Faculty Research interview prep.

Behavioural questions to expect

1. Tell us about yourself and your research trajectory.
2. Tell us about the paper you're proudest of.
3. Tell us about a setback in your research or a piece of feedback you've worked on.
4. Why a faculty position at a research university — and why now?
5. What's your research agenda for the next five years?
6. Why the firm?
7. How would you describe the firm's department + research profile in your own words?
8. How does a faculty hire create value for a research department over a tenure-track horizon?

Technical concepts to master

• Research statement + 5-year program agenda

  Intellectual thread · Project portfolio (3 projects, 5 years) · Funding plan · Departmental fit

• Job talk + chalk talk + paper-defense craft

  Job talk shape · Chalk talk shape · Q&A generosity · Time + rehearsal discipline

• Teaching + mentoring + DEI statements + practice

  Teaching statement structure · DEI statement substance · Doctoral mentoring stance · Teaching demo (when requested)

• Tenure-track economics + service load + P&T criteria

  Tenure clock + P&T criteria · Course load + teaching release · Service load · Startup package

Practical drills

• Deliver your full 50-60 min job talk on your strongest paper or research thread, as if presenting to a mixed-audience research department. I'll probe with Q&A at the end.
• Lay out your 5-year research program on the board — three projects, named grant mechanisms with timing, startup package use, departmental collaborators. I'll interrupt freely.
• Walk me through your job-market paper at dissertation-defense rigor — I'll probe identification, robustness, limitations, and field placement for 45-60 minutes.

Smart-question anchors

• Research strengths + recent hires + departmental trajectory — where the hire fits the 5-year plan
• Tenure + promotion criteria + recent successful cases — what the bar looks like in practice
• Grant + startup support — institutional infrastructure for the early-career grant cycle
• Doctoral program + students + qualifying-exam culture — the pipeline the new hire will draw on
• Teaching load + course release + curriculum needs — what the department needs taught and the realistic load

Sourced from

The Professor Is In (Karen Kelsky) — academic job market guide · Chronicle of Higher Education — Vitae job-search advice + faculty hiring columns · Inside Higher Ed — Carpe Careers + faculty job-market guides · NIH + NSF grant mechanisms (early-career investigator pathways) · ERC + Wellcome + UKRI early-career fellowships (non-US grant landscape) · Tomorrow's Professor (Stanford) + faculty mentoring archives