Getting better letters?

[squid]

I've read elsewhere (and maybe here too) that one should try to get better letters from "famous" references. I've also read that the faculty at "Leiterrific" schools just write better letters than the lesser-knowns, and faculties from non-Leiterrific schools. So, great. Just another way that I'm screwed. Just how does a loser such as myself, from a sub-Leiterrific school get "better" letters from "better" letter-writers?

[humeismyhomeboy]

I've had some success here. (Not much, but some.) Sometimes you'll be lucky enough to have someone offer. That's _real_ lucky. The other route is that you send papers to people in your area to see if they'd be willing to look at your work. If the response is positive, you might then ask if they would be willing to write a support letter.

[categoricalimp]

Letters from well-known folks in your area are really important. There are a number of ways to get them:

1) If your committee members are doing their job, they should be helping you make contacts with well-known people they know. They should introduce you to folks at conferences, visiting speakers, etc., or at least email those people to ask them if they'd mind reading some of your work.

2) Go to as many talks in your field as you can and talk to the speakers afterwards. Ask them if they would mind reading something of yours. Make sure it's something that's directly related to what they're working on, so they can easily see the benefit of reading it.

3) If you get a positive review from a journal and your paper is accepted, ask the editor to contact the reviewer and see if he/she would mind talking with you. If so, you can ask that person to read more of your work.

4) Contact authors of papers that you really like. Just email them and tell them specifically what you like about their paper, and ask some questions. If they seem receptive, ask if they'd be willing to read something of yours. This works especially well if you have a paper in which you discuss their work, since they'll want to read that.

The idea here is to spread a wide net and contact many people. Many will say no, for a lot of reasons -- they're too busy, they have a policy of not reading work of students who aren't their own (I know a couple of people with this explicit policy), or maybe they're plain old selfish. And even the ones who say yes may end up not liking your work and not being willing to write a letter. But there will be a few with whom you form a real connection. You'll be able to tell when there's enough of a connection that it's appropriate to ask them for a letter. And, anyway, even if they don't end up writing a letter for you it's still worthwhile to build these relationships. Most people in the profession recognize that reading each others' work and writing letters is just a professional duty we all have, and we all need each others' help at some point; and practically everyone in the profession loves to talk philosophy!