Mixing
Bouncing between two PhD supervisors
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I'm a PhD student in engineering. I work in a small group with two professors and 5 PhD students (no postdocs).
Both the professors "follow" my thesis as supervisor. However, they don't get along with, and they are continuously trying to pull me to their side and change my research subjects.
It's not that my project is not going well (I have 12 publications: 4 journal papers and 8 conference papers). However my two professors don't want to collaborate together and every time assign me random extra work to do for them, on various subjects, uncorrelated one with the others, and in which I'm not even expert.
All the other PhD's in my group are in the same situation. If we raise a concern about our thesis, their answer is just "now do what I ask you, we'll think to put together a thesis at the end of your PhD".
It even happened that I sent a full paper to one of them, ready to be submitted, just to be told "If you want to publish this, you have to do this other (uncorrelated, ndr) work before".
The worst part is that professors and researchers from other divisions know the situation and come to our group every time they need cheap work. So, one day, one of the supervisor comes to your office and says: from now you'll collaborate with professor A of dept. B on this topic. Another day, the other supervisor has lunch with some professor, comes and tells you: I need you to work with prof. X of division Y on this other topic.
Most of the time, these extra assignments are running tons of calculations and collect results, code debugging, or even external consulting for private companies. Needless to say, this is a major slow down to my research activity because I spend more than half of my time on other topics in which I'm not competent. Most of these random activities ends up without publications. I'm only publishing from my main research project.
My only luck is that I have contact in other universities and I have postdoc offers there, and that I've always had clear ideas on my thesis. So I still managed to publish my papers. Other students are not so lucky and they are at the second or even third year of their PhD without having publications nor having a clear direction for their research project.
I'll finish in less that one year and, as I mentioned, I have offers in other places. However, I'm starting to ask myself a question: Is this normal in academy? I wonder if this is the standard, and I'll find exactly the same situation in other universities or if it was just an unlucky combination of bad bosses.
I love my research activity, but if these are the working conditions, I'm starting wondering if it is worth to go on..
phd
edited 15 mins ago
kmm
1,6441318
asked 1 hour ago
kratos
92
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kratos is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
add a comment |Â
up vote
1
down vote
favorite
I'm a PhD student in engineering. I work in a small group with two professors and 5 PhD students (no postdocs).
Both the professors "follow" my thesis as supervisor. However, they don't get along with, and they are continuously trying to pull me to their side and change my research subjects.
It's not that my project is not going well (I have 12 publications: 4 journal papers and 8 conference papers). However my two professors don't want to collaborate together and every time assign me random extra work to do for them, on various subjects, uncorrelated one with the others, and in which I'm not even expert.
All the other PhD's in my group are in the same situation. If we raise a concern about our thesis, their answer is just "now do what I ask you, we'll think to put together a thesis at the end of your PhD".
It even happened that I sent a full paper to one of them, ready to be submitted, just to be told "If you want to publish this, you have to do this other (uncorrelated, ndr) work before".
The worst part is that professors and researchers from other divisions know the situation and come to our group every time they need cheap work. So, one day, one of the supervisor comes to your office and says: from now you'll collaborate with professor A of dept. B on this topic. Another day, the other supervisor has lunch with some professor, comes and tells you: I need you to work with prof. X of division Y on this other topic.
Most of the time, these extra assignments are running tons of calculations and collect results, code debugging, or even external consulting for private companies. Needless to say, this is a major slow down to my research activity because I spend more than half of my time on other topics in which I'm not competent. Most of these random activities ends up without publications. I'm only publishing from my main research project.
My only luck is that I have contact in other universities and I have postdoc offers there, and that I've always had clear ideas on my thesis. So I still managed to publish my papers. Other students are not so lucky and they are at the second or even third year of their PhD without having publications nor having a clear direction for their research project.
I'll finish in less that one year and, as I mentioned, I have offers in other places. However, I'm starting to ask myself a question: Is this normal in academy? I wonder if this is the standard, and I'll find exactly the same situation in other universities or if it was just an unlucky combination of bad bosses.
