Pick the right supervisor.

It is THE power relationship that matters when you are writing a PhD, and its impact not only on your work and career, but also on your wellbeing should not be underestimated. If you are looking for a PhD position, don’t just start with the university, the reputation of the department or the field. People matter, and academia is built on personal networks. Being part of the right ecosystem so to speak, is everything.

I’ll tell you a story to illustrate.

I thought I had all this supervision business covered when I applied for my PhD position. I researched the person who would likely become (and in fact did become) my first supervisor ahead of time. He had worked very closely with a professor I knew well at my home university, a professor who had been a mentor figure for me and who I trusted. I had read the papers they had co-authored and they seemed interesting enough. My thought process was as follows: well, they seem to like each other, so he is probably a decent person, and they have written some interesting stuff together, so all will be good.

Not so.

Turns out he was a bully.

During our first ever group supervision meeting, he decided to put me down in front of my peers by saying: “I doubt you’re capable of producing one single coherent and rationally sound argument,” when I stumbled trying to answer one of his questions, after he had already made clear my PhD proposal did not fit into his idea of what political science was about.

Rather ironically, these group supervision meetings were an initiative to try to create a more supportive, collective supervision culture.

It worked in a way, I suppose: later that week at the bar (and after a couple of drinks) one of my colleagues remarked: “he is a pig to everyone, you know.”

I switched supervisors soon after and this man left no mark on my self-worth or the rest of my PhD trajectory. In a way him being so extreme made it easier to see the problem was entirely him. But I don’t even want to think about what it might have been like to have to complete a PhD under his ‘guidance’. As some of my colleagues would have to suffer through.

So, how to prevent supervision mishaps and disasters?

My advice would be to get in touch with a prospective supervisor’s current or past supervisees for a coffee and an informal chat and see what they have to say. Don’t be afraid to ask: this information is key! If you hear multiple negative stories, it’s an easy decision: don’t do it. Just don’t. There will be other, better opportunities for you, trust me here.

I may have a skewed perspective because I hear all the stories where things have not gone well, but my conclusion is that if you have ambitions in academia a supportive supervision relationship is one of the most important pieces to get right. (Support may mean different things to different people, but that’s a post all to its own.)

What are your thoughts on supervision? Any stories to share?

I have come across one book before explicitly aimed at explaining the inner workings of academia to PhDs: ‘The Unwritten Rules of PhD Research‘ by Marian Petre and Gordon Rugg. I recommend it. In the preface they explain the book is aimed at reducing their ‘caffeine overload’, that is the time they spend explaining the basic concepts of research and what they call “the ground rules of the academic world” to PhDs over a cup of coffee. It is often assumed PhDs have this knowledge already, partly because supervisors don’t realise what the gaps in their inside knowledge are: it has all become so familiar to them over the years. I’d add to that that a great many academics are overworked and busy and — difficult truth– too often not particularly interested or well equipped when it comes to the supervision part of their jobs. This book is written from a supervisor’s perspective: it is indeed a bit like a candid chat with a supervisor (many chats!), which in real life would cover a great many coffees!

Dr. Lantsoght’s book has the same goal, but a different perspective: this book is like having an experienced colleague telling you about all the ins and outs of PhD life. It feels more like a pal or a companion, less like a lecture (nothing wrong with lectures, they are useful too!)

Some Q & A’s

Why did you decide to write the book, what is its purpose?

I wanted to combine the most important information that is available on my blog to bring everything together in a book. When I was a PhD student, I read a number of books about the PhD trajectory. Most contained some important information, but since many of these were more aimed at students in social sciences, I always felt there was something missing for people in STEM. I also came across books that seem to present the PhD trajectory as something you can “hack” or that you can complete by follow a step-by-step procedure. In my experience, all research is messy, contains setbacks, and requires you to dig deep – I wanted to share that perspective, and teach students that the PhD trajectory is a deeply personal journey, and that writing and learning to write, which is such an important part of of the PhD trajectory, is an academic coming-of-age.

Which topics did you know you had to cover, from your own experience?

I had to talk about planning, and I talk about planning throughout the book – and I try to show that, while research is a messy convoluted process that is hard to plan, it can be very helpful to know what you need to be working on when, rather than finding yourself surfing the internet or staring out of the window.

Since most available books on the PhD trajectory are written from the perspective of the social sciences, I also wanted to dedicate a chapter to experimental work. I wanted to show you need to be prepared for your experiments, but at the same time, know that things always go wrong in the lab, and that you need to learn to roll with the punches. I also wanted to mention how physically exhausting laboratory work can be.

I like your focus on self-care. Could you share your thoughts on self-care in academia?

