Page 52 - Through the gate of the neoliberal academy • Herschberg

50 CHAPTER 2
rather than someone who they evaluate from a broader perspective, as someone who is deemed suitable for a further career in academia. As a result, the postdoc position seems to have become a job, rather than a career step. So even though postdocs tend to “depend on their professors for career support in return for their cooperative efforts” (Lam & de Campos, 2015, p. 820), “securing the occupational future will require a high degree of initiative on [postdocs’] part” (Allen-Collinson, 2003, p. 411, see also Teelken & Van der Weijden, 2018), or so called entrepreneurial behaviour (Hakala, 2009). When early-career researchers work on series of fixed-term postdoc contracts and thus various projects (Ylijoki, 2016), they might end up with a scattered research line instead of an independently developed, coherent research line that is required for a next – more stable - position. The effect of this precarity manifestation is a different ideal candidate for postdoc positions compared to more stable academic positions. This current short-term orientation might not be sustainable on the long-run, for both the careers of postdocs and the quality of knowledge production in academia.
We conclude that the projectification of early academic positions resulted in recruitment and selection practices that focus on short-term objectives. This reveals a sharp contrast with the emphasis on academic excellence and talent that dominates the debate on the neoliberal academy (e.g., Butler & Spoelstra, 2012) and academic evaluation and hiring decisions (Herschberg, Benschop, & Van den Brink, 2018b; O’Connor & O’Hagan, 2015; Van Arensbergen, Van der Weijden, & Van den Besselaar, 2014a; Van den Brink & Benschop, 2012b). Our study shows that the increase in externally funded postdoc positions can lead to an erosion of the notion of talent. PIs tend to look for good project workers rather than the best talented academics; so to speak sheep with three legs instead of ‘sheep with five legs’ (i.e., ‘excellent in all respects’) such as for professorships (Van den Brink & Benschop, 2012b, p. 512). According to the idiomatic expression, sheep with three legs will be able to ‘walk’ (i.e., perform sufficiently well in the project) but will not run away, which makes us question the attractiveness of postdoc positions for early-career researchers in the current system.
The practical implications of our study are that HR should be more closely involved in the recruitment and selection of postdocs to make sure that the short- term myopia of PIs is mitigated and a broader spectrum of criteria is taken into account to select the academics of the future. Implementing formal recruitment and selection policies for postdoc positions that require open recruitment of postdocs, can eliminate biases inherent in closed recruitment. More formalized recruitment and selection could also prescribe that PIs should form a hiring committee to ensure that PIs are not solely responsible for the hiring. Furthermore, universities should