I hate evaluating applications

It's application season again. Everyone is applying for grad school and postdocs and jobs; there are inevitably a lot of rejections, and they hurt. Of course they hurt. We're people; we have egos. And a lot of scientists (including me) have egos that are all about being good at science. It's who we are. So when we apply for something, it doesn't feel like a committee is judging our application; it feels like they are judging us. It's just guaranteed to make a person miserable.

Of course, the truth is that committees actually judge applications, not people. I'm sitting on a search committee right now for a faculty position in our department, and I'm also reviewing applications for our PhD program, so I've read well over a hundred applications (maybe 200, I don't know) in the past couple of weeks, and I can confirm that what I am judging is much, much smaller and narrower than a whole person. A CV, a research statement, letters of recommendation . . . it's not nothing, but it's not a person.

One thing I wish I had known, back when I was applying for jobs, was how much of it is about fit. You want to study X? That's great. No one in this department does that, so none of us can advise you. But best of luck elsewhere.

Your research is about Y? Very cool. We're actually looking for someone who does Z, so we won't be interviewing you. Best of luck with the job search.

I know that this judging process is unavoidable. We have only one job to fill, and a whole bunch of qualified people interested in filling it, so we have to make some decisions. I mean, if we didn't decide this way, how would we decide? Would we just give jobs to our relatives, like the president some tin-pot dictator? Nobody wants that. We believe in merit.

But I'm painfully aware that everyone who doesn't get hired for the job or accepted into the grad program will probably feel it as a personal rejection. They won't think, Well, I sent a bunch of paperwork and it must not have matched what they were looking for. They'll think, What's wrong with me? I wish it were otherwise, but I think it's just human nature.

Here's hoping that each one of these applicants is safe, healthy, happy and peaceful this holiday season, and that the path each of them is on leads somewhere good, even if they can't see the end from where they are right now.