In terms of planning, I call self-care a non-negotiable meeting with yourself. I recommend students to plan time in their weekly template for fun activities (and sufficient sleep!). It’s important to keep functioning in the long run. On the other hand, it is so tempting to go into survival mode for “just a few more weeks” trying to finish a project. I know it all too well – I just returned to work full-time after a year of working a shorter workday to take care of my baby daughter. I’m still figuring out how to organize my days now and find some time for myself…

How did you come up with the idea for the glossary of the book? (It is great. It goes into great detail explaining a wide range of PhD life related topics)

From the beginning of writing this book, I wanted it to become a practical tool. For that reason, the book is organized as a coursetext, so that it can be used in a formal classroom setting throughout the study trajectory of PhD students. As I was brainstorming ideas on how to make this book a practical tool, I wondered what I could offer somebody who finished reading the book. A glossary of terms, in which you can dip when you need some inspiration, was what came to my mind. It seemed a bit of a daunting task and I wondered if I could “cover everything” in the glossary. I decided to shake off that voice, and opened a blank Word sheet in which I started to type all the letters of the alphabet. Bit by bit, I added terms to the list – and the result is the glossary you can find in the published book.

The book is written from a STEM background, which is decidedly different from doing a humanities/ social sciences PhD. It is also quite ambitious and gung-ho, in that it assumes you can handle a really full-on schedule. This may not be the case for you right now. But if you are full of energy, raring to go, or if you are willing and able to take what works and leave the rest (always a good idea), without being discouraged by the full-on schedules it comes highly recommended! There is also Eva’s blog PhDtalk, which she started in the second year of her PhD, and is an excellent resource for PhD students.

The next live sessions of the Stress-Free PhD Programme start November 12th! Get your early bird tickets here. I’m also giving away two free places in class. Interested? Enter the Giveaway here!

Roanne takes the concept to the next level. After obtaining her PhD with honours, she decided she would try to create an academic life…differently. Instead of focussing solely on her academic career, she now works part-time as an academic, while running an online business on how to live a courageous and productive life on the side. She has written books about her time living in the slums of Jakarta, multiculturalism, conquering your fears, and her latest, about soldiers returning to civilian life. She gets a few things right, if you ask me!

Today we catch up. I thought it would be interesting to hear Roanne’s perspective on freedom in academia and the choices we have and make, on productivity, on fear, and living a full life.

Roanne’s top tips:

1. Don’t settle for what is ‘normal’. You can create your own academic career path and create your own rules. You don’t have to conform to what everybody else is doing
2. You don’t have to work an 80-hour workweek to be successful. It will drain your energy and inspiration
3. Balance output, input, and rest, for creativity and productivity
4. Take time to think and reflect, and write from the heart
5. In the academic world receiving harsh criticism doesn’t mean you aren’t doing well. It means you are exactly where you should be. It’s the job of your supervisor and colleagues to criticize you. It’s your job to practice self-care and reflection, so you can deal with the criticism.
6. Take your PhD one step at a time. Keep your eye on the next step – don’t look to the end goal, this will cause overwhelm.

I’ve always admired your independence, the choices you make. Can you tell me a little about the process over the past couple of years? When did you know you didn’t want the classic academic career, and how did you carve out a way that combines the best of all worlds? Did you have many doubts?

Thanks for your kind words – likewise, you’ve been an inspiration to me!

I was initially trained as a journalist and worked as a foreign correspondent for several years. I loved the excitement of that job, but missed depth in the news items I made. For this reason I decided to go back to uni and obtain a PhD in anthropology. During and after my PhD I’ve done in-depth fieldwork in Inuit communities, slums; among refugees and humanitarian aid workers and soldiers – and each and every time, I was fascinated with what I learned and enjoyed emerging myself into a complete new world.

However, there were also things about my new academic job that I didn’t like. One of them was the culture of overwork in which working endless hours was regarded not only normal, but as something positive and necessary. For several years, I went along with it. I worked very hard and felt exhausted, but it was never enough. When I’d leave the office at eight in the evening, most of the lights in other offices were still lit. I felt like a faker, a fraud, as if I wasn’t a proper or ‘real’ academic, as the others seemed to be. After some years of trying to make this culture my own, I noticed two things: not only was I so tired of work that I lacked energy for other aspects of my life, I also felt that I was becoming less creative and inspired. My life felt too narrow, as if I could only develop part of my identity.

For a long time, I was in doubt whether I should get back into journalism, but at some point I decided to give it one more chance: I’d experiment to see whether I could be an academic – on my own terms. And although it’s an extremely unconventional way of working, it works well for me.

What does that look like, specifically?