I love my research activity, but if these are the working conditions, I'm starting wondering if it is worth to go on..
phd
edited 15 mins ago
kmm
1,6441318
asked 1 hour ago
kratos
92
New contributor
kratos is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
add a comment |Â
up vote
1
down vote
favorite
up vote
1
down vote
favorite
I'm a PhD student in engineering. I work in a small group with two professors and 5 PhD students (no postdocs).
Both the professors "follow" my thesis as supervisor. However, they don't get along with, and they are continuously trying to pull me to their side and change my research subjects.
It's not that my project is not going well (I have 12 publications: 4 journal papers and 8 conference papers). However my two professors don't want to collaborate together and every time assign me random extra work to do for them, on various subjects, uncorrelated one with the others, and in which I'm not even expert.
All the other PhD's in my group are in the same situation. If we raise a concern about our thesis, their answer is just "now do what I ask you, we'll think to put together a thesis at the end of your PhD".
It even happened that I sent a full paper to one of them, ready to be submitted, just to be told "If you want to publish this, you have to do this other (uncorrelated, ndr) work before".
The worst part is that professors and researchers from other divisions know the situation and come to our group every time they need cheap work. So, one day, one of the supervisor comes to your office and says: from now you'll collaborate with professor A of dept. B on this topic. Another day, the other supervisor has lunch with some professor, comes and tells you: I need you to work with prof. X of division Y on this other topic.
Most of the time, these extra assignments are running tons of calculations and collect results, code debugging, or even external consulting for private companies. Needless to say, this is a major slow down to my research activity because I spend more than half of my time on other topics in which I'm not competent. Most of these random activities ends up without publications. I'm only publishing from my main research project.
My only luck is that I have contact in other universities and I have postdoc offers there, and that I've always had clear ideas on my thesis. So I still managed to publish my papers. Other students are not so lucky and they are at the second or even third year of their PhD without having publications nor having a clear direction for their research project.
I'll finish in less that one year and, as I mentioned, I have offers in other places. However, I'm starting to ask myself a question: Is this normal in academy? I wonder if this is the standard, and I'll find exactly the same situation in other universities or if it was just an unlucky combination of bad bosses.
I love my research activity, but if these are the working conditions, I'm starting wondering if it is worth to go on..
phd
edited 15 mins ago
kmm
1,6441318
asked 1 hour ago
kratos
92
New contributor
kratos is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
I'm a PhD student in engineering. I work in a small group with two professors and 5 PhD students (no postdocs).
Both the professors "follow" my thesis as supervisor. However, they don't get along with, and they are continuously trying to pull me to their side and change my research subjects.
It's not that my project is not going well (I have 12 publications: 4 journal papers and 8 conference papers). However my two professors don't want to collaborate together and every time assign me random extra work to do for them, on various subjects, uncorrelated one with the others, and in which I'm not even expert.
All the other PhD's in my group are in the same situation. If we raise a concern about our thesis, their answer is just "now do what I ask you, we'll think to put together a thesis at the end of your PhD".
It even happened that I sent a full paper to one of them, ready to be submitted, just to be told "If you want to publish this, you have to do this other (uncorrelated, ndr) work before".
The worst part is that professors and researchers from other divisions know the situation and come to our group every time they need cheap work. So, one day, one of the supervisor comes to your office and says: from now you'll collaborate with professor A of dept. B on this topic. Another day, the other supervisor has lunch with some professor, comes and tells you: I need you to work with prof. X of division Y on this other topic.
Most of the time, these extra assignments are running tons of calculations and collect results, code debugging, or even external consulting for private companies. Needless to say, this is a major slow down to my research activity because I spend more than half of my time on other topics in which I'm not competent. Most of these random activities ends up without publications. I'm only publishing from my main research project.
My only luck is that I have contact in other universities and I have postdoc offers there, and that I've always had clear ideas on my thesis. So I still managed to publish my papers. Other students are not so lucky and they are at the second or even third year of their PhD without having publications nor having a clear direction for their research project.
