This guest blog has been kindly written for HEPI by Roger Watson, Academic Dean, School of Nursing, Southwest Medical University, China and outgoing President of the National Conference of University Professors.
This piece is a review of Pathways to professorship: a toolkit for success by Marily Leask (2023) published by Routledge, London.
Asking an established professor how they arrived at that position can be like asking a centipede to explain how it walks. Those of us who got here were often too busy doing the kind of work that got us here to keep note of the steps and strategies. In fact, I doubt that many of us had a strategy.
During my PhD study and in my early days as an academic, I recall individuals who did claim to have their pathway to professorship worked out or who aimed to be a professor before they were 40 or some similar goal. Without exception, while many of these people became successful academics, none became professors. It seems to me that many of us got here by chance, although that would be to ignore the help of informal mentors who gave us the occasional nudge in the right direction. Many, equally, prevented us from the career-ending incidents to which some of us are prone.
Pathways to professorship is a remarkable book. As far as I know, it is unique, although Leaske does refer to one other work which is specific to psychology. Also, while Leask is attributed as the author of the book, she is also the editor in the sense that there are other contributors. With two exceptions, these are all women. This is a notable, although unstated, feature of the book as while nearly half of UK university academics as female only 28% are professors. This was borne out in the recent NCUP (National Conference of University Professors) survey, The role of the UK professoriate, where other differences regarding being mentored and providing mentorship were noted among female professors.