I decided to take a part-time position, I don’t work from 9-5, and I refuse to work 80 hours a week. I also make sure I take the time to talk with my PhD supervisees at length and often, it’s important to me to be an inspiring supervisor and colleague. And I skip unnecessary meetings, the ones mostly spent scrolling on your phone – don’t tell anybody! But seriously: I prioritize other tasks, like thinking, studying and writing.

That must have taken some courage. How were your choices to opt out of the academic rat race received in the academic world?

With scepticism, in the beginning. But honestly, my way of working works well for me, and my colleagues notice. As long as my work is of high quality and I publish it is not a problem. And I know I am energized, happy and inspired, exactly because I stick to my own rules. We tend to forget that no pre-determined rules exist. Who determines what an academic job should look like, or how an academic should behave?

Many academics are addicted to their work and have little to no time for a social life, or other interests. Well, I don’t want that life. I love my academic work, but I also love time off to explore my other interests. Yes, I’m an academic, but I am also a writer, a woman, a rock climber, a wife, a daughter, a public speaker, and a friend. Those identities are important too.

You are also a writer. That’s another way your work deviates from the academic norm. Do you experience a conflict between pursuing academic impact and general impact?

I’ve always seen my writing skills as a strength. After my fieldwork on poverty and slum life, it felt extremely important to me to share what I had learned with as many people as I possibly could. I felt it was my job, in a way, to tell the stories of the people I’d met in the field – people who would remain voiceless, otherwise. So I wrote an academic monograph in which I developed a social theory on poverty and risk behaviour, but I also wrote a popular non-fiction book, and several articles on why it is often so difficult for people to escape poverty.

When I’d spent years of research studying people who lived or worked in risky circumstances, including extreme athletes, humanitarian aid workers and soldiers, I did something similar: I wrote academic articles for colleagues in my field, but I also wrote a non-fiction book in which I shared the main lessons on fear management I’d learned from my interviewees. As a spin-off I developed on-and offline training programmes to help people overcome common fears like stage fright, a fear of failure, fear of driving a car or flying.

This may be an unconventional path in academia, and I’m sure some of my colleagues will think my approach is too popular, or not complex enough to deserve the academic label. But I firmly disagree. Why do social research, if hardly anyone can learn about the findings? Aren’t we supposed to do stuff that is relevant and not only to an elite group of highly-educated, jargon speaking colleagues? If I, as an academic, am capable of communicating my research in a way that people are eventually helped by the research– then it is my responsibility (and joy) to do so.

Let’s get down to the nuts and bolt of how you do all this. How do you get your writing done?

I use a number of strategies that help me be productive. I have a rule of thumb of four hours of output a day – that’s the actual, complex work that I do, like writing an academic article -, and four hours of input – that’s finding inspiration, learning new things and refuelling my creativity, and four hours of rest, recharging and relaxation. I never start my day checking my Email – that only distracts me from my long-term goals. Instead, I start my day with journaling to set clear intentions for the day, and reading non-fiction books that I find inspiring. Then I move on to my ‘productive’ phase of four hours. I start with my most important task. The afternoons are for reading, listening to podcasts, learning new things that interest me or following webinars or online trainings. Currently, I’m inspired by themes such as minimalism, the warrior mind and high productivity, and empathic activism. I also like to go climbing in the afternoon, or walk with my dog. Exercise, to me, is not a luxury. It’s part of my job: I need to be able to think clearly in order to be a good academic, and physical exercise is a great way to do so.

When it comes to writing I always start with a pen and paper, a good cup of coffee and a quiet mind, to think about what my main message is. One useful tactic I use is to ask: if a ghost writer would do this job for me, then what would I tell her to write? How would I explain to her what my puzzle is, what I found, or what fascinates me? How would I explain it to a student? The trick is to write down the answers; then stop for the day – continue the next.

It’s most effective to do this kind of creative work in short bursts rather than forcing yourself to think for an hour or longer. Our brains prefer short peaks of maximum activity, followed by a break of several hours. During this break I try to find distraction. I do easy, practical work, or read something that inspires me. I’ve planted the seed of the question, now I give it time to ripen – the answer will come after several hours or days.

Taking time to reflect and think also helps avoid a common trap: writing (low-quality) articles solely for the sake of getting published. Yes, such articles count towards your publication record, but they do not develop your thinking or add to your body of work in a substantive way. They won’t make you sigh with pride after you’ve written them; at most, you’ll sigh because you’re relieved they’re done and over with! That’s not the way I like to work, and I know for many early career academics, it’s not the way they would prefer to work either – only they may know no other way. Above all I propose we write with a sense of urgency and longing. Personally, I want to feel joy in the creative process that writing essentially is – even academic writing!

Are there any specific PhD writing tips you’d like to share?

