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I, too, was once a postdoc. The real problem with being put in a unique position to do important work is that you're under the gun to do important work. That

I, too, was once a postdoc. The real problem with being put in a unique position to do important work is that you're under the gun to do important work. That situation leads to lots of negative consequences. Especially when you notice that the number of people employed as postdocs at any given time is at least an order of magnitude larger than the number of assistant professors being hired that year. I certainly think that being a postdoc can have great value (it did for me, and it did for everyone I know who eventually became a professor), but in practice it's a mixed bag and the structure of the situation produces mixed results.

merraksh 16y ago
The real problem with being put in a unique position to do important work is that you're under the gun to do important work. But so are you as a professor, at least up to tenure. I agree it is a double edged sword. It is intuitive that a research community prefers to evaluate someone before offering him a tenure-track job. PS The ratio postdocs/asst.prof can vary a lot. For example it was much lower than 10 in all of the departments I worked at, though not far from it in Europe.