Tips for Your First Law Professor Screening Interview
I got an inquiry from a law professor candidate who is having their first screening interview. I pointed them to the AALS page and then shared the following additional tips:
[Note: I have been on three appointments committees, so many professors have far more experience with this topic than I have.]
* Be authentic. Don’t try to be whoever you think the committee wants to hire. Be yourself.
* If you are doing the interview via Zoom, remember that the camera subtracts some of your energy. Don’t act, but be as energetic as you can be. Also, present a positive Zoom image (good sound, good lighting, cleaned-up backgrounds). Free yourself of any external distractions, but I personally never mind when there’s a pet sighting.
* Most interviews will ask about scholarship, teaching, and service. You will want to have some concrete examples about each topic that showcase the attributes you want to highlight.
* My view is that you should answer any question “I don’t know” if you don’t actually know the answer, and then explain your thought process about how you would think through or research possible answers. Committees know you are an entry-level candidate and won’t know everything about being a successful law professor, but they will credit logical and thoughtful approaches to problems.
A specific example: you might get asked what casebook you would use to teach a specific class. If you haven’t gone through the casebook selection process for that course, you can answer this question by explaining how you would research the casebook options and what attributes you would emphasize or avoid. In other words, you turn this into a question about your pedagogical priorities and how a casebook might help or hinder that, rather than a mechanical question about which specific casebook you prefer.
* Be prepared with questions for the committee. The questions you ask signal your priorities, so use them to that effect. For example, despite the AALS guidance on the page I linked to above, I would recommend not asking a question about the interview process before the whole committee. That’s a missed opportunity to signal some other priority of yours. Ideally, you will have done enough homework about the interviewing school that you can ask questions specific to the school, not just a stock or standard question.
* Sometimes you will encounter jerk interviewers who punch down on interviewees. I’m sorry if you run into those. It’s their insecurities speaking, so try not to let them rattle you. You will find that most interviewers are nice and genuinely want you to be your best self.
* The screening interviews are two-way sales pitches. Every school wants you to come out of their interviews being enthusiastic about them. Don’t be surprised if the committee spends some scarce interview time touting how great their school is.
* Do some mock interviews, if you haven’t done them already. Practice but don’t rehearse.
Faculty hiring is a super-complicated and incredibly idiosyncratic process. There are many complex interpersonal dynamics on appointments committees (as the old joke goes, ask 5 law professors their opinions and you will get 6 answers), and committee members often bargain with each other over their preferred or verboten candidates while trying to optimize against weird and constantly changing institutional constraints. So much of the hiring process does not turn only on your strengths and weaknesses as a candidate. Go along for the ride, but don’t take anything personally if it doesn’t work out, because that may have nothing to do with you personally.
Also, you are in an incredibly talented pool of candidates. There are hundreds of other candidates who also have elite credentials and who will (or could have) become successful academics. You should feel good that you already have stood out to the committee sufficient to get a screening interview. You probably already have at least one champion on the committee. But the amazing talent in the pool means committees make impossibly fine distinctions between candidates, some of which will appear nonsensical or inexplicable to non-committee members. Sometimes those distinctions work to your benefit, sometimes not. You might be the committee’s top candidate on paper; or you might already have some skeptics who will downrank you no matter how your interview goes so that they can advance their preferred candidates. Believe in yourself and your strengths, and don’t let anyone take that away from you.
* * *
UPDATE: I got the following comment:
As someone who just spent some time on the lateral market, I would suggest adding:
– Candidates should research the institution and its institutional mission. Is there a research focus? A teaching focus? Access schools have different operational needs (and budgets) than larger schools with a bigger research footprint. Some focus on first gen lawyers, others on big law. Your background and talk should be tailored to the school’s mission first and foremost.
– Ditto for the people on the search committee. If there is overlap in research agendas or teaching areas it can make relating to the search committee easier during the screener. If not, find something in their bio that you do relate to. A candidate in the IP space needs to find some way to relate to the criminal procedure experts.
– This also extends to the institutions culture/political leanings (they all have one, expecially given the current political environment). The same for parochial schools that may have a religious mission that candidates should be aware of. Some religious schools have a very passive religious mission, and others have full on embraced Christian Nationalism. Other culture things to think about include: does the institution still value and embrace DEI? Or is it in a state with legal restrictions on academic freedom like Florida? What sort of community outreach does the school do? Is there a robust alumni network or is it more of a commuter school? What is the regional/national reputation of the school? (not talking about U.S. News).
– Try to be human. I never thought reading directly from a CV was a useful exercise, search committees want to know what you are going to be like outside of the classroom too. Be open to sharing about hobbies, especially if you have a screener with something in the background of their Zoom call you can relate to.