What is specific about a PhD, is that it is a long process – a marathon, rather than a sprint. This means PhD students need to look after themselves. They have to keep their energy and creativity high for months and years in a row, despite the on-going criticism they will inevitably receive, the uncertainty of not knowing whether they are doing a ‘real’ job, the stress that sometimes comes with supervision, etcetera. Taking your own needs seriously is crucial for such a marathon job. For most, it means making sure to take plenty of breaks from work, live healthy, work out, and find support in peers or others who can make you feel less lonely.

It is also important to factor in what I call ‘buffer time’. Everything always takes longer than you’d like – especially getting published – and even when you think you’re done, you are most likely not yet done. You need to anticipate that you will have to edit and amend more than you’d hoped for – it’s a normal part of the process. It takes a while to get used to these very long timelines, and to make sure you have the resources for the long haul.

You have studied fear, and how to overcome it. I am sure this is relevant in academia. The mountains PhDs climb are not the physical kind, like the ones you climb in your free time, but that doesn’t mean fear doesn’t strike! What to do when fear of writing gets the better of you?

Generally, PhD students have high standards and grand ambitions. They are also insecure. That’s only natural – essentially, it’s the job of their supervisors and their committee to constantly criticize the work they hand in, and so a PhD student is faced with a lot of harsh words. It’s the job of the PhD student to remind herself that this criticism does not mean she is not doing well. It simply means she is exactly where she needs to be. She needs to keep herself mentally fit, practice self-care, make sure she has a supportive circle around her, rest, and continue her work.

I work with people who struggle with a fear of failure a lot, and I myself have struggled with it throughout my career. One good piece of advice, which suits the mountain metaphor you came up with may be useful here. I learned it when I was studying mountaineers and other extreme athletes, to learn about their risk-taking behaviour and their fear management strategies. When mountaineers climb, they don’t look at the top. It would seem too far away, they would be overwhelmed with a fear of not being able to ever get there. Instead, they only look at their feet – and the first metre ahead. As long as they keep their heads down, literally, hour after hour, they will get closer to the top, and they will be reminded of their progress and hence stay confident. I think this is an amazingly apt metaphor for the writing life.

You are soon starting with a year-long programme that helps people be more productive and successful. I will be participating in the programme myself, and I am so looking forward to it. Can you tell us a little about the programme and how it came about?

I’d been given lectures and workshops about what I call ‘stress-free productivity’ for some years now, and recently decided to turn it into an online training programme to make it accessible and affordable for more people. The programme will run from 1 January 2018 onwards – but before that participants will already receive planners and other tools to help them set their goals. People who join me will not only learn the most effective time management skills, but we will also implement them as we work together on our personal projects. We’re in this together. Me from my computer; you, from yours. Each week, 12 months, for 52 weeks, myself and the other participants are there to advise you when you get stuck, help you overcome self-doubt, and get you in touch with exactly the right people, networks and tools to get you where you want to be. It is be the most complete training programme I have ever developed, and I can’t wait to get started!

Alright, let’s all sign up. If you are interested in joining Roanne’s ‘One Year of Focus and Success’ programme, you can get all the details here. Choose the affiliate option at check out, and you will get a €100 discount. Be quick! Offer expires Tuesday December 12^th. (Small print: I don’t receive any money from Roanne when you sign up through me. Academics need more support and I believe her programme contributes to that cause.) As always, if you found this article useful, could you share it? I appreciate it!

He’s right: Struggle is part of the process, it’s part of the deal.

I’m always trying to figure out ways of lessening the struggle though (and if your supervisor is worth his/ her salt they will do the same). Because intellectual struggle is one thing, and truly necessary and inevitable when you’re in this trade, but you don’t want the struggle to start spilling over into how you feel about yourself and your work in a perpetual self-reinforcing negative cycle, ending up truly, properly stuck.

I have found that to allow the stuckness to lessen its grip, we need to change our relationship with it.
We need to stop staring at the problem endlessly, exhausting ourselves in the process.
To untangle the tangle, we have to do some active untangling as well as allowing the untangling to happen.
We need to do some things differently, to break the loop.

This tends to be what happens: We are having a few difficult days which turn into difficult weeks, maybe even difficult months. Research is slow, and slowing, our mood slowly dropping, and we get more emotional about even small setbacks. Now, at one point we properly enter the zone of maladaptive coping strategies and we start seriously worrying, or procrastinating, or pushing ourselves to stay on even longer at work because maybe that way we will get things done.  It’s not happening, and even if we do have a good day we leave worrying because we need to ‘catch up’ for work hours lost in the past weeks or months, and in view of deadlines rapidly approaching. At this point we are scaring ourselves into performing, we feel we need to push harder, somehow get our adrenalin going to cope, maybe we feel we need an absolute miracle to get us out of the pit.