I'll finish in less that one year and, as I mentioned, I have offers in other places. However, I'm starting to ask myself a question: Is this normal in academy? I wonder if this is the standard, and I'll find exactly the same situation in other universities or if it was just an unlucky combination of bad bosses.
I love my research activity, but if these are the working conditions, I'm starting wondering if it is worth to go on..
phd
phd
edited 15 mins ago
kmm
1,6441318
asked 1 hour ago
kratos
92
New contributor
kratos is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
edited 15 mins ago
kmm
1,6441318
asked 1 hour ago
kratos
92
New contributor
kratos is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
edited 15 mins ago
kmm
1,6441318
edited 15 mins ago
kmm
1,6441318
edited 15 mins ago
kmm
1,6441318
1,6441318
asked 1 hour ago
kratos
92
New contributor
kratos is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
asked 1 hour ago
kratos
92
asked 1 hour ago
kratos
92
92
New contributor
kratos is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
New contributor
kratos is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
kratos is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.
add a comment |Â
add a comment |Â
3 Answers
3
active
oldest
votes
up vote
2
down vote
This seems like a mixed blessing/curse to me. It seems to be hard and frustrating, of course, but on the other hand you have two professors who, while not agreeing on much, seem to love your work. You get a lot of finalized work (publications) out of the deal. I suspect you are building a strong academic career for yourself.
But I suggest you look for the end of the tunnel. Get the main work done somehow and find a good position without alienating either of your "patrons." I suspect that you are in a strong position in the long run and quitting would be giving up too much.
I suspect that you are pretty good already at putting the two off at least a bit to make some room for yourself. If you can continue that, then just start to plan your exit. You won't be juggling their needs forever, I think.
answered 1 hour ago
Buffy
25.3k682138
add a comment |Â
up vote
0
down vote
Have you considered asking one, or both, of the universities if they would accept you to complete the PhD? And then continue Post Doc?
May be easier than dealing with two supervisors who regard you as cheap, or slave, labor...
This is not a professional attitude on the supervisors part...
answered 32 mins ago
Solar Mike
9,82432142
add a comment |Â
up vote
0
down vote
The goal of research for a PhD is to allow you to demonstrate your ability to carry out a successful program of unique, robust and independent literature review, experimentation, analysis, and publication within a reasonable time period. The roles of a PhD advisor are to assure the integrity of your work and to guide you to complete it in a reasonable time.
One danger is that your situation continues with no foreseeable effort by either of your co-advisors to acknowledge the need for an overall plan. The other danger is that your situation continues with no due respect by either of your co-advisors to prohibit you from distractions to your dissertation research. These two aspects point to a failure of your advisor(s) to respect their role in assuring the integrity of your work and guiding you to complete it in a timely manner.
I do not favor an approach that says ... You are gaining experience, so keep your head down, wait it out, and (eventually) you will be granted permission to leave. I also do not favor the approach that says ... Leave now. I recommend instead that you seek to gain some control of the aspects of your work that your advisor(s) are failing to recognize are theirs.
You might seek to resolve this situation in a few ways.
Establish that you will prepare a Dissertation Proposal
now, not " at the end of your [dissertation research]". This will define the bounds of your work and a timeline to complete it.Establish that you will have only one Dissertation Advisor, not
two co-advisors. This assures that you have one person to oversee the integrity of your work (not two who fight about the definition of the work let alone provide no guide on its integrity).Establish that you will engage a Dissertation Committee to co-advise as well as monitor the progress on your dissertation research. This can give you advocates to help guide your work when your main advisor is weak (or fails) in his/her role.
How should you do this in your current situation? You may need to invoke a higher authority.
Does your university, college, department, or program have a graduate catalogue? Does it define the requirements for a PhD? Do any of those requirements help you establish either of the above as standards? By example, our program has a requirement for a PhD student to defend a Dissertation Proposal, and the recommendation is this must happen within 2-3 years of starting the degree.
Does your department have a Chair or Head? Have you discussed your situation with him/her? I cannot imagine that a department chair will be happy to have such a situation as yours become a standard, especially when that news should start to propagate outside of the department and university and when that news is backed up by consistent reports from all of the graduate students under the advisor(s) of concern here.
