But this leaves Harvard at a disadvantage, forcing candidates to teach twice as many classes as they would at another school--but the University still is unwilling to hire faculty before they have established themselves in academia.

"The question becomes, are you willing to take a risk to appoint someone younger who is a world-class but maybe not world-known scholar?," MacFarquhar says. "I think Harvard tends to be risk-averse because we are claiming to hire the best."

Stuck on the Ladder

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When it comes to promoting Harvard's own junior faculty, the University's record is spotty at best. According to Knowles' letter, only 16 percent of tenured professors in the humanities departments came from within the University.

Although there is a consensus that Harvard has improved on this front from its past insistence on sending promising candidates away before rehiring them with tenure, administrators say many candidates fear old habits die-hard.

"Even in departments where there has been successful promotion from within, the perception is that it doesn't happen," Fisher said. "People who choose to go elsewhere have a better sense of their future prospects than they do here."

This perception also reinforces itself by discouraging top junior faculty from staying through the end of Harvard's eight-year junior appointment and undergoing the tenure review process.

"The cases [where candidates don't get tenure] tend to resonate more loudly," said Vincent J. Tompkins, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs. "And a junior faculty member will find that by the fourth or fifth year, they're getting offers elsewhere."