Thread by @carsonaust

We often hear: "Job market these days means grad students have to publish while in grad school." OK sure. But how?

Some tips/ideas/advice …others should chime in! (THREAD)

Important to take a big, amorphous goal like this and break it down. First step is choosing which idea to pursue as an article. Second is getting that idea into publishable shape. Third is submission. (R&R-type stuff is for another day…)

On idea selection:
1. Don’t overvalue reactions from famous advisors. These folks can be out of touch w/ cutting edge style, methods, and substantive debates. They often have idiosyncratic tastes about what is good/not good work. Best to triangulate w/ input from junior faculty

2. Choose an article idea that has several plausible publishing venues. Based on the kind of article (e.g. “quant/security/IR”), ask whether there are three first/second tier journals that plausibly publish this kind of work. Avoid writing a one-and-done article ms

3. Don’t overthink the link to dissertation. Totally independent projects can do the trick. Co-authored works; spin-offs somewhat related to the diss work. Core material from the diss also works but can be held up by snags in the larger diss project

On getting it into publishable shape:
1. Present at internal and external venues. Most important is to get eyes on it from folks outside your home Ph.D. program. Reviewers will be from outside your intellectual womb, so get those kinds of reactions early, often

2. Dissect published work in your preferred journals. Take five roughly similar articles from the past 5 years. Analyze their structure at the paragraph and section level. There is often an unwritten – but quite powerful – template most articles follow. Figure it out, imitate it

3. Work especially hard on abstract and intro. Reviewers are lazy and busy. Rightly or not, they form quick judgments about article manuscripts, esp from authors and projects they have never heard of. Early opinions likely shaped by whether it “feels like” a publishable article

On submission:
1. Think carefully about reviewer name suggestions (if journal asks for them). Many reviewers will review manuscripts they have seen in earlier iterations. If you know a fan of your work, don’t necessarily leave them off the list

2. Finish the marathon strong. Pay attention to the formatting and submission instructions for the journal. Polish polish polish. Treat the word/length maximum as a kind of budget and allocate it carefully (e.g. 4000 words for theory; 1500 words for intro; etc.)

3. Submit it, don’t sit on it! There is value in learning the process even if rejected. Grad students too often imagine they aren’t ready. Give it a shot!

Many of these tips/ideas are not mine! This came out of a lunch chat with @UChicagoPoliSci grad students. Includes great insights from @RochelleTerman @BobbyGulotty & Chiara Cordelli (END)