Post by @sophiehuiberts@mathstodon.xyz

2026-04-03 12:23 UTC

I think today &quot;publish more papers&quot; is bad career advice for young people. Better to publish fewer and better work Most good institutions, both employers and funders, have stopped counting papers. What&#39;s more, often in applications you are asked for &quot;your 3 most important works&quot;. If you salami-sliced your work into thin papers then your 3 best papers will look anemic. No quantity of papers can save you The only institutions that still count papers are fhe ones you don&#39;t want to end up anyway. Clearly their management consists of nitwits who will make your life miserable

Replies (3)

@tito@social.sciences.re 2026-04-03 15:02

@sophiehuiberts OK but what about the other common advice: "publish more A/A* papers", which is quite compatible with the "3 most important works" requirements? I'm thinking for instance of the following excerpt from these slides https://mimuw.edu.pl/~bojan/slides/slajdomat/teaching/soft%20skills/Research_Landscape/?step=30

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@soaproot@sfba.social 2026-04-03 19:01

@sophiehuiberts I hope you are right but I'm too far from academia to really know.

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@BrKloeckner@piaille.fr 2026-04-04 06:57

@sophiehuiberts Unfortunately this kind of advice is heavily dependent on context: which country, which field. Each will have its own habits and expectations, and my only general advice for academic career is to not follow any general advice, but seek specific advice for one's precise context.

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