The interesting bit about this scenario is that our energy is now for the most part spent worrying and obsessing about our work instead of on the act of research itself. I have used a pie chart in my HappyPhD workshop named the work/worry ratio. I can confidently say that for the early stretches of my PhD for me the work/worry ratio was 20/80. Not good.

There are practical steps that can take you from worrying and feeling stuck, to getting back into a more pleasant work groove, and one key element is to allow the untangling to happen. We need to take a step back, re-assess what is working and what isn’t, do what we can and chill out about the rest. That last part is important.

Some ways to get started in undoing the I’m stuck-panic loop:

1. Time (and momentum)

Once I knew what exactly my PhD was about, once my question and methods section became more defined, everything became easier, and sped up. I realise this is probably not very helpful if you’re in the beginning stages of the PhD, but it does get better when you gain clarity. You need a direction to be able to move forward (truth!), and especially in the beginning the work is finding that direction. It can be difficult and demoralising, and slow. If this is the case for you, the trick is, as our professor mentioned to not worry too much about it. It’s normal. Part of the game and the process. Shrug your shoulders. I would add to that: it’s important to find tools to keep momentum. One way may be to shorten your work sessions, and ask yourself at the beginning of each session what you want to work on and what you want to accomplish during that particular session. When you lack direction that’s one way of reintroducing it. Bit by bit, one work session at a time.

2. Change the worry habit

When I fell ill, I had no more energy for worrying. We all know worry is futile, but I realised then, that worry is worse. It is harmful, and seriously drains our energy. We can get away with it, that’s why we do it, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t harmful all the same. Why was I so invested in worrying? I concluded that it’s one of the stategies that allows us to feel safe. A bit silly, and a bit twisted, and absolutely counter-productive, but at least we’re thinking about work, that must count for something? Errr… Changing this habit means being aware of our worrying, and choosing to shift our attention away from it by either doing something constructive about what we’re worried about (work), or by doing something enjoyable utterly unrelated to our worries (not work – not implying though that work can’t be enjoyable), or by doing absolutely nothing at all (yes, that’s allowed). That’s all. Oh yes, and not be a perfectionist about the ‘not worrying’ bit either – give ourselves a bit of a break!

3. A basic work routine

Set up a work routine, and do LESS than you think you should be aiming for. The more stuck you are, the more you feel you need to speed up, SLOW DOWN instead. Ignore what fear is telling you and break the panicked ‘I need to work 12 hours a day and it’s not happening’ loop. Schedule one focused work session a day, or two, then be pleased with yourself once you are done, and give yourself the rest of the day off (also from worrying!).  The doing the work and the not worrying part are equally important here. Now, when that goes well for a couple of days, add an extra work session, see how it goes. Keep your focus equally on working and relaxing. Over the course of a couple of weeks, you should be able to build a sustainable work schedule. One metaphor might be that of being stuck in the mud. It’s unwise to go into high gear to try to get out: you will only dig yourself in further in the process. You need to have the courage (and sense) to go right back to first gear and get yourself out of there slooooowly. It’s the fastest way.

4. Keep it light

Often, what we need is momentum, and momentum is quick. Flashes of insight are quick too. What if work could be ‘quick’ and playful instead of heavy and problematic and looming over us? Can we allow ourselves to ‘play’ a bit more, to have some fun with what we’re doing? This light and playful energy gets us out of the pit. Yet we often don’t allow ourselves to enjoy what we’re doing, because we’re too focused on all the ways we’re not doing enough, it is going wrong, all the ways we are stuck, and the situation is impossible. We take our problems and our work very seriously. Forget it. Drop it. Just for one work session at a time, can we forget about how stuck we are? Can we keep it light?

5. Trust the process

It’s supposed to feel slow, difficult and frustrating! Can you become okay with that? What if you don’t have to worry about being behind, what if you don’t have to worry it’s all so slow? What if you do what you can do, whatever that is that day and be content with the messiness of the process? I used to have a yoga teacher who always repeated: “learning to be comfortable in an uncomfortable situation: that’s yoga.” If that’s the definition of yoga, academia is a yogic pursuit! Find comfort in the discomfort. Keep going, one day at a time, and trust it will pay off in the end. When I realised, deeply, that I didn’t have to do anything, except what I was doing, it was a massive relief. Let go. It’s going to be OK. (And the more we let go, the less energy we put into the negative loops, the smoother the process is going to be).

Entertain these thoughts:

Maybe the hole you feel you’re in isn’t that deep… Maybe you aren’t that stuck…Maybe all you need is the courage to do less, in a structured way, with as much playfulness as you can muster. Forget worry and obsession. Let’s do it differently. Focus on your work only when you choose to. Have a life outside work. Worry less. Allow the knots to untangle.

