when academic posts ask for "PhD or equivalent experience" what do they mean? am I ever likely to get into academia?

[hatwoman]

Just been told by a PA at a university that they only put it there because HR says they have to and what they really mean is "a PhD". could I ever hope to get an academic post without one? I have an MPhil (in an unrelated area, finished 15 years ago, Oxford); a recent masters (with distinction, from a university generally considered in the top 3 in its specialisms); 2 published journal articles; 3rd on the way based on an upcoming presentation at a conference; several published relevant consultancy pieces; a book proposal that I was approached by the publisher for - part of a series to be edited by a top dog in my field; 10 years relevant professional but non-academic experience; and a term's lecturing. am I still pissing in the wind?

(and I know I've been here before. a million times. but it's coming to a crunch point for non-professional/personal reasons)

if you have enough publications of high enough quality they may let you off the PhD though they may insist on you doing one in your first few years in the job.

in my field I think you'd be in with a fighting chance, esp against someone with the ink still drying on their PhD, but if it was you vs someone with identical experience but who'd done a DPhil 15y ago rather than an M, it'd be close.

Sounds pretty impressive to me .

Ime experience univsersities LOVE relevant business/professional experience, but perhaps depends on your field. Mine was techie before the DCs and when I did a bit of lecturing, people would practically prostrate themselves because I'd done it as a job.

I think it depends on your field and whether you want an academic job (lecturer) or a research post (post-doc, RA or similar).

But it will be harder without one. In mine, to get a shot at lecturer at the mo in the current climate you need all of the above and your own funding. Some university departments are having everyone re-apply for their own jobs as they will be making job cuts.

What do you do?

oh thank you lovely ladies. you've made a despondent person smile! dh and I moved out of London and as all the non-academic jobs in my line are in London I think I need to accept that academia is the way forward. and my local university (which is good) has just advertised no less than four jobs. two temp. two permanent. I'm trying not to get too excited. and I'm trying to do as much prep work as possible to make my application as good as possible.

Can you put MN down as a reference?

I think its the 10 years experience that is the key here. You need to make clear that you are a technical expert in your field.

What field are you in, if you don't mind me asking?

In my field (science) you would certainly need a PhD and a h-index of 10-12 for a good university if you are looking at a lectureship. However, a friend of mine is in the arts and she has a senior lectureship without a PhD. Her role is very teaching orientated though and she has no research students.

I think the reasoning is (at least at my University) that you can not supervise a research group if you do not have a PhD as you can't teach someone else how to get a qualification you don't have yourself, if that makes sense.

You would probably fair better with a new University where the emphasis is less strongly on research.

tbh I''d rather not say what field. but it's not science. it's an area where there are quite a few practice-academia cross-overs. eg the organisation I used to work for got a particular university to do training for them (training which I'm now giving); it's not unusual for people who work on the non-academic side to get stuff published; recently there's been a new journal started called "Journal of xxx Practice"; academics often act as advisors of various sorts to trhe practice side; academics and practice types often come together on various expert committees etc. so the links are reasonably strong. but not as strong as they should be imo.

In that case, it sounds like you should be in with a pretty good chance. I think the main subjects where they are quite rigid about having a PhD are science-based subjects. I know a few people in what sounds like similar situations to yourself who don't have PhD's but are based in more "professional" type areas and are in permanent academic jobs.

I do think however that it takes a lot of perseverance to get academic jobs, especially a permanent one. Get as much teaching experience as you can (and a qualification like the PGCHE - post graduate certificate in higher education) would help. This is even more true in the current climate with budget cuts in many universities and more anticipated immediately following the election.

Hatwoman
We always put that on our ads, mainly to cover people who are just about to submit their PhD, but also to include equivalent experience. I would, and have, interviewed people without PhDs (my field is also professional - academic crossover). I'm sure you know this already, but, if you haven't alreday done the application, address the issue directly. The ones I put to the top of the pile are those that tell me clearly that they meet the essential criteria, rather than having to fiddle around and interpret their CV. So if you explained how and why you have the equivalent to a PhD, and more than met the other criteria, you would be on the interview list.
Hope thta's not telling you what you already know! Good luck with the apps.

honestly though, publications are the key in the current climate for any decent academic job.
any job for which they are not the most important thing is likely to be a cannon fodder job where you do everyone else's teaching to free them up while they produce their publications.
Research grants are also vital. You presumably won't have any of those because you're not in a position to apply if not already in a post but if you can come to an interview with some very well-worked out ideas about what you will apply for this will help greatly.

Total depends on the field, but you say that:

"Just been told by a PA at a university that they only put it there because HR says they have to and what they really mean is "a PhD"."

I would interpret this as meaning that the DEFINTIELY want someone with a PhD or something completely equivalent (like a DPhil).

I got my lecturership without a PhD and then studied for it part time.
I had experience in my industry and my university (post-1992) is focused on business relevance. Working in a business school it is not unusual to come across academic staff on the teaching side with masses of experience, publications, etc, but no PhD.
The head of my department actually does not have one, now I think of it, but is well thought of in the administration side.

If it would be possible for you to collate a few of your working papers into a Phd (topped by an intro and lit. review and tailed by a conclusion drawwing findings together) within 6 months or so then there should be no problem. Im o and e departments prefer publications and experience to PhD as you have shown yourself able to research and to teach independently, they might need you to have a PhD for admin reasons and if you could obtain one quickly (by grouping a bit of your research together) then all the better.
good luck

Witch, that would depend upon the rules for a PhD in the particular field. I have a science PhD, and we were encouraged to publish throughout our PhD. However, my sister has an arts PhD, and she could not include anything in her PhD which had already been published - it had to be a completely novel piece of work at the time it was submitted.

Don't know if this is a difference between science and arts PhDs, or between universities, TBH.

but was thinking that op probably has a few working papers as yet unpublished. In my field (economics) it depends on the university

Ah, I see whatcha mean Witch. Clearly, having a PhD does not mean I can read posts properly

There is a mechanism for submitting a collection of published papers as a PhD. Depends on the rules of the institution but I know a guy who worked at postdoc level for ages and then finally did this. To be fair he had done most of his PhD, just didn't actually write it up.

I think the short answer here is that everything varies so much depending on the field and the uni that you will have to contact the HoD and find out what the individual situation is.

oh and it is common to have 'registration' requirements for a PhD so that you have to be registered at the instition for a certain period of time.

thanks all. I've arranged to meet someone I know who works at said uni. completely different dept but thought it might be useful to have a general chat.am varying between thinking I don;t stand a chance to allowing myself a smidgeon of hope. The smidgeon of hope is only there because of the fact they're after four people.

I think you should give yourself more than a smidgeon of hope.

Also depends what type of uni it is - whether teaching or research based, and how good the university is

I think you sound like you have a good chance - a similar background to me and I am an academic (have a PhD but not the professional experience). PhD's do really open doors though and gain you a different level of 'respect' so something to say you are definitely interested in.