Let’s face it, nobody likes selling themselves. Yet self-advocacy is a critical skill in any competitive job market right now, and particularly in academia. The unfortunate fact is that your access to valuable resources (funding, opportunities, positions and awards, etc.) depends on staking the claim that you and your work are brilliant, unique, and deserving of recognition.
So why is it so difficult to say that? Whether it's describing yourself in an application or highlighting a paper’s contributions for reviewers, talking about the value of your work can be downright painful for many. My own theory is that it’s so hard because academia as a whole swings between the extremes of self-effacing and self-aggrandizing: you’re not supposed to be too satisfied with your own work (how else can they keep you reaching for the ever-dangling carrot of the teacher’s/supervisor’s/department head’s approval) but you’re also constantly required to defend the merit of your every thought and method.
The result is a bunch of incredibly accomplished people who don’t quite know how to communicate their accomplishments effectively. Fortunately, helping you wax poetic on your own brilliance is one of my favorite tasks as an academic editor. These are the most common pitfalls that I see when academics describe their own work and achievements, and how to fix them.
Too vague
You’re the “first to fill a and b gaps” or your work makes “innovative contributions to x and y literatures”… okay, but what does that actually mean and who does it help? This type of vague language not only fails to communicate value but can actually harm credibility since it suggests you’re not entirely sure of the value of what you do yourself. Similarly, I see many people describing their work’s “scholarly impact” or “implications for practitioners” without diving into enough (or any) concrete details about what that impact looks like.
The fix
Focus on objective facts and observations. Statements like “We extend the x literature by considering this previously neglected aspect of its central theory” or “My research is the first to investigate one of the populations most affected by y, addressing a critical gap in y scholarship" provide specific details about exactly what you’re doing and why it’s important.
A couple other examples: Instead of "This paper advances understanding of corporate governance,” provide the details that make this broad statement true: "By analyzing 20 years of board meeting transcripts from 150 failed startups, we reveal three previously unidentified patterns in how boards gradually lose their monitoring effectiveness." Instead of “I have made important contributions to sustainability research", describe the specific contributions that make that sentence objectively true: "I introduced the first empirical measurement framework for quantifying the trade-offs between short-term profitability and long-term environmental impact in manufacturing decisions."
Authors in all areas are constantly reminded to “show the reader, don’t tell the reader.” When you focus on your specific actions, findings, outcomes, or methodological innovations, you show rather than tell the objective value of your work.
Too repetitive
You’ve got one or two clear examples of how important your work is—and you really can’t think of others so you drill down on those two to fill up an application or discussion section.
The fix
Don’t explicitly state the same achievement or contribution more than twice in the same document. You may refer back to the same thing more than that as support for something else you’re saying (e.g., “In addition to my novel theory of x and findings on y, I have explored z”). But don’t state it as if it’s new information more than twice, max. Any more than that and you risk giving the impression that there’s not much more to say.
“But Catie,” you may worry if you’re earlier in your career, “There really isn’t much more to say yet.” I promise you that’s not true. You don’t get to be an accomplished academic of any standing without scads of different achievements under your belt. Be sure to consider every angle of everything you’ve done that comes to mind when someone says, “What are you proud of?” I had one client who had a tragic personal loss impact her research; we wove both topics into her (successful) application for a new position, so that the story of her academic accomplishments was informed by what she’d overcome and learned in both personal and professional contexts.
Still having trouble seeing your own highlights? Bring in an objective third party like a trusted colleague, writing coach, or professional editor. We’ll see many things, and in many ways, that you’re too close to see yourself.
Too much
Some authors seem to have the opposite psychology from those in the “too repetitive” camp, above. Rather than feeling they’ve done nothing of note, these authors do have a solid grasp on just how much they’ve achieved (which is great!). But they’re unsure how to deliver the information, so readers get an overwhelming pile rather than a curated portfolio of successes.
The fix
Organize everything of value into 2-4 themes. These thematic threads should extend beyond the overarching categories of the document (e.g., the sections of a paper, resume, or tenure package), so readers start to get a clear picture of the most valuable things about your work.
The reason this works is because organized information is memorable information (and conversely, unorganized information isn’t). A particularly powerful tool that I use in this regard is a past-present-future structure that tells the story of where you’ve been, where you are, and where you hope to go. It works like this:
(1) Pick a defining theme of your early and emerging career. Why was it important to you/why did it capture your interest? How did it lead or relate to what you do now? How did it inform the work you did (whether that’s research, teaching, or service)?
(2) Pick the biggest theme defining your career right now. How are you advancing this stream of work? What have you achieved and accomplished by working on this topic?
(3) Pick a research direction that you’ve more recently picked up and plan to go deeper into as you progress. How are you already headed there? What foundations have you laid to move into this area? What developments make this area interesting to you (hint: they’re likely things that align with the research you’re already doing)?
Applying this clear structure of three main themes charts an unconscious hero’s journey for the reader (and we humans can’t get enough of the hero’s journey!): rather than a boring CV-style list of research interests and accomplishments, they’re now looking at a transformative progression from strength to strength that ends on a feeling of hope and excitement about where your ideas will take you in future.
Too shy
“I wouldn’t say my theory revolutionized the field,” said a client who, by any metric, had revolutionized his field. “Can you just say ‘changed’ it, please?” I did as he asked but urged him to reconsider. Remember that self-aggrandizing I mentioned? I’ve certainly seen it in academia, but almost never among the people who contact me and my team for help. They mainly suffer from the opposite problem, downplaying and dismissing their own achievements in language that undersells rather than oversells their contributions.
The fix
Use the strongest language that is objectively true, and let the facts do most of the talking. Novel, critical, revolutionary, unique, unprecedented, groundbreaking, seminal, pioneering—these are words that you certainly should use as long as you can back them up with hard facts (again, show, don’t just tell). If your work is the first to consider some important aspect of an old problem, say so—then specify exactly how. If you won a university-wide teaching award, don’t just say you won a teaching award.
After all, whatever you’re writing is likely putting you in direct competition with people who have no problem blowing their own trumpet—and can we acknowledge that that’s not necessarily a bad thing? Now more than ever, the world needs people who have worked hard for their knowledge to show up and shine.
Ultimately, advocating for your value as a scholar isn't about puffery or self-promotion; it's about precision and respect. It’s respecting your readers (who deserve to understand exactly what you're bringing to the conversation), your research (which merits clear articulation of its contributions), and your academic community (which only advances through specific, verifiable claims).
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