A match made in academia: you and your graduate advisor

Abstract

Joe shivered as he looked out of his window at the falling snow. Even the cockroaches that usually haunted his office had moved on to cozier places. He was working late on his dissertation proposal, as he had been doing for months. He had hoped to defend it in a week's time, but yesterday his advisor had postponed the committee meeting and requested substantial revisions. Joe was furious, and had spent the day searching for ways to prove his advisor wrong. Now he was exhausted and alone in his cold office at 3:00 am on a Saturday, he lacked adequate proof, and he finally had to accept that his advisor was right. Like Joe, we graduate students look to our advisors for guidance, but it can sometimes be hard to accept their criticism. With good communication, you can develop a strong working relationship with your advisor, that will have positive and long-lasting impacts on your career. If you hope to shine brilliantly as a job candidate when you finish your graduate degree, the key person who can help you shine (or dull you completely) is your advisor. Most of us have good relationships with our advisors. We meet regularly, have fun exchanging ideas, collabo rate on research projects, co-author papers, and generally like each other. If a student-advisor relationship does not work out, it is usually for one of two main reasons: