I think if a person is not getting the job based on bad (or mediocre) letters, it is indicative of other reasons not to give that person the job - i.e., no one actually appreciated his work; inability to make friends or work well with others such that no one wants to reccomend him or her; a level of unacceptable tone-deafness (in picking a recommender) which would probably follow him to the new job.
In undergraduate it is fairly common practice for the applicant to review and revise a letter of recommendation before it is sent out with a post-graduate, fellowship or job application. And at larger universities it is not unheard of for the applicant to write a preliminary draft of the letter. Is there something entirely unique about letters of recommendation out of graduate school that require us to draw an ethical line between ‘petty’ undergraduate letters and ‘consequential’ graduate letters? Or, alternatively, are both practices equally (un)ethical?
We had a guy who everyone recognized as the best philosopher among us, and he worked with someone who became famous for trying to single handedly fight recomendation-letter-inflation by writing the truth about the candidate without all the usual hyperbole. Result: he is out of philosophy, couldnt get an interview. sometimes it is the letter writer, not the candidate.
I find that very odd. In all my life situations I've been able to see my letters of recommendation. When TheWife was applying for clerkships out of law school she got to vet her letters as well. This confidentiality seems like an arcane practice.
What's the presumed benefit of the confidentiality?
the writer is writing under the assumption that the content of the letter would not be communicated to the applicant.
This is true but the emphasis is misplaced. The confidentiality is supposed to benefit the hiring committee. In the interest of getting an honest assessment, the recommender is obligated not to discuss the contents with the recommendee.
If the recommender discussed the letter with the recommendee, he would be violating the hiring department's expectation of confidentiality. But the expectation is not symmetric. Hiring department/committee members are free to provide any feedback they like to an applicant. They have no obligation to refrain from disclosing the contents of a letter.
As a general rule, I think it's a bad idea. If you have good reason to think someone's written a negative letter after the fact, then it's different. I do know someone where that probably happened.
When I was a teacher (high school), I told my students that for recs, I'd put them in a positive light but I wouldn't lie. I refused to write a rec for one student because, as I told him repeatedly, I couldn't honestly write a positive evaluation, and it wouldn't do him any good. He didn't care, which tells ya a lot...
I don't think I've ever seen one of the recs written for me. I would generally give a copy of those I wrote to my students, but I'd have pretty frank assessments with them throughout the year. When I wrote one for a colleague, I'd always give them a copy. But I know at least one prof of mine really took the confidentiality part seriously. For many applications, you need to sign a waiver of some sort, anyway.
As someone currently entering the job market, I'm glad to see this discussion. I worry about these things. I have a person writing letters for me this year who is really awesome and has always been a big supporter of me. However, this person also has the reputation of fighting letter inflation on his/her own. So I don't know if she'll put something unnecessarily negative in there or not. It certainly worries me.
This person does however show people the letters at the end of the cycle, something no one else writing for me does. So I'll know if I should not go back to this person next year. But it is definitely is on my mind.
While letter inflation, like grade inflation, may be unfortunate, it also hurts other people to fight it on your own.
"is it immoral to have a friend look at your confidential letters of recommnedation to make sure one of your recommenders isn't shooting down your applications?"
It depends. There are times when it is wrong. But there may be times when a wrong needs to be corrected. Not all recommenders are ethical people and sometimes job candidates are not in a position to see this, otherwise they wouldn't have asked the person. Not all recommendations need to be problem free, but problems may be stated in a positive frame, e.g. the recommended is learning to overcome a specific problem in the classroom or in her/his research, instead of damning the candidate with little praise.
I currently have a Credentials File at my Graduate Alma Mater, and have been involved in job searches as an applicant on and off for over 10 years. The purpose of confidential letters, I thought, was to protect the letter-writer's total freedom of expression should they want it. But I have had several letters sent "confidentially" to my Credentials File, but was also handed a copy by the writer. Am I correct in assuming that there is no question of ethics here. The confidentiality is being breached, by choice, at the personal level, and being retained at the public level (I can NEVER see that letter should the writer not choose to give me a copy at some point). I know this is a differnt ? than the one from the post, but it appeared to be an issue in several replies. Even if I am right, it is precisely when the writer does NOT offer a copy to the candidate that Steve's original question becomes important, right? but some recommenders may just not be the kind of person to offer a letter, or may not consider it appropriate (but in my mind, again, it cannot be unethical for the writer to share the "conf" letter with the candidate by choice)
BTW, I would say it is unethical to have a third party "screen" your letter in any way. And I wouldn't even use Kant to defend that claim! But on a continuum of innocuous beating the system to simple cheating, I think it is closer to simple cheating.
