What level of interest in a candidate does a request for more material/more writing samples indicate, approximately? Is the SC asking 20 people for more materials? 10? It doesn't cost them much to ask, but it can cost a candidate a lot to respond, depending on what has to be prepared, and it would be nice to have *some* idea of the chances...
And what about phone/skype interviews? If 3 people get campus visits, how many people get phone/skype interviews, for the schools that do them?
You should interpret asking for additional materials as cheap talk. It costs nothing (aside from the 15 seconds to write an email) for an SC member to request more materials, so it means nothing meaningful. It's a matter of personal taste more than anything.
And that brings me to another important point. Anybody on the committee can ask for materials, it doesn't require consensus by the SC. Sometimes one member just feels like a file was a little thin but is interested in seeing if the candidate has anything else to show.
Again, it's not a decision by the entire committee.
If you sincerely have nothing else to send, then just admit it and don't make the mistake of sending in a bad rough draft of a dissertation chapter that might knock you out of the running. Don't try to overthink the odds on this. There's no telling whether only 10 candidates were asked for more materials, or whether 30 candidates were asked. You can't know for sure, so just be honest.
This just means you're on a long list and they want more to get it down to a short list. The long list could be 6 or 60. Depends on the school.
"And that brings me to another important point. Anybody on the committee can ask for materials, it doesn't require consensus by the SC. Sometimes one member just feels like a file was a little thin but is interested in seeing if the candidate has anything else to show."
At our public school, if we contact any of the candidates it has to be the exact same protocol for everyone else still in consideration at that stage. I.E. we couldn't legally (or is that just university policy in fear of a lawsuit?) ask only one candidate for more information.
Otherwise, I agree, this sounds like you're on the longlist, probably somewhere closer to 10-20 than 60 people.
Thanks for the info, folks. It's nice to have some idea of what the length of the long list might be. This wasn't a generic email, which I've never taken to mean much, but a phone call from the search committee chair asking for two specific pieces of writing.
care to share the school so we have an idea of where it is in its search process?
If you are looking for real information, you've come to the wrong place
If the SC asks for more material it means that someone wants to read more of what you have written. That is always good. (While it may be "cheap" to ask for more material, it is never cheap to read more material.) As pointed out above, this certainly means that you are on a long-short list, and the school is narrowing to an interview list. Unlike ^^^^, my department has never felt constrained by a rule that "what we ask of one, we must ask of all." We regularly ask some applicants for more material. This is especially true for dissertation work where we want to get a better sense of the theory or empirical chapters when only one of these was sent, or when we want to get a better feeling for how far along the dissertation is.
You have probably led with your best work, and may be hesitant to other papers/chapters. That's your call, but at least for me, holding back is a bad idea. We understand what dissertations look like in progress, are are probably not as critical of these chapters or working papers as you are. Ignoring or deferring the request will more than likely keep you at the long-short list. Sending more material might do the same, but also might help move you to the interview list. Since being asked to send more work is a good sign, and probably leave you no worse off than you are now, my recommendation is that you send promptly.
Thanks very much, flyoverprof. You've exactly nailed my concern, which is that what was requested is not my best work. I have other writing samples that I would be happy to send, but they have requested a specific chapter, which not only is not my best work, but it's by my estimation the least interesting chapter of my dissertation (which should be obvious from the chapter summaries that they have) so I find the request perplexing. I know that I don't really have any options here, though, so it's comforting to hear that at least some committees have an understanding of what dissertations in progress look like...
What flyoverprof said.
Though I would add my public U does have a pretty strict rule about equal treatment of candidates, which we interpret in practice to mean that we can only solicit extra materials from everyone on the long list or nobody. (A couple of my colleague believe we shouldn't accept any information from candidates sent clearly after the deadline, such as an email/updated CV showing that a manuscript was accepted for publication, but in practice we do).
We usually do phone interviews with about twice the number of people we invite to campus (a top SLAC). As far as extra materials, it really depends on the candidate's individual file, especially when we are trying to narrow it down (eg, if we have n+1 candidates we'd like to invite to campus and our dean will only fund us to invite n candidates). I would take it as a compliment and send the material on. I also think you should get off PSJR right now and whip that chapter into shape as best you can before tomorrow morning as you can get away with not sending it on the weekend. Good luck!
OP,
I would echo the warning of the person who warned against sending any work that you are not confident in. Anything that you wouldn't be ready to present in a week as a job talk, you probably should think twice before sending in.
A common scenario in search committees that I've served on is that two members are in favor of interviewing a particular candidate, while the third member is against. The third member then tries to find any evidence that the candidate is not so impressive (such as by quoting a lukewarm comment in one of the letters, or by pointing out a not-so-impressive working paper the candidate has written). You want to be careful with anything you send to the search committee, as it could be used against your candidacy.
OP should send his/her undergraduate senior thesis if he/she has nothing else to send.
With respect to ^^, I have never seen a situation where someone on a SC sought additional materials for nefarious motives. I'm not saying that such doesn't happen; just that I have never seen it. In my experience, if a SC member doesn't (does) want someone on an interview list, he or she doesn't have to resort to such silly means to remove (include) someone from (on) the interview list. That's one of the perks of being on a SC; one can go a long ways towards shaping the interview list.
Again, *if* you have been asked (past tense) to send additional material, I cannot see a situation where declining to do so will help you. To be sure, sending more material may not help either; your remaining work maybe weak and underdeveloped, but that will be the assumption anyway if you say 'no'. (But recall my comment above about not being too harsh at this point: there is a big difference between sending out a draft dissertation chapter and what you think is a polished paper to JOP.)
flyoverprof is right. You must send what has been requested, regardless of what you think about it. SC members don't ask for materials to give them ammunition to destroy someone's candidacy - they ask for it because they want to read more by a candidate. If an SC member had nefarious motives, there are plenty of other ways of torpedoing someone's application.
OP if they have asked for something specific, it is because what you sent (e.g. your intro chapter) does not demonstrate the skills they are looking for. Did they ask for your empirical chapter (case study, quant, etc)?
If that's "not your best" well that's sort of too bad. Send it. Hopefully all they want is an illustration.
We usually ask all of the female candidates to submit a full body picture. We used to allow just head shots but a couple of fat ones were able to sneak on to our short list one time. We've learned how to prevent that now.
> You should interpret asking for additional materials as cheap talk. It costs nothing (aside from the 15 seconds to write an email) for an SC member to request more materials, so it means nothing meaningful.
It's not just a signal from the recruiting school to you. It may also be a request for a signal FROM you to the recruiting school. And this could be informative to them exactly because complying with the request is not cheap talk.
In other words, they might be looking for a sign of your seriousness, which you provide by willingness to incur the cost of giving what they want.
^ has a good point. We asked for additional materials of our long list on our search, and its both to see who is serious about their interest in our position AND to move from a long list to a short list. In our case, we asked this of everyone on our long list (about 12 people).
I realize I'm the 21st post here but this is a great example of something not worth overthinking. They have asked for specific things. You need to send those specific things or just give it up entirely. Your concern is not that the work is unfinished or incomplete, but that it's "not my best work" and "the least interesting chapter of my dissertation." You'd be surprised what some people find interesting; obviously someone is interested or they wouldn't have asked. Regardless, you only have one course of action here.
As for trying to analyze what is all happening on the SC, what it means and why, you'll have to go with the standard PSJR answer: it depends.
I received a similar request to send in more chapters/outlines of my thesis. Not sure what to make of it.
Send what is asked for. Don't send more. If you can't send them what they request, you need a good explanation.
Enough said