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I was enjoying some of the pithy humor at Despair.com and ran across a poster that made me think of why I left my last position:
Having been out of academics for a little over a month (and loving it) I am now able to talk about things I knew but maybe didn't want to admit. One is that academics tend to act in their own self interest, even if it's to the detriment of others. Nowhere is this more clear than in the handling of a 'dud' faculty member.
I've seen and heard examples in the past, but saw it first hand recently when my former Department hired a faculty member as chairman from a reputable University after an extensive search. The search was performed not only by our institutional search committee, but was aided by a search firm (to which I'm sure we paid good money). Imagine my surprise, then, when his arrival could be a sequel to Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde and I took an almost instant dislike to him. I decided to move on to pastures so intensely green in color that I really can't describe it.
It is only now, when I and others encounter former co-workers in the course of our normal business, that we find out he lacked the respect of his colleagues and was rather significantly disliked. Search committees and search firms make phone calls to find out these sorts of things. Why weren't they told? Probably because, when you have a dud, you want to get rid of them, even if it's to the detriment of their new department. In this case I am becoming convinced it will be the ruin of a nationally known academic anesthesiology department. Will the institutions administrators allow it? They already have.
You know, it's interesting, we were spending lots and lots of time developing objective measures of competence for our residents. Perhaps a more important task would have been to develope objective measures of competence for prospective chair candidates in the Ivory Tower of Liars.
I resigned my position as an Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology at Milton S. Hershey Medical Center today. The resignation is effective March 21, 2003. It's been nearly seven years since completing my residency in anesthesiology and I'm looking forward to entering private practice in the Harrisburg area.