Does your university have a Graduate Programs Office? Does that Office have a Head or Dean? Again, I cannot imagine that this office will be unable to offer some level of guidance to overcome the failures of your advisors.
Before you do anything independently, you should sit with both advisors at the same time and bring your concerns forward to them. Outline a plan (a Dissertation Proposal White Paper) in writing and have it available as a talking point for the meeting. Bring to the attention of your advisors at that meeting the issues that you raise above as factors that impact negatively on your ability to focus on your own research work and see a tangible end point to it.
answered 19 mins ago
Jeffrey J Weimer
76918
add a comment |Â
3 Answers
3
active
oldest
votes
3 Answers
3
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
up vote
2
down vote
This seems like a mixed blessing/curse to me. It seems to be hard and frustrating, of course, but on the other hand you have two professors who, while not agreeing on much, seem to love your work. You get a lot of finalized work (publications) out of the deal. I suspect you are building a strong academic career for yourself.
But I suggest you look for the end of the tunnel. Get the main work done somehow and find a good position without alienating either of your "patrons." I suspect that you are in a strong position in the long run and quitting would be giving up too much.
I suspect that you are pretty good already at putting the two off at least a bit to make some room for yourself. If you can continue that, then just start to plan your exit. You won't be juggling their needs forever, I think.
answered 1 hour ago
Buffy
25.3k682138
add a comment |Â
up vote
2
down vote
This seems like a mixed blessing/curse to me. It seems to be hard and frustrating, of course, but on the other hand you have two professors who, while not agreeing on much, seem to love your work. You get a lot of finalized work (publications) out of the deal. I suspect you are building a strong academic career for yourself.
But I suggest you look for the end of the tunnel. Get the main work done somehow and find a good position without alienating either of your "patrons." I suspect that you are in a strong position in the long run and quitting would be giving up too much.
I suspect that you are pretty good already at putting the two off at least a bit to make some room for yourself. If you can continue that, then just start to plan your exit. You won't be juggling their needs forever, I think.
answered 1 hour ago
Buffy
25.3k682138
add a comment |Â
up vote
2
down vote
up vote
2
down vote
This seems like a mixed blessing/curse to me. It seems to be hard and frustrating, of course, but on the other hand you have two professors who, while not agreeing on much, seem to love your work. You get a lot of finalized work (publications) out of the deal. I suspect you are building a strong academic career for yourself.
But I suggest you look for the end of the tunnel. Get the main work done somehow and find a good position without alienating either of your "patrons." I suspect that you are in a strong position in the long run and quitting would be giving up too much.
I suspect that you are pretty good already at putting the two off at least a bit to make some room for yourself. If you can continue that, then just start to plan your exit. You won't be juggling their needs forever, I think.
answered 1 hour ago
Buffy
25.3k682138
This seems like a mixed blessing/curse to me. It seems to be hard and frustrating, of course, but on the other hand you have two professors who, while not agreeing on much, seem to love your work. You get a lot of finalized work (publications) out of the deal. I suspect you are building a strong academic career for yourself.
But I suggest you look for the end of the tunnel. Get the main work done somehow and find a good position without alienating either of your "patrons." I suspect that you are in a strong position in the long run and quitting would be giving up too much.
I suspect that you are pretty good already at putting the two off at least a bit to make some room for yourself. If you can continue that, then just start to plan your exit. You won't be juggling their needs forever, I think.
answered 1 hour ago
Buffy
25.3k682138
answered 1 hour ago
Buffy
25.3k682138
answered 1 hour ago
Buffy
25.3k682138
answered 1 hour ago
Buffy
25.3k682138
25.3k682138
add a comment |Â
add a comment |Â
up vote
0
down vote
Have you considered asking one, or both, of the universities if they would accept you to complete the PhD? And then continue Post Doc?
May be easier than dealing with two supervisors who regard you as cheap, or slave, labor...