Do you worry about your PhD? Let me know what helps you when you’re feeling stuck… If you’d like a structured way out of worry and stuckness: take a look at the HappyPhD course. It will walk you through the process step by step. As always, if you enjoyed this post could you like or share it? I appreciate it!

In my own case my first supervisor had a bit of an anger problem, and bullied his PhDs. He had been recommended to me by a former professor of mine so to say I was surprised puts it mildly. Apparently he is better behaved with colleagues or superiors than with his PhDs! I was incredibly grateful to be able to switch supervisors after the first year. But even then things weren’t smooth sailing: my new supervisors were much better, but one was overloaded with work (he had 12 or so PhDs to supervise? I don’t recall the exact number, but there were too many) and the other was not specialised in my field. Come to think of it neither of them were exactly specialised in my field! Partly because my ‘field’ didn’t exist: I subscribed to an interdisciplinary pick and mix approach, which was highly original, but did not exactly fit with what anyone else was doing. It was a major hassle.

I was recalling these tales during one of my coaching calls. I’m working with someone who would like to do doctoral research and we were discussing the best strategy of where and how to apply.

With regard to applying to different departments I mentioned two important initial factors to consider when deciding to approach a potential supervisor:

1. Field/ Topic (Is the person an expert in your topic? Can you learn from him/ her? Does he/she belong to an academic ‘school’, research group or network you’d like to be part of)

and

2. Method (Do you have a similar inclination when it comes to methodological issues? Don’t underestimate this one. Academia is all about method.)

Other factors to consider are:

3. Availability (You don’t want to find yourself a few years in with a supervisor who only scans your work and barely answers your emails.)

and

4. Personality (Do you like them? Not entirely unimportant.)

When I went into academia I thought I would enter the land of the free thinkers, the open-minded and the curious. I thought details of field and topic and method were important but not prohibitive.

I was underestimating the degree of specialisation of doctoral research.

Academia is a hyper-specialised place, where people spend years creating their niche in a field. And once they have done so, they will prefer to supervise PhDs who want to do similar work to what they are doing, which makes sense from the angle of capability as well as convenience…oh, and I hadn’t yet mentioned ego matters: people get attached to their way of doing things and supervision may be a pain, a real pain, when your and their views, on something like methodology clash.

‘That’s rather pointing out the obvious,’ my client said, ‘but very helpful to look at it that way.’

Yes, it is. People do well when an actual mentor relationship can be established, and this isn’t as obvious as it may seem! But having research interests and approaches aligned  is a promising start.

Before you embark on a PhD: read your prospective supervisor’s work. This is one of the best ways to get a feel of whether you would be a good match in terms of content. The same still applies when you are already working on your PhD. The better you understand your supervisor’s work, the easier supervision will likely be, as you’ll understand where he or she is coming from. (This is good advice for thesis defences too: read or at least scan the work of the people on your committee: you’ll find valuable hints as to questions.)

If you’re like me and you’re stubborn and want to do things your way, that’s also a possibility, but make sure you find someone to supervise you who will be open to that more creative approach to avoid setting yourself up for having an even more difficult time than you probably will have. And be prepared, because you will be on your own. You can do it, of course you can do it, but it has its drawbacks, and you will only to a far lesser degree be able to learn from your supervisor.

Another idea is to talk to a person’s current PhDs. Does this particular supervisor invest time and energy in his PhDs? It may be a delicate question, but it’s an important one, and answers whether positive or negative or mixed, will be invaluable in making up your mind on deciding which supervisor to work with.

Did you choose your supervisor/ department wisely? If so, you have my admiration. There is a week on supervision in the HappyPhD course which will help with choosing a supervisor, and aims to ease supervision trouble if you’re struggling. It’s not at all uncommon. If you found this post of help, could you share it? I appreciate it!

The topic interests me as it touches on one of the core concepts that I teach, both in my online course, and when I teach seminars. It is that (academic) wellbeing is not simply the function of the demands placed on an individual, and how he or she copes; but as the function of the demands and the rewards in place. In terms of rewards, the most important tends to be ‘feeling valued’. In short: when we feel our efforts aren’t rewarded and our work and presence isn’t valued or even noticed we become stressed out, and our performance suffers. However, if we do feel supported and rewarded we are much more likely to rise to the challenge of whatever is thrown at us. We become resilient. (If you’re interested in the literature on this start with Siegrist (1996))

You might balk at the psycho-babble and the pseudo-science that, let’s be honest, often goes with managerial talk of ‘optimal performance’. But if you look at the data, and, into your heart, you will find some truth in this reciprocal model. In the Guardian survey, it’s true that ‘heavy workload’ comes out on top as major stressor (mentioned by 51% of respondents), but the two runners-up are ‘lack of support (44%)’ and ‘isolation (43%)’. These issues are major, and I believe they deserve more attention than they currently do. Academics are human. Easy to forget at times.

