Do professors compete a lot at work?

Question

I mean, do they step on each other to keep their jobs? Is being a professor a tough job? And what's the difference between assistant professors, associate professors and just professors?

Answer 1

Since most university professors have life tenure there is comparatively little backstabbing and other forms of unfair competition among them. But there is some informal competition with respect to "output" (number and quality of publications) and reputation within the scientific community as well as popularity wth students. So, being a professor is as tough a job as you make it for yourself, but most professors are quite happy, as far as I know.

"Assistant professor" and "associate professor" in the U.S. are titles for persons who do not yet have life tenure and are just beginning their university careers. Their life is hard because they must publish and teach well in order to qualify for a good job either at their own university or at another one.

Answer 2

To a large extent, it really depends on the university, the culture within the department, and the age/classification of the professors currently within it.  Most I've been in seem fairly collaborative instead of openly antagonstic, but there are also a lot where people just don't talk to each other.  Period.  If you want to collaborate with anyone because you can't get funding any other way, it may require arm-twisting since most people are apathetic at best about the idea.  "What. . . I have to work with other people now?!?"

Unless perhaps if you're talking about some really top universities, there isn't a lot of actual competition to keep jobs as far as I've noticed.  The first few years as a new professor (assistant professor) can be rough since you have to do enough work in a few years to be given tenure, a.k.a. job security (made an associate professor at this point).  If you don't get tenure, you're usually back at square one once you find a new job.  Once you have tenure, you're now supposed to be able to manage the basics of just teaching/research, so they often feel like they have to give you more jobs to do and maybe they'll want you to pursue more risky research.  Full professors are basically associate professors who've been in that position for at least enough years (sometimes many more than that, too) and have demonstrated their abilities as a faculty member well enough to merit a better title.

Workloads will vary, although they're usually pretty high.  Most professors have told me they're often working 60 hours a week or more, particuarly during the regular semesters when they have classes to teach.  Some basic universities and community colleges don't make you do research and so you'll have more time to prep for your classes and perhaps get a fair amount of time off over the summer.  Most major schools aren't like that, though.