Monday, January 07, 2013

Fake CV #4

This is a very interesting fake CV, in part because of the reasons why it was created. Says the author:
I decided to .. make the CV of the mythical wunderkind I imagine is the dream candidate in the applicant pool of whatever it is for which I'm humbly supplicating. It's basically an impossible exaggeration of actual people I know that I think of when I am applying for something.
Interesting!

Also of note is the series of comments at the bottom, annotations from a fake search-committee:


Dr. Magical Robot Unicorn
Dept of Science
University of Fame and Awesomeness
1234 Mt. Olympus, State, USA

Education
2011-present: University of Fame and Awesome, Postdoctoral Fellowship of Awesomeness
2008-2011: Possibly Even More Amazing University, PhD
2006-2008: Insanely Eminent University, B.Sc., Summa Cum Laude 

References
* Prof. Progenitor oftheField 
* Prof. Future Nobelaureate  
* Dr. Director oftheNIH

Grants and awards
* MacArthur Fellow
* Giant NIH Grant, co-PI 
* Best Speaker Ever, TED 
* Most Beloved Teacher, Possibly Even More Amazing University
* Top Dissertation, awarded by Important Professional Science Organization 
* Best Undergraduate Honors Thesis, Insanely Eminent University 
* Gordon E Moore Award, Intel International Science and Engineering Fair

Selected Publications
* Unicorn, M.F. (in press). Pulling off the paradigm-shifting experiment everyone thought was impossible. Nature.
* Unicorn, M.F., OtherPerson, Other Person, & Nobelaureate, F. (2012). Inventing the breakthrough technique that will drive science for the next 100 years. Science. 
* Unicorn, M.F., & oftheField, P. (2011). An elegant unified theory of everything. PNAS. 
* Unicorn, M.F. (2010). An article that finally makes an important body of scientific work accessible to anyone. Scientific American.  

Annotations made by Search Committee Chair: 
 
* Education: note the impeccable pedigree and insanely efficient graduation dates which clearly mark Dr. Unicorn as a wunderkind
 
* References: the holy trinity of letter of reference writers -- (1) the living legend who founded the subfield we have been dying to hire in, did I mention Dr. Unicorn was his very last advisee? (2) the current hot stuff so you know Dr. Unicorn is part of the bleeding edge, and insists Unicorn was really the one responsible for the work everyone knows will be nominated for the Nobel one day, (3) person of important position who happens to be a close personal friend -- did you know Dr. Unicorn has also been raising her 2 beautiful children without a nanny and with no discernible impact to her professional productivity and famously charming collegiality?  
 
* Publications: demonstrates uncanny chops in all domains -- popular science writing, theory, engineering, and experimentation
 
* The awards, letter and writing samples let you know this person will kick ass in interviews and be a great colleague 
 
* Result: let's get real people -- do we even need to look at any other applicants?



8 comments:

Anonymous said...

As I always say about REAL people who combine tremendous talent in science with being genuinely nice:

These people are the worst because you can't even hate them.

Mark P

Anonymous said...

Funny...when I read "let's get real people", for a second I understood "let's get people that are real, not people that are unreal". I think this is what we would have said in our not top-10 university.

studyzone said...

My former dept. had a near-wunderkind apply for faculty positions. Because of family considerations, he had to cast a fairly narrow net, and applied for positions at several mid-tier universities, in addition to the traditional R1s. His PI got a call from the search committee chair at one such school, saying that given the awesomeness of his application, they couldn't fathom why he'd want to work at their school, and decided not to "bother" interviewing him, since he'd be gone in a year, or so they thought.

Anonymous said...

Overqualified. Not serious about the position. Only first author publications? Not a team player. Too threatening.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, Dr. Unicorn is referred to with a female pronoun, so she will be a threat to the department. Not that I've ever seen such a thing happen first-hand, mind you. That was...somewhere else. A long time ago. In a university far, far away. Or so I'm told.

The only way Dr. Unicorn could be any more threatening is if she attached a photo to her CV and turned out to be attractive. Not that looks have ever played into the evaluation of a candidate in any situation that I have personally witnessed. But my friend, at another school, tells me the most interesting stories.

(I really wish this comment was sarcastic and not grounded in any sort of real event in my...my friend's experience. Oh, Dear Lord, do I wish...)

Anonymous said...

First thing that went through my mind:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_Is_Nothing_(video_résumé)

David Stern said...

Re Studyzone - yes, that's why you need to state in your cover letter why you are really interested in the job if you think there is a chance that the SC won't think you are interested.

Davie Yoon said...

Re: Anonymous 05:45:00 PM

"Only first author publications? Not a team player"

The CV lists "selected publications" -- no doubt Dr. Unicorn has several papers in her back pocket that demonstrate her ability to be the Best Team Player Ever.