Click for the findings in full of the Guardian’s mental health survey

But so are students. The study by Gallup which looks at links between college experience and being engaged at work and experiencing high well-being afterwards, suggests that student interaction with engaged and encouraging professors is key (just skipping over the issue of direction of causality here – let’s assume that professors indeed encourage students to develop their thinking, and themselves, leading to higher job and life satisfaction later, not that more engaged people in general are more likely to find mentors who inspired them). Professors who ‘made me excited about learning,’ ‘cared about me as a person,’ or ‘encouraged my hopes and dreams’ are important figures in a person’s life.

Click for the full Gallup – Purdue Index report

I know that for me personally, this has been very true, and I can find many examples that illustrate the links between feeling valued and challenged, and performance. When I was a student I was very lucky to have mentors, who helped me shape not only my thinking, but also my attitude. I have talked about Gordon Smith, my tutor at the LSE, before (I never stop when I start talking about Gordon!), but he really was fantastic. He was terrifying enough to frighten me into engaging in seminars – he barked at me during our first meeting: ‘I expect you to come to my office weekly, and report on your contribution to the academic debate at the LSE. If you decide to keep your mouth shut in class, I will get very angry.’ So yes, he ‘encouraged’ me. He was also offensive enough to make me cross, which resulted in some very sharply written essays he was more than pleased with, and when he was done offending me, there would always be an unexpected compliment thrown in, which would mostly be suitably politically incorrect, and would flatter and entertain me immensely. When I was worried about failing my exams he would exclaim things like: ‘Amber, I don’t worry about you, and neither should you!’ Thank you, Gordon. Other mentors (Stefan Collignon comes to mind) have been tremendously important in shaping how I think about the world (he also encouraged me to ‘develop my originality’. Immensely grateful for that), or simply by being absolutely terrific at what they do and showing me a new way to think, period (Simon Hix).

On the other side of the uplifting experience of having a mentor who challenges and supports you, there are the anti-mentors who put you down. The difference can be down to personality – I know some of Gordon’s students did not appreciate his style, and I remember comforting a crying friend whom he had told to ‘stop floating around, or get married and have children.’ (I told you he was politically incorrect! I appreciated it, but I can see why others wouldn’t). But style aside, some things should never be said, to anyone. Too many people have told me of PhD supervisors telling them they were too stupid to be in academia. Personally, I have been told in a seminar setting by my supervisor at the time, that he ‘doubted I was capable of producing a single coherent rational argument’. It would have been funny, if it wouldn’t have been for the anger and disdain behind the words. For some time, I almost believed him, and it affected me. I knew my work was in a bit of a chaotic phase, which is probably the understatement of the century, but I also knew I was at least somewhat capable. I started doubting that. I have heard from others who have had to endure much, much worse from the same person. PhDs should not be torturous never-ending projects, but they became exactly that in the absence of decent supervision.

The bottom line is that, in academia, maybe even more so than in other work environments, the quality of social interaction in general, and of supervision relationships in particular, can make or break you. So how go about creating an academic environment that is challenging, encouraging and supportive? An environment that truly supports the academics working there, and the students they teach?

I’ll give it a shot. To start it’s important to be aware of how the way academia and academic work are set up may impact our wellbeing, and how we can devise strategies to best cope with these pressures. Such strategies range from the very practical, such as setting up our workday in a way that allows us to do your work most efficiently, to the profoundly spiritual, in the sense that work becomes almost effortless when we are more connected to why we do it in the first place. These are strategies at the individual level, but their effects will spill over into the organisation we work in as a whole. I also believe it is important we are sometimes reminded of how valuable we are, and can be (and in some cases could be), to others. That we affect others, positively or negatively. That we matter. I believe it makes a difference.

This is touchy-feely territory which is incredibly challenging to approach in any organisation, let alone in the cerebral, insular world of academia. Which self-respecting academic doesn’t roll their eyes at ‘motivational’ or ‘team-building’ activities? I know I do. How many hollow phrases and pointless activities can we endure in one lifetime anyway? Trying to picture someone like Gordon, the ultimate difficult academic, in ‘motivational’ activities, is enough to cause a laughing fit. I sometimes wonder whether these things can be orchestrated, at all. At the same time, of course, I am someone who goes to universities to speak about these topics, and from what I’ve heard people leave inspired (So please, yes: hire me. Warning: surges in productivity, wellbeing and self-reflection will ensue). I have found my audiences to be more open and receptive to what I have to say than I had expected. Which, in turn, may not be surprising seen the fact that academics struggle with exactly these issues, as articles such as the Guardian article quoted above underline. *facepalm*

Mostly, I believe in an inside-out approach. It’s why I like Twitter initiatives such as #ScholarSunday and @AcademicKindness so much. Simply academics showing a bit of appreciation and sharing small, important, moments of kindness. This whole business of feeling valued, and creating a supportive environment, is about being genuine. So, keep your sarcasm, keep your wit. Be difficult, if you are. But be kind. It’s appreciated. And it matters.

