The Interfolio Blog

Last week, one of our favorite blogs, ProfHacker, had a great piece on how blogs and other online tools have been included by academics in their CVs as part of consideration for tenure decisions.

A lot of readers weighed in on ways they have shown that having their academic work online has been a major factor in the success they've seen in other areas of their careers. Below, we've pulled together those comments to summarize some of the key reasons for having a professional online presence.

Expanded exposure for your academic work

The article notes, as do many of the readers, that putting academic work online provides a great deal more opportunity for interested parties to read and appreciate the research and work that you are doing. Getting published in journals has become increasingly frustrating as the circulation is limited and the likelihood of increasing your renown in the field is slim.

With an online presence, the circulation of your work can be as limited or unlimited as you like. In addition, many scholars begin research or the search for classroom resources and reading materials online. Many of the respondents to the ProfHacker piece note that their work has been found online through their blog or website, and that as a result, they have been asked if their work can be used for lectures and required reading.

Collaboration with peers on new research or projects

Publishing your work online can have benefits outside of having the finished product used as a source or classroom materials. 

Many people have noted the benefits of being able to seed new ideas online and interacting with peers and colleagues to explore new ideas and collaborate on projects. These conversations and brainstorming sessions can influence the development of professional work, and enhance that work by providing the academic with a way to develop their idea before beginning to write. 

Without having a presence online, these academics would not have had the opportunity to enrich their work in this way.

Opportunity for speaking/lecture experience

Publishing work online makes you more findable, and when conference organizers start to look for guest speakers, they usually turn to the internet first, looking for someone with expertise in a particular field. Having a presence online means that when they search, you'll be found. 

Nels Highberg notes that he was invited to several guest lecture and speaking engagements as the result of his blog, and that it was the blog specifically that precipitated the first invitation, helped him gain recognition, and led to future opportunities. 

All of these opportunities are elements of the traditional CV. Places your work has been cited or used, new research you've published or worked on, places you have spoken or lectured. 

Many people don't think that a blog or website is something they'd include on a CV, or that it could even make that much of a difference for their academic career. If the ProfHacker post and the people who contributed are any indication, that's simply not the case anymore. In fact, each person noted that their web presence was a key element in almost every other aspect of their professional career, and that it touched many elements of the work they included on their traditional CV. It's time we started thinking about online tools as a serious way to enhance the academic career, and stopped believing these tools are just an frivolous side hobby.