Supervising PhD candidates: 'the 10+ commandments'
Every year the BCN Education committee distributes a questionnaire among all our PhD candidates in which we ask about scientific progress, teaching and also about supervision. We ask our PhD candidates not only about the amount of supervision they receive, but also about the quality of supervision. The answers differ widely, not only between first and fourth year candidates, but also between faculties and, within faculties, between research groups. And no, unfortunately not all supervision is excellent! Year after year we must conclude that there is definitively room for improvement. This finding has lead to extensive debates in the committee. How can supervision of PhD candidates be improved? And especially, how can we actually get supervisors to be critical of themselves and try to improve themselves?
This is an extremely important matter: research has shown that failure or success of a PhD project is largely determined by supervision (Berger & de Jonge, 2005). Ofcourse you, as a supervisor, may think that you do your job very well. If this is true, you will only recognize what follows below. However, if you think that you could improve yourself in this respect, please continue reading. And you, as a PhD candidate, consider the suggestions below as an opening for discussion with your supervisor, if necessary.
We thought it would be best to first decide what determines good supervision. How else can we try and implement good supervision for all our PhD candidates? Some time ago, three senior BCN researchers and all PhD candidates in the PhD council wrote up their 'Ten Commandments of Good Supervision'. Below the integrated version, in no particular order, is given. Supervisors: please read the commandments, consider them and use them to your and your PhD candidates' benefit.
1. A supervisor should be enthusiastic about the project, and able and willing to be actively involved in it.
Supervision is part of management: any good manager should be able to motivate an employee, also in difficult times.
2. A supervisor's knowledge, experience and network should be shared with the PhD candidate in order to advance the project.
No amount of literature study or hard work can replace this. It will help the PhD candidate build a personal network and experience base, which is an important part of becoming an independent researcher.
3. Regular and -when necessary - emergency meetings with the PhD candidate are required.
Urgent requests from PhD candidates should be handled as soon as possible: sometimes it is better to talk for 15 minutes right away than to postpone a meeting for a week to be able to talk for an hour. However, meetings should also be scheduled well ahead of time to ensure the undivided attention of the supervisor.
4. Manuscripts, abstracts and other texts should be reviewed within a reasonable period of time.
Manuscripts should preferably be corrected within a couple of days. This does not mean that a PhD candidate can ignore a supervisor's agenda!
5. A supervisor should guarantee the availability of money, facilities and supporting staff needed to finish the project.
These matters can hardly ever be directly influenced by the PhD candidate, but will seriously affect progress and success when unavailable.
6. Supervisor and PhD candidate should keep track of the progress of the research project and, where possible, the supervisor should prevent erroneous planning by the PhD candidate.
The project should be finished within the time of the PhD candidate s' appointment or stipend.
7. A supervisor should actively recommend courses and conferences for the PhD candidate to attend
8. Supervision should balance between independence and guidance for each PhD candidate.
9. A supervisor should provide feedback about work and progress of the PhD candidate, both positive and negative.
As for any training program: pay a compliment whenever called for, but also discuss problems as soon as they arise. Problems should be faced head-on. No one profits when a problem is not brought out into the open.
10. Effective supervision prospers in an environment in which discussing and asking questions is easy.
A supervisor should listen and be prepared to admit being wrong when the PhD candidate is right.
11. Supervision must be personalised.
Personality plays a role in supervision. If it doesn’t “click” between the supervisor and PhD candidate, mediation may be necessary. Also, what works for one PhD candidate may not work for the other. Both supervisor and PhD candidate should signal problems or suggest improvements. A supervisor should not compare his/her own graduate career with that of PhD candidates. Ambitions and goals differ, as do other claims on time such as family.
12. Supervision should aim at letting the PhD candidate develop into an independent scientist.
A supervisor should realize that, in accepting a PhD candidate, responsibility is taken for an important phase in the career of a person, and not only for progress in research. A PhD candidate is not a research assistant nor a secretary: a PhD candidate is a researcher in training. A supervisor should be able to step away from personal interests in the research project and make sure that this higher goal is served. In due time the PhD candidate should become a specialist in his own field and should therefore be allowed some freedom to develop the project according to personal insights. A PhD candidate has to defend his/her own thesis in the end.
That the main goal of supervision is to let a PhD candidate develop into an independent researcher who can solve scientific and other project-related problems and finish a PhD project in time. A supervisor should thus provide support and structure, correct when necessary and finally, let go.
Additionally, you could consider the English course “Teaching & learning in the intercultural classroom” organized by the UOCG (Universitair Onderwijscentrum).