Siegrist, J. (1996). Adverse health effects of high-effort/low-reward conditions. Journal of occupational health psychology, 1(1), 27.

Gordon is now roaming the Elysian Fields, so I couldn’t ask him for his PhD advice firsthand. Instead, I compiled some of the advice he gave me when he was my tutor at the LSE, as it could be applied to writing a PhD.

His top 4 tips (according to me):

Write for the right reason

Gordon had an unlikely academic career, and only took up a lectureship at the LSE at the age of 45, after mostly working outside of academia. He told me how he started writing his first book, I believe it was a text on West German politics, on the train on his commute to work. “One day,” he told me, “I just started. I knew I had to write the book. So I took out pen and paper and I started writing. I remember it like it was yesterday.” That conversation always stuck with me, as I struggled finding my own PhD topic (something I naturally got yelled at for when he visited Florence: “Amber, you have to do something. I have to shake you up. You have got to stop faffing about!”)  I was also reminded of it whenever I was stressing for a deadline, instead of writing because I felt compelled to write. The lesson Gordon taught me is to write what you need to write. Because the work needs to be written. Nobody is forcing you to write a PhD. Write the right thesis for the right reasons.

Don’t let your canoe sink

It’s easy to get lost in the sea of scholarship, and I see some PhD students close to drown in the piles of papers they think they need to read. When I was finishing my PhD my energy levels were so low that I could not add many new papers to my repertoire. At the time, I was worried about it, as I thought my work might not be as current as it should be. The opposite turned out to be the case – I was forced to focus on the most important arguments already out there, and it markedly clarified my thinking. In the end, the couple of important new papers weren’t difficult to incorporate. It reminded me of a meeting with Gordon in which he warned against over studying, during exam time at the LSE. “Some people need the books,” he said, “but I think you don’t. You know enough. You’re smart enough. All you need to do is think. In your mind, that’s where it’s all happening. Think!” He continued: “Imagine you’re on a deserted island. No, even better, you’re in a canoe. And you’re only allowed to take one article for each topic with you. If you take more on board, your canoe will sink. Now read these articles and think about what the author is telling you. Reflect on it. Get inside the article you’ve chosen.” How many articles have you got in your canoe? Don’t let it sink.

Remember not to spend all your time in the library

One of the things Gordon had no patience for was procrastination. He used to tell me again and again, when I was confronted with yet another essay to write: “You have to get these things done! Get it over with!” And more than once he told me: “Remember not to spend all your time in the library.” At the LSE, the dominant paradigm was one of study till you drop. It’s a misguided paradigm of more is more, and one I see dominates many PhD student’s lives. According to this paradigm your productivity is measured by the hours spent on your PhD, not by the actual outcome of your efforts. I understand – it is notoriously difficult to measure your output in many phases of PhD research, and it’s so easy to trick yourself into thinking that you are doing a good job, if you at least put maximum hours in. But at best it’s a paradigm that makes you spend too much time in the library, at worst it’s a paradigm that is destructive for your productivity, alongside your sanity. Resist temptation. Instead, focus and get your work done. (If you are interested in learning how to do this: it’s what my online course is all about).

Don’t bore us too much

In my 2003 diary I jotted down:

‘Gordon and I agree on writing.  He tells me: “Be inspired. You have to be on a whirl. Make it crisp. Make it sharp. Put your pen on paper, get excited and write like you’ve never written before. Just let it happen.”

Though perhaps not on all of it: “If all else fails, don’t worry. Have a drink. A straight shot of vodka should loosen you up.”’

Gordon never quite approved of my choice of topics. He could not comprehend why anyone in his right mind would want to write on the EU in general, and on its policy processes in particular. (By now, I see his point. I have switched to studying ‘real politics’ Gordon. Not to worry.) At one particular meeting he told me I was “such an EU maniac”, and dismissed my proposed dissertation titles as “EU mumbo jumbo”. At the end of the meeting, on my way out, he grumbled: “Oh, well, write whatever you want to write.” Then, as I was about to close the door behind me he added: “Just don’t bore me too much!” I tried very hard not to. And I still do.

Do you have a mentor who inspires and encourages you? Tell me in the comments!