I have joked on many occasions that I am the Oprah Winfrey of academic self-help books. I read them all, for while I have received excellent mentoring from friends and senior scholars, I still had many questions about the basics of establishing an academic career. Have I been able to implement all the great ideas I’ve encountered? No. I’m a “do as I say, not as I do” kind of person.

In any case, the following books and websites are ones that I have found most helpful in my professional journey (clearly, this is not meant to be an exhaustive list, just a “best of the best”). I encourage advanced graduate students and my fellow junior colleagues to check these out immediately. And please let me know if there is a title you would like to recommend to me…

Academic Websites

• ProfHacker: a Chronicle of Higher Ed blog on teaching, technology and productivity
  
• Job Advice columns at the Chronicle of Higher Ed
• Inside Higher Ed

Teaching

• McKeachie’s Teaching Tips: Strategies, Research, and Theory for College and University Teachers, by William McKeachie and Marilla Svinicki (Wadsworth Publishing, 2005)
• Tools for Teaching, by Barbara Gross Davis (Jossey-Bass, 2009)
• On-Course: A Week-by-Week Guide to Your First Semester of College Teaching, by James Lang (Harvard University Press, 2010)

Writing and Time Management

• Writing Your Journal Article in Twelve Weeks, by Wendy Belcher (Sage Publications, 2009)
• Write to the Top! How to Become a Prolific Academic, by W. Brad Johnson and Carol Mullen (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007)
• How to Write A Lot: A Practical Guide to Productive Academic Writing, by Paul Silvia (APA Life Tools, 2007)
• Professors as Writers: A Self-Help Guide to Productive Writing, by Robert Boice (New Forums Press, 1990)
• Writing with Power: Techniques for Mastering the Writing Process, by Peter Elbow (Oxford, 1998)

Thriving on the Tenure Track

• Academic Self: An Owner’s Manual, by Donald Hall (Ohio State University, 2002)
• The Black Academic’s Guide to Winning Tenure–Without Losing Your Soul, by Kerry Ann Rockquemore and Tracy Laszloffy (Lynne Reinner Publishers, 2008)
• Advice for New Faculty Members: Nihil Nemus, by Robert Boice (Allyn & Bacon, 2000)
• Life on the Tenure Track: Lessons from the First Year, by James Lang (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2005)