SERIES ON SUPERVISION, PART V – The 10 Commandments of Supervision, Episode 47

• Host and Producer: Maria Bach (Centre Walras-Pareto, University of Lausanne)

Based on almost 2 years of interviews with current and former PhD students, supervisors along with lots and lots of conversations on supervision, I offer you a series of episodes on supervision.

In the first episode, I explore a series of critical “don’ts” that both PhD students and their supervisors should be aware of to ensure a healthier, more productive PhD journey. In the following episode, I offer up lots of solutions or rather the dos of supervision. Then there will be an episode on all the cases where it’s not clear what the best solution is, or the solution is rather different depending on context: I am calling them the in-betweens. In a fourth episode I will be talking to a sort of PhD coach, who has lots of experience with supervising and thinking about supervision. In this final short episode I offer a list of 10 key things that supervisors and PhD students need – the 10 commandments of supervision, if you will.

The 10 Commandments of Supervision

1. Use a reference manager
2. Organise notes on reference
3. Establish a healthy work schedule
4. Meet regularly and take meeting notes
5. Set deadlines
6. Listen to each other
7. Ask lots of questions
8. Support and empathy
9. PhD students should present and learn to communicate early on
10. Build a community

The voice at the end is Pedro G. Duarte (Insper), featured in several of the other parts of the series.

Featured music (apart from the usual intro and outro music): Education – upbeat positive (short ver.), Awakening (loop ver.3) and Dreamy Day (loop ver.2) by AudioCoffee: https://freesound.org/s/712212/ License: Attribution NonCommercial 4.0

To check out Mamma Mu, the children’s books I mention at the end, go here.