Last week I posted about some practical tips for working effectively with your supervisor. Donât get me wrong â Iâm not saying all supervisors are great, or even ok. Some are really, really bad. You only need to take a glance at the âyou and your supervisorâ tag on The Thesis Whisperer to read some horror stories. As recently as December 2015, a post on The Guardianâs Academics Anonymous blog discussed how Bad PhD Supervisors Can Ruin Research. Whereas I think the rhetoric of âmanagingâ your supervisors isnât helpful, these online fora are. They enable discussion, debate, the sharing of advice and more importantly a sense of community.
So this week, I want to begin collating online discussions, blog posts and resources that deal with supervision â both good and bad. The aim is to draw together these stories, which all contain useful advice and guidance.
Bad PhD Supervisors can ruin research. So why arenât they accountable? From The Guardianâs Academics Anonymous blog A demoralising and sarcastic professor left me wondering if I should be doing a PhD at all â and Iâm not alone
Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right, here I am stuck in the middle ⌠of two supervisors who donât agree for The Thesis Whisperer
Most universities that go down the two supervisorâs route do so because they believe it to be beneficial for the student however, it can also lead to an interesting set of issues, especially if they donât agree.
How I broke up with my supervisor for The Thesis Whisperer This post, written by a PhD student, who wishes to stay anonymous, was sent to me late last year. I think you will find it an interesting story that highlights the tensions we all experience around the âfinish at all costs (and on time)â mentality.
How to email your supervisor (or, the tyranny of tiny tasks and what you can do about it) by The Thesis Whisperer Ah email⌠blessing or curse of contemporary academic life? The letter below describes a common email problem between students and supervisors. My response to this letter dwells on the importance of lunch, amongst other things.
How to tell your supervisor you want a divorce by Sarah-Louise Quinnell for The Thesis Whisperer This weekâs guest post comes from Dr Sarah-Louise Quinnell, who gained her PhD from the Geography Department at Kingâs College London in 2010. Sarah is also the managing editor of âPhD 2 Publishedâ â a blog all Research students should have on their list. Here Sarah talks about the delicate matter of âsupervisory divorceâ
Learning to Fly by Jess Drake for The Thesis Whisperer This guest post is by Jess Drake who is doing her PhD in soil science at the Australian National University. In this post Jess offers some advice for the next time your supervisor says âJust do itâ.
Managing conflicting feedback on your thesis by Alison Crump for The Thesis Whisperer We rarely have posts from our North American academic cousins on the Thesis Whisperer, so itâs a pleasure to bring you this one from Dr Alison Crump. Alison is the Academic Projects Officer in Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies at McGill University where she teaches graduate and undergraduate courses in Second Language Education at McGill.
Mum and Dad are fighting â what should I do? By The Thesis Whisperer This is prompted by what feels like the 1000th time Iâve had a discussion with a PhD student about conflict with a supervisor. This particular conversation touched on one of the little discussed, but most common problems in research management: supervisory panel members who donât get along.
PhD students: what to do if you donât work well with your supervisor by Gina Wisker for The Guardian Supervisors can be enabling and supportive - but they can also be bullies. Gina Wisker offers advice on how to manage this sometimes tricky relationship
PhD supervisor sadness: the empty nest by Pat Thomson for The Guardian Pat Thomson experiences mixed feelings at this time of year â it's not just doctoral researchers who find the final deadline hard
PhD supervisor: the perfect one doesnât exist, so where else can you find help? By Gwen Boyle for The Guardian If youâre struggling to get the support you need from your PhD supervisor, there are online communities that can help fill the gap, say Gwen Boyle
Please stop telling me to âmanageâ my supervisor! For The Thesis Whisperer This post is really an email, sent to me be a student who was responding to a Facebook conversation I started on the theme of âmanagingâ your supervisor.
Please treat me like a grown up! By The Thesis Whisperer Over the years Iâve become a kind of thesis âagony auntâ. Students from all over see me as someone to whom they can pour out their tales of woe to and ask for independent advice. I want to help. My sympathetic ear is what got me the nickname of Thesis Whisperer in the first place, but writing these emails is time consuming. When itâs possible I prefer to reply publicly as the problem is usually common enough that what I have to say to one person can be useful to many. This is the latest one.
Supervisor wanted (must have own car) by The Thesis Whisperer A couple of weeks ago @emilyandthelime sent me a link to a job advertisement which was posted on The Conversation jobs board. The ad had been posted by an anonymous PhD student who described themself as âan industry veteranâ.
The Missing Links by John Wakeford for The Guardian Too many postgraduate students suffer from inadequate support and end up failing. John Wakeford has investigated a number of complaints about shoddy supervision. Here he details some of the worst cases
The PhD supervisor is a mentor by Raquel Da Silva for Patter This guest post is written by Raquel Da Silva. Raquel is a PhD student at the University of Birmingham at the Institute of Applied Social Sciences. Her research is about the life stories of former political violent activists in Portugal. She can be found on twitter as @RaquelBPSilva. Raquelâs post is about the importance and nature of the doctoral researcherâs relationship with their supervisor(s).Â
The tyranny of the Awesome Supervisor by Dr. Catherine Ayers For The Thesis Whisperer This post is by Dr Catherine Ayers, who was a PhD candidate in the School of Sociology at the Australian National University, researching the multiple and sometimes conflicting ways we conceptualise and experience âNatureâ, specifically in the realm of national parks and other protected areas. She has been known to nerd it up as an intern at ANU Research Training but now she works in the ANU school of Law. Since she wrote this post, Cathy has become a Dr. Congratulations Cathy!
When good supervisors go bad⌠For The Thesis Whisperer I get a lot of emails from students complaining about their supervision experience. This one, from an anonymous student, stood out. I think itâs the way the student thought they had it all figured out â before it went so very wrongâŚ.