This is not a professional attitude on the supervisors part...
answered 32 mins ago
Solar Mike
9,82432142
add a comment |Â
up vote
0
down vote
Have you considered asking one, or both, of the universities if they would accept you to complete the PhD? And then continue Post Doc?
May be easier than dealing with two supervisors who regard you as cheap, or slave, labor...
This is not a professional attitude on the supervisors part...
answered 32 mins ago
Solar Mike
9,82432142
add a comment |Â
up vote
0
down vote
up vote
0
down vote
Have you considered asking one, or both, of the universities if they would accept you to complete the PhD? And then continue Post Doc?
May be easier than dealing with two supervisors who regard you as cheap, or slave, labor...
This is not a professional attitude on the supervisors part...
answered 32 mins ago
Solar Mike
9,82432142
Have you considered asking one, or both, of the universities if they would accept you to complete the PhD? And then continue Post Doc?
May be easier than dealing with two supervisors who regard you as cheap, or slave, labor...
This is not a professional attitude on the supervisors part...
answered 32 mins ago
Solar Mike
9,82432142
answered 32 mins ago
Solar Mike
9,82432142
answered 32 mins ago
Solar Mike
9,82432142
answered 32 mins ago
Solar Mike
9,82432142
9,82432142
add a comment |Â
add a comment |Â
up vote
0
down vote
The goal of research for a PhD is to allow you to demonstrate your ability to carry out a successful program of unique, robust and independent literature review, experimentation, analysis, and publication within a reasonable time period. The roles of a PhD advisor are to assure the integrity of your work and to guide you to complete it in a reasonable time.
One danger is that your situation continues with no foreseeable effort by either of your co-advisors to acknowledge the need for an overall plan. The other danger is that your situation continues with no due respect by either of your co-advisors to prohibit you from distractions to your dissertation research. These two aspects point to a failure of your advisor(s) to respect their role in assuring the integrity of your work and guiding you to complete it in a timely manner.
I do not favor an approach that says ... You are gaining experience, so keep your head down, wait it out, and (eventually) you will be granted permission to leave. I also do not favor the approach that says ... Leave now. I recommend instead that you seek to gain some control of the aspects of your work that your advisor(s) are failing to recognize are theirs.
You might seek to resolve this situation in a few ways.
Establish that you will prepare a Dissertation Proposal
now, not " at the end of your [dissertation research]". This will define the bounds of your work and a timeline to complete it.Establish that you will have only one Dissertation Advisor, not
two co-advisors. This assures that you have one person to oversee the integrity of your work (not two who fight about the definition of the work let alone provide no guide on its integrity).Establish that you will engage a Dissertation Committee to co-advise as well as monitor the progress on your dissertation research. This can give you advocates to help guide your work when your main advisor is weak (or fails) in his/her role.
How should you do this in your current situation? You may need to invoke a higher authority.
Does your university, college, department, or program have a graduate catalogue? Does it define the requirements for a PhD? Do any of those requirements help you establish either of the above as standards? By example, our program has a requirement for a PhD student to defend a Dissertation Proposal, and the recommendation is this must happen within 2-3 years of starting the degree.
Does your department have a Chair or Head? Have you discussed your situation with him/her? I cannot imagine that a department chair will be happy to have such a situation as yours become a standard, especially when that news should start to propagate outside of the department and university and when that news is backed up by consistent reports from all of the graduate students under the advisor(s) of concern here.
Does your university have a Graduate Programs Office? Does that Office have a Head or Dean? Again, I cannot imagine that this office will be unable to offer some level of guidance to overcome the failures of your advisors.
Before you do anything independently, you should sit with both advisors at the same time and bring your concerns forward to them. Outline a plan (a Dissertation Proposal White Paper) in writing and have it available as a talking point for the meeting. Bring to the attention of your advisors at that meeting the issues that you raise above as factors that impact negatively on your ability to focus on your own research work and see a tangible end point to it.
answered 19 mins ago
Jeffrey J Weimer
76918
add a comment |Â
up vote
0
down vote
The goal of research for a PhD is to allow you to demonstrate your ability to carry out a successful program of unique, robust and independent literature review, experimentation, analysis, and publication within a reasonable time period. The roles of a PhD advisor are to assure the integrity of your work and to guide you to complete it in a reasonable time.
