recommendations discussed earlier. Since the job talk is rather topic specific, the focus of the next part was on the subsequent discussion and interview, including some practice on how to reply best to critical comments concerning the CV. In fact, it turned out that the applicant himself is frequently far more critical than others. On the second day, we focused on the negotiation subsequent to a successful application. The general rules, steps, and time lines were presented and we were exposed to different negotiation strategies and made aware of any “No Go”.

All attendees found this workshop exceptionally helpful. It is not only a great support for those who have already started to apply for a professorship, but also for those who are just preparing for the next career step. The hands-on experiences and insightful information covered different backgrounds, “No Gos”, mind setting, and inspiration about what to further focus on for the own career