My observation has been that an enormous number of letter writers really don't know how to write letters.
Some years ago, I was in the bookstore at Penn State, and FOR SALE was a pamphlet for faculty of one dept (poli sci, maybe) with instructions on how to write letters. The model letters in this guidebook were dreadful. One showed that the Penn State recommender was insecure about the standing of his [sic] own department, arguing that the candidate had turned down other grad schools for Penn State...thereby pointing to the quality of his department. He further indicated that the candidate [she] had a brother in medical school at an Ivy as evidence that the student hadn't choosen Penn State because of financial considerations.
Is it ethical for a faculty member to comment on the candidate's relatives? (complete with coded information that reveals something significant about the class background--not qualifications--of the candidate).
I'm with a previous commenter that this system is a complete anacronism. The schools will contact recomenders by phone or e-mail or in-person before hiring anyway, so why all the secrecy at the screening level?
It's very, very difficult for candidates who are not getting interviews to be in the position of guessing what the problem is. Given the level of competition, a letter of faint praise condemns one to the waste can, anyway...so simply writing a generally positive letter is not enough. BTW, the Chronicle of Higher Education once published an article demonstrating that the same Ivy League recommenders routinely describe their students (all of them) as the best student they've taught in 20 years. I've seen this as well. Ethics are moot in a system where only the weakest member (the candidate) is held to some mysterious ethical standard.
The best letters reveal something of the work and personality of the student. A journalistic report of the facts, for example, of how a student had presented a paper with poise and professionalism, or a journalistic account of teaching observation is much more useful to hiring committees that lots of laudatory platitudes. Or letters (I've seen many) where the writer spent more time listing their own qualifications (insecurity, once again) than describing the candidate.
I think that your graduate department should vet your letters before sending you off onto the job market. It's part of ensuring that you are adequately prepared (and not unfairly disadvantaged). If your department fails in its obligations here, then I think it would be perfectly permissible to make your own arrangements to ensure that your letters are properly vetted (though it's unfortunate if the system is such that your only available means is somewhat underhanded).
Does it matter whether the position was really one you were interested in or whether it was a straw-application for the purpose of checking the letters?
It might seem like it should, but no. The question here is whether it's permissible to apply for jobs you might not actually want. And, of course, it is permissible, maybe even necessary.
First, if you're that worried about your letters, who's to say you wouldn't take the "straw-application" job under the right circumstances?
Second, in the private sector, it's perfectly acceptable to apply for jobs you probably don't want. (Good way to get a raise, sometimes.) Academia is no different...a fact we learned (at the latest) when we were told to apply to some 'safety' grad. schools.
I don't see any ethical question here.
How ethical is it to have an academic market driven by recommendation letters?
If you disagree with your boss, will you be blacklisted from every university? This sounds like 19th century when workers could be blacklisted from the job market for complaining too much...
"If you disagree with your boss, will you be blacklisted from every university?"
It's the dissertation advisor that's the issue for the first job. And it's not so much analogous to being blacklisted as needing a patron or an agent. One really can't represent oneself.
Unethical? I think that's taking the discussion further than it needs to go.
It's more a question of how clueless the candidate is. You should not be asking someone for a letter of reference unless you know exactly how positive the recommendation will be. And if your relationship with the recommender is good enough to warrant the request, then the recommender will usually offer to let you see it.... after which you can politely decline with an expression of complete trust, which strengthens the relationship further.
If you -- as the recommender -- get a request from someone whom you hardly know, or cannot vouch for, you have to ask whether such a clueless person deserves the job. But in all fairness, YES, you should decline if you can't say something nice. If they insist, then you are under no obligation to lie.
Unethical to sneak a second-hand peak? You shouldn't have to.
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