One danger is that your situation continues with no foreseeable effort by either of your co-advisors to acknowledge the need for an overall plan. The other danger is that your situation continues with no due respect by either of your co-advisors to prohibit you from distractions to your dissertation research. These two aspects point to a failure of your advisor(s) to respect their role in assuring the integrity of your work and guiding you to complete it in a timely manner.
I do not favor an approach that says ... You are gaining experience, so keep your head down, wait it out, and (eventually) you will be granted permission to leave. I also do not favor the approach that says ... Leave now. I recommend instead that you seek to gain some control of the aspects of your work that your advisor(s) are failing to recognize are theirs.
You might seek to resolve this situation in a few ways.
Establish that you will prepare a Dissertation Proposal
now, not " at the end of your [dissertation research]". This will define the bounds of your work and a timeline to complete it.Establish that you will have only one Dissertation Advisor, not
two co-advisors. This assures that you have one person to oversee the integrity of your work (not two who fight about the definition of the work let alone provide no guide on its integrity).Establish that you will engage a Dissertation Committee to co-advise as well as monitor the progress on your dissertation research. This can give you advocates to help guide your work when your main advisor is weak (or fails) in his/her role.
How should you do this in your current situation? You may need to invoke a higher authority.
Does your university, college, department, or program have a graduate catalogue? Does it define the requirements for a PhD? Do any of those requirements help you establish either of the above as standards? By example, our program has a requirement for a PhD student to defend a Dissertation Proposal, and the recommendation is this must happen within 2-3 years of starting the degree.
Does your department have a Chair or Head? Have you discussed your situation with him/her? I cannot imagine that a department chair will be happy to have such a situation as yours become a standard, especially when that news should start to propagate outside of the department and university and when that news is backed up by consistent reports from all of the graduate students under the advisor(s) of concern here.
Does your university have a Graduate Programs Office? Does that Office have a Head or Dean? Again, I cannot imagine that this office will be unable to offer some level of guidance to overcome the failures of your advisors.
Before you do anything independently, you should sit with both advisors at the same time and bring your concerns forward to them. Outline a plan (a Dissertation Proposal White Paper) in writing and have it available as a talking point for the meeting. Bring to the attention of your advisors at that meeting the issues that you raise above as factors that impact negatively on your ability to focus on your own research work and see a tangible end point to it.
answered 19 mins ago
Jeffrey J Weimer
76918
add a comment |Â
up vote
0
down vote
up vote
0
down vote
The goal of research for a PhD is to allow you to demonstrate your ability to carry out a successful program of unique, robust and independent literature review, experimentation, analysis, and publication within a reasonable time period. The roles of a PhD advisor are to assure the integrity of your work and to guide you to complete it in a reasonable time.
One danger is that your situation continues with no foreseeable effort by either of your co-advisors to acknowledge the need for an overall plan. The other danger is that your situation continues with no due respect by either of your co-advisors to prohibit you from distractions to your dissertation research. These two aspects point to a failure of your advisor(s) to respect their role in assuring the integrity of your work and guiding you to complete it in a timely manner.
I do not favor an approach that says ... You are gaining experience, so keep your head down, wait it out, and (eventually) you will be granted permission to leave. I also do not favor the approach that says ... Leave now. I recommend instead that you seek to gain some control of the aspects of your work that your advisor(s) are failing to recognize are theirs.
You might seek to resolve this situation in a few ways.
Establish that you will prepare a Dissertation Proposal
now, not " at the end of your [dissertation research]". This will define the bounds of your work and a timeline to complete it.Establish that you will have only one Dissertation Advisor, not
two co-advisors. This assures that you have one person to oversee the integrity of your work (not two who fight about the definition of the work let alone provide no guide on its integrity).Establish that you will engage a Dissertation Committee to co-advise as well as monitor the progress on your dissertation research. This can give you advocates to help guide your work when your main advisor is weak (or fails) in his/her role.
