An investigation into academic hiring outcomes for biological-science roles has suggested a surprising trend: women who applied for assistant professor positions in North America were more likely to get job offers than were men.

The findings, published on the bioRxiv preprint server¹, have not been peer reviewed. Still, they offer a sign that the academic job market might be making progress towards equity in hiring, says co-author Nafisa Jadavji, a neuroscientist at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale.

Jadavji and her co-authors surveyed 449 researchers, of which 89% were from the United States, who applied for positions between 2019 and 2022. The team then built a computer model to identify the factors that predicted success or failure.

Overall, women were at an advantage. Two-thirds of women in the sample received at least one job offer compared with half of the men. The advantage is particularly notable because men had slightly more first-author publications in highly ranked journals. “Men had a few more CNS [Cell, Nature, Science] papers, but women were getting more job offers,” Jadavji says.

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However, there were some negative trends. Researchers who had completed several postdoc positions were the least likely to receive an offer. Older applicants, first-generation scholars (those whose parents didn’t go to university) and applicants who were residents of countries outside North America were also less likely to find success.

Jadavji says the apparent advantage for women is somewhat unexpected, given the gender imbalance at higher levels of academia and the “leaky pipeline’ that continues to remove women from the academic career path. “We know that women are taken out of the job market at every level of science training,” she says.

The finding that women in this sample were more likely to receive job offers than were men was “pleasant to see”, says Yvette Pearson, a STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education researcher and the former vice-president of diversity, equity and inclusion at the University of Texas at Dallas. “It’s less surprising in the biological sciences, where we see a larger number of women completing undergraduate and graduate degrees. I’d like to see this in engineering, computer science and other STEM disciplines.”

The study found that men and women were equally likely to be offered on-site job interviews, but women were more successful at turning those interviews into offers. That might be partly because men are more likely than women to apply to jobs even if they don’t meet all of the required qualifications, Pearson says. “Women might go into interviews with a higher level of confidence,” she adds, because, in reality, they have stronger CVs.

Pearson co-authored a 2023 paper² in the International Journal of STEM Education that looked at the qualifications and characteristics that are deemed important by faculty members and administrators during the hiring process. That study found that qualifications related to research — including institutional prestige, postdoctoral experience and publications — were more important when evaluating tenure-track applicants. By contrast, qualifications and qualities related to diversity, equity and inclusion (such as a proven ability to work with people of different genders, races and ethnicities) took on more importance when hiring for non-tenure-track teaching positions.

Michael Yassa, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Irvine, says that the bioRxiv study provides an interesting snapshot of a crucial part of the hiring process. He co-authored a 2023 report³ in the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) Journal that detailed successful efforts at his institution to diversify faculty recruitment in the field of biomedical sciences. Among other things, his institution took steps to ensure greater gender balance in hiring committees.

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Women who do land a faculty job continue to face obstacles in promotion and leadership opportunities, Yassa says. “Even if hiring is equal, every step onwards is disproportionately challenging for women and under-represented minorities.”

In the bioRxiv study, the race and ethnicity of applicants had no apparent bearing on the chances of receiving a job offer. Jadavji cautioned that only about 10% of respondents identified as Black, Hispanic or members of another under-represented minority.

When it comes to job applications, the more the better, Jadavji says. “The number of applications you submit plays a major role in the number of offers you receive,” Jadavji says. In this sample, the sheer volume of applications — ranging from one to 96 per person — was the most reliable predictor of success.

Pearson says that 96 applications is probably overkill for any particular job search, but she does see a lesson in the findings: applicants shouldn’t skimp on their opportunities. “My advice is to apply to every position that meets your qualifications and your interests,” she says.

The finding that completing several postdoc positions can lower the chances of a job offer might be unwelcome news for many junior researchers who have spent years trying to land a tenure-track role.

“The general advice, especially in biomedical sciences, is that you have to do a number of postdocs” to be competitive for a faculty position, Jadavji says. “But if you stay too long, you may become undesirable.”

Junior researchers who are in their second or third postdoc position shouldn’t necessarily despair, Yassa says. Instead, they should continue to work towards awards, publications and other accomplishments that can reassure hiring committees. “They need to show that they have the potential to launch a successful research programme,” he says.

Jadavji plans to continue studying job applicants to get a clearer picture of the factors that determine success in academia. Hiring departments are ultimately looking for someone who is a good fit, which is a difficult quality to measure, she says.

“We’ve recruited social scientists to our team to start looking at the qualitative experience of being on the faculty job market,” Jadavji adds. “There are a lot of factors to consider.”