Page 107 - Through the gate of the neoliberal academy • Herschberg
P. 107

who is competitive, productive, and confident. However, our data reveal that most committee members do not want these characteristics to carry too far because they want to hire a candidate who is a collaborative team player, an academic citizen, too. We find implicit gender connotations in the tacit criterion of academic citizenship.
We build on teamwork. Of course, individual scientific excellence is important for us, but as our ambition is to build a strong and prosperous research group, we consider the social dimension – sociability of the researcher – an important dimension as well. Someone who has problems working in a group despite being scientifically excellent can break the team. Therefore, sometimes we accept a person, that is not so scientifically excellent, but a socially intelligent individual, since our ambition is to build a strong team. (SO, SSH, F)
According to this committee member “individual scientific excellence” is important in her group but the “social dimension” seems even more important. She argues that a candidate who is scientifically excellent however not able to work in the team will not be hired. On the contrary, someone who is not scientifically excellent but “a socially intelligent individual” can be hired. She emphasizes the team component that seems decisive in hiring decisions.
Interestingly, many committee members throughout the various countries and disciplines consider scientific excellence and teamwork as two opposite characteristics that cannot be held by one and the same person. We find that committee members consider “a whiz kid with a super impact factor” (CH, SSH, F) incompatible with being “a good colleague” because they argue that whiz kids are “wrapped up in [their] own thing” (CH, SSH, M). A Swiss research participant refers to this as a “paradox” which reflects an opposition between the requirement of individual development in the area of research and the desire of a team for collaboration. Or as a Belgian respondent argued: “there are two types of researchers/academics: there is the collaborator and the individualist” (BE, SSH, M).
Moreover, research participants suggest that being excellent in research not only restricts collaboration but also resembles having a problematic character. They argue that “brilliant researchers” are “very difficult to work” with (BE, SSH, M) as they cannot “work with others” and have “a difficult character” (CH, SSH, F). We notice that this stereotypical image is connected to researchers who are extremely productive. Moreover, this stereotypical belief causes committee members to look at “brilliant researchers” with suspicion.
We find that committee members construct the criterion ‘collaboration’ as
THE PERIL OF POTENTIAL 105
 4



























































































   105   106   107   108   109