How should you do this in your current situation? You may need to invoke a higher authority.
Does your university, college, department, or program have a graduate catalogue? Does it define the requirements for a PhD? Do any of those requirements help you establish either of the above as standards? By example, our program has a requirement for a PhD student to defend a Dissertation Proposal, and the recommendation is this must happen within 2-3 years of starting the degree.
Does your department have a Chair or Head? Have you discussed your situation with him/her? I cannot imagine that a department chair will be happy to have such a situation as yours become a standard, especially when that news should start to propagate outside of the department and university and when that news is backed up by consistent reports from all of the graduate students under the advisor(s) of concern here.
Does your university have a Graduate Programs Office? Does that Office have a Head or Dean? Again, I cannot imagine that this office will be unable to offer some level of guidance to overcome the failures of your advisors.
Before you do anything independently, you should sit with both advisors at the same time and bring your concerns forward to them. Outline a plan (a Dissertation Proposal White Paper) in writing and have it available as a talking point for the meeting. Bring to the attention of your advisors at that meeting the issues that you raise above as factors that impact negatively on your ability to focus on your own research work and see a tangible end point to it.
answered 19 mins ago
Jeffrey J Weimer
76918
The goal of research for a PhD is to allow you to demonstrate your ability to carry out a successful program of unique, robust and independent literature review, experimentation, analysis, and publication within a reasonable time period. The roles of a PhD advisor are to assure the integrity of your work and to guide you to complete it in a reasonable time.
One danger is that your situation continues with no foreseeable effort by either of your co-advisors to acknowledge the need for an overall plan. The other danger is that your situation continues with no due respect by either of your co-advisors to prohibit you from distractions to your dissertation research. These two aspects point to a failure of your advisor(s) to respect their role in assuring the integrity of your work and guiding you to complete it in a timely manner.
I do not favor an approach that says ... You are gaining experience, so keep your head down, wait it out, and (eventually) you will be granted permission to leave. I also do not favor the approach that says ... Leave now. I recommend instead that you seek to gain some control of the aspects of your work that your advisor(s) are failing to recognize are theirs.
You might seek to resolve this situation in a few ways.
Establish that you will prepare a Dissertation Proposal
now, not " at the end of your [dissertation research]". This will define the bounds of your work and a timeline to complete it.Establish that you will have only one Dissertation Advisor, not
two co-advisors. This assures that you have one person to oversee the integrity of your work (not two who fight about the definition of the work let alone provide no guide on its integrity).Establish that you will engage a Dissertation Committee to co-advise as well as monitor the progress on your dissertation research. This can give you advocates to help guide your work when your main advisor is weak (or fails) in his/her role.
How should you do this in your current situation? You may need to invoke a higher authority.
Does your university, college, department, or program have a graduate catalogue? Does it define the requirements for a PhD? Do any of those requirements help you establish either of the above as standards? By example, our program has a requirement for a PhD student to defend a Dissertation Proposal, and the recommendation is this must happen within 2-3 years of starting the degree.
Does your department have a Chair or Head? Have you discussed your situation with him/her? I cannot imagine that a department chair will be happy to have such a situation as yours become a standard, especially when that news should start to propagate outside of the department and university and when that news is backed up by consistent reports from all of the graduate students under the advisor(s) of concern here.
Does your university have a Graduate Programs Office? Does that Office have a Head or Dean? Again, I cannot imagine that this office will be unable to offer some level of guidance to overcome the failures of your advisors.
Before you do anything independently, you should sit with both advisors at the same time and bring your concerns forward to them. Outline a plan (a Dissertation Proposal White Paper) in writing and have it available as a talking point for the meeting. Bring to the attention of your advisors at that meeting the issues that you raise above as factors that impact negatively on your ability to focus on your own research work and see a tangible end point to it.
answered 19 mins ago
Jeffrey J Weimer
76918
answered 19 mins ago
Jeffrey J Weimer
76918
answered 19 mins ago
Jeffrey J Weimer
76918
answered 19 mins ago
Jeffrey J Weimer
76918
76918
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