Promotion to Prof without request

[WhatNoReally]

My sister applied for a promotion to Reader and was given Chair instead. Obviously she's delighted! It sounded unusual to me so I was just wondering if anyone has heard of this happening before?

Well, it's true that the principle of being promoted to your level of incompetence applies also to academia. It's also the case though, increasingly so, that such people are managed out once bad results, eg from the REF, come in.

Paeonia we are explicitly banned from doing that (trying to jump SL to prof). Not saying it might not happen in exceptional circumstances - but it is Not Allowed officially. Pisses me off because SL and reader are the same pay grade with the same job description

I'm at a post 92. SL and Reader are not the same pay grade. After SL you can become a Principal Lecturer, which is on par with Reader.

In my uni, readers get two automatic increments above the ceiling of SL. If not promoted to Chair though, they get stuck there. The advice I received when I was thinking of promotion, and it worked out well, was to go straight for Chair, as the tradition of readerships was on the way out in many universities. It's a bit surprising to see that this doesn't seem to be the case though.

my university doesn’t really move with the times (to put it mildly)

reader is same job description and pay grade as SL but you have to get it first as it apparently means ‘will be prof in 3 years’

some people DO jump L to reader if they have spectacular success

That doesn't sound like a bad deal if you are guaranteed prof in 3 years.

Yes it happened to my husband. After the interview the VC decided he was professor material. Congrats to your sister!

That doesn't sound like a bad deal if you are guaranteed prof in 3 years.

Nobody's guaranteed a chair! You really have to earn it, and if you ever want a pay rise after that, you have to keep on being better - than yourself and others.

The opposite of a good deal then. 🥲

No you aren’t guaranteed a chair / some people
get stuck at reader forever. It’s just another step for when you’re ‘almost ready!!’

its bullshit

@GoodThinkingMax also wondering what happens at Imperial?

@GCAcademic I'm not sure why you think a Professor needs to be paid more money than a Reader. Where I work, pay depends on other factors such as experience, etc. We had a young woman who was fast tracked into a professorship, and no doubt, she was earning less than some of the Readers who had been in their positions for decades. There was one Reader (male) who negotiated a substantial pay rise when he was offered a position at another institution, and from what I recall his salary was comparable to a Professor after that.

I think GC was making the same point as me which is that in my place the reader and professor salary scales don’t overlap. When you have been a reader for 10 years and gone up all the increments you jsut get stuck at the top of your pay scale. You can’t earn more than a professor. Obviously it is different in your place!

It's the same at mine. There's an overlap at the top end of SL and Reader so you can find yourself being promoted to a more senior position but with no pay increase. The Professorial pay scale starts where Reader ends, and tops out who knows where.

I'm not sure why you think a Professor needs to be paid more money than a Reader.

Usually - nowadays anyway because we do a fucktonne of work. A lot of it invisible, and - for me at any rate - a lot of it expected as "professorial" facilitation of others' research and careers. I read other people's grant applications, papers etc weekly. I'm expected to take on a higher load of PhD supervision, and I'm expected to do all sorts of "academic citizenship" outside my workload.

I actually have far less time for my own work than many of my more junior colleagues, and I'm expected to bring in more money.