Academic rank of faculty?

[countingdays]

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What difference does your academic rank make?
I mean what does an associate professor have that an assistant professor doesn't and why should you care?

 

[sevoflurane]

There is definite hierarchy in academics (at least this is what I saw during residency). Something I would not like. You do med school, then residency then "junior faculty". At my old institution, the division was obvious. More academic time (internet time), less call (sometimes no call), more political power, more vaca and more $$ the more senior you get. Maybe my old academic system is not universal but i saw some frustration from some of the new attendings who i became pretty good friends with.

Our chair was notorious for starting a CT case and handing it off to the junior CT attending once on bypass. That's just poor form IMO.

Some PP groups function the same way but I wouldn't be caught dead in one of those practices. You want to have a happy group working efficiently towards a unified goal? Don't step on your partners who may one day bail you out of trouble. Besides, by the time you finish residency why should you have to proove yourself over and over again?

In my group, partners = friends I hang out with (poker, wake boarding on the lake, dinner, vacation in the rockies, etc..). They are not just M-F work colleagues. I know it's not a perfect world, but fairness is important at this stage of my career. Why shouldn't it be?

My 2cents.

 

[Mman]

What difference does your academic rank make?
I mean what does an associate professor have that an assistant professor doesn't and why should you care?

I am an adjunct professor at our local medical school. It means I teach medical students on their anesthesia rotation and am not compensated by the school in any way financially. Since the medical school has no anesthesia department, hanging with the private practice guys/gals is the only exposure they get aside from away rotations.

I find it amusing to have that title, but it means a bunch of nothing.

 

[rsgillmd]

I am an adjunct professor at our local medical school. It means I teach medical students on their anesthesia rotation and am not compensated by the school in any way financially. Since the medical school has no anesthesia department, hanging with the private practice guys/gals is the only exposure they get aside from away rotations.

I find it amusing to have that title, but it means a bunch of nothing.

I find my title funny also. I am an "Assistant Professor" but other than teaching med. students and rotating residents, I do not do any formal lectures in a medical school. As long as you are board certified, you start off with a rank of Assistant Professor. To progress upwards involves more academic involvement, namely research/publications. Since only a very small percentage of my salary comes from the university (the rest comes from the group), the rank means nothing in day to day interactions. Our vacation time is according to group policies, not university policies. Everyone, except one person and the chairman, takes call. My unofficial mentor is the head of L&D anesthesia and a "Professor," but she takes just as much call as me.

So I guess it varies according to the system you are in.

 

[IlDestriero]

For me, promotion to Associate professor is worth an extra $20k/yr and full Professor is $20 or 25k/yr more than that. Promotion to Associate is pretty likely for a clinical faculty after 6 years if you are solid with good teaching scores. The academic (research) track is publish or perish, with clearly established guidelines. Promotion to Professor remains quite difficult for clinical people, but this is a fairly new and evolving track. Some Universities are also notoriously difficult to secure promotions. We interviewed a senior "professor" from another university for a position a couple years ago. She did almost nothing in 20 years on the faculty, many do more as a resident😴. She wanted to be brought in as a full Professor. By report she was very surprised to hear that she would be lucky to be brought in as an Associate, and Professor was never going to happen.
At my institution, the only other perks for promotion are for Tenure track faculty, and I don't think we have a single one in the department now.

 

[Masseter Spasm]

It varies by institution. My institution uses the following system. Usually, you get hired as an "instructor" (right out of residency). When you become board certified you advance to assistant professor. If you achieve recognition for teaching and other academic contributions to the department, you will advance to associate professor in another 5-7 years. From there things get stagnant. A few faculty have what it takes to become full professor. There are only a handful in the whole department.
My department allows you to select an academic track. I am clinically oriented, so I selected "Clinician Teacher." There are also Clinician Scholar Teacher and Clinician Researchers depending on one's orientation. As a Clinician Teacher, I can advance to associate professor without doing research but may never make full professor. If I had Scholar or Researcher in my track name, research would become critical in academic advancement. Some departments will keep you at instructor level, unless you publish.
Usually, you are salaried at an academic appointment. Being promoted between each academic level probably earns you an extra $10-20,000 per year. Some departments will offer incentives for taking additional call or clinical productivity. These incentives may account for up to 20% of your salary in some institutions. Academic compensation is usually structured much different than private practice.
If you are considering an academic position, be realistic about your career goals. How do you want to spend your time? Are you interested in or even capable of doing research? If you think you are more interested in clinical responsibilities does your potential employer value clinical contributions. Departments that only value scholarly activity tend to be very bottom heavy. Most of the faculty in these departments will be at assistant professor level or below. These will be the people actually taking care of patients. Often turnover of faculty at this level will be constant. (New graduates join the department for a few years and leave when they realize they have no opportunity for advancement.)

 

[cchoukal]

I would agree with what the others have said. Rank is a reflection of how long you've been around and what you've contributed to the department, hospital, medical school, and field. The ease of advancement depends on the level of prestige of the department and what your niche is. Many places, including my own, have tracks, either formally or informally, and your accomplishments/contributions are evaluated in light of your track. We have 3, basically: researcher, educator, clinical/quality/admin. The idea is that you basically pick one in your first year or two and then work towards excellence or acknowledgement in that area so that by year 6 you have something to show the promotion committee. Evaluation for promotion typically included evaluation within the department and medical school, but also there's often an external review (by faculty at other, peer institutions). Sometimes this comes in the form of letters of rec from outside faculty.

The terms of advancement are often, as they are here, laid out pretty explicitly by the medical school.

Advancement brings with it more money and "prestige," whatever that is. At my department, the monetary increase is modest and amounts to about the same increase as the annual increases within a given rank, so it's not a huge difference in pay. I haven't noticed that promotion = less work (aside from the fact that qualifying for promotion requires accomplishing the kinds of things that ALSO qualify a person for more non-clinical time to actually DO those things). That is, it's not like you jump to associate and get handed an extra free day, but rather to GET to associate you have to achieve a bunch of things for which the department would award you non-clinical time.

 

[proman]

Every institution has it's own rules for promotion. Usually the larger the place, the harder it is to make the progression to full professor. The usual progression (for tenure track) at the places I've been goes:

Instructor
Assistant, usually easy to get after a publication or two, some start here
Associate, variable to get, requires a national reputation, proven track record of publication and grants, usually takes 6-10 years of work
Associate with tenure, optional step, easier to get than professor, a few more years
Professor, requires international reputation, extensive publication and leadership, large grant support etc. Usually takes 15-20 years.

The link with clinical work is that the more clinical you are, the less academic production you'll create (papers, presentations etc). Grants pay for your time so that you don't have support your salary with clinical work. The obviously also allow for the type of academic work that leads to publications and reputation. Many institutions struggle with how to reward those attendings who excel at clinical work and education yet don't have grants or publications. Keep in mind that every institution is different.

 

[Tuohy]

Clinical Instructor-what you start out at (new grad/no fellowship)
Assistant Professor-what you start out at (prior work experience (1-5 years) or as a courtesy, offered to me because I had done a fellowship)

I agree with the above post-I have met many "(full) professors" who have done absolutely nothing in years if you take a look at their CV or PubMed. Often, they were inked in as professors before the standards/policies were raised-obviously, the criteria for advancement between institutions also varies remarkably....