Convincing evidence of an assistant professor's research independence

Question

I am back to the university that I got my PhD, as an assistant professor now. My mentor is now the department head (but not when I was a PhD student). Given that we are working on similar subjects, I will always send all of my work that relevant to him and will have him as a co-author. Even if the work could be done without him, he is still experienced and may have useful comments. I am afraid this would be considered as not independent, and affecting my tenure applications. What could be the evidence to show I am independent?

My field is health-related, so that usually there are collaboration works.

Answer 1

To show independence while still collaborating with your mentor, make sure some of your publications have you as the sole author or with other co-authors besides your mentor. Engage in projects or grants where you are the principal investigator. Present your own research at conferences or in seminars without your mentor. Lastly, involve yourself in new collaborations outside your mentor's influence. These steps helped me demonstrate my ability to lead and conduct research independently, highlighting my contributions to the field on my own merits, which is crucial for your tenure application in a health-related field.

Answer 2

I think that your current problem is that you are not fully independent. Why?

• still working on research directly related to your former advisor
• still publishing with your former advisor and likely benefiting from the perception of work coming from a senior faculty (as opposed to making your own independent mark on the field)
• as someone who has worked in departments where the chair had active early career faculty who were group alumni hired, there was always an unwritten rule that the young faculty was "protected", if your advisor remains chair or moves up in admin, you will be fine through tenure, but you don't want to give fodder to any opposition when its time for tenure.

None of these things mean that you lack competency, or any other negative connotation, but unfortunately they do make you not fully independent. You need to carve your own path.

I began publishing/collaborating with my advisor (different University) about 11 years after graduating and establishing myself independently.... and the nature of the collaboration was more my former advisor moving into a research area that was adjacent to my independent work.

Answer 3

You have clearly earned the high opinion your thesis advisor has of since you have been hired as his colleague by a department where he is now chair.

Do discuss your work with him. That would be natural and collegial since you are in the same field. Although you seem to think it a sign of respect, there's no need to list him as a coauthor on all your papers, even when his remarks have been helpful. In fact I think that would be wrong. Coauthorship should be reserved for papers that are truly joint work. Acknowledge any help those conversations provide is sufficient.

In time as you mature your interests may (perhaps even should) diverge from his. Your independence will grow.

Answer 4

The best evidence to show that you are an independent researcher is to publish top-tier academic papers as single author, and secure research funding as principal investigator.

A good criteria that you are convincingly independent is that your tenure is denied because "although the candidate has a good number of papers as a single author, there is lack of evidence of productive research collaborations". This is a joke, of course, but ultimately in academia you can never convince everyone, and maybe convincing everyone of everything is not the right goal.