Establishing good mentor-mentee relationships
Our second book winner is Charles Izuchukwu Ezekiel, a first-year PhD student! Be sure to enter the book giveaway for your chance to win a copy of A Field Guide to Grad School! More details below (at the end of the post). Now, onto the good stuff!
It’s not always obvious how to develop productive (and healthy) mentor-mentee relationships. If I’m being honest, I wasn’t very intentional about my approach with my PhD mentors. That is, I waited to learn their preferences and benchmarks and, fortunately, everything worked out. In general, though, I would advise against this strategy and encourage PhD students (especially first-year PhD students) to be more proactive. So, this week, I’m sharing a few ways you can work with your mentor(s) to develop a productive and healthy relationship with them. More specifically, I’m focusing on mentor-mentee relationships between primary advisors and early-career PhD students (however, the recommendations may be useful to everyone!).
Be explicit. It’s hard to know what others are thinking without directly asking them to share their thoughts. For this reason, I encourage you to explicitly ask your advisor to share more about their mentorship style and goals for you. I’m sure many of you did this at the interview stage; however, now that you’re starting your program (or well into your program), it’s good to make sure everyone is on the same page. To do this, you can ask your advisor questions like:
What is your mentorship style?
What does student success in this program look like for you?
How do you (and the department) measure student progress toward degree (program) milestones?
How (and when) do you prefer to communicate with your students?
How can I best prepare for (and follow up on) our meetings together?
What recommendations do you have for developing new projects in your lab (or under your advisement)?
There are many more questions you could ask and may need to ask depending on your situation, so these are just a few to get you started. And I should acknowledge that it’s not always easy to ask these questions (nor get the answers once you’ve asked). Keep in mind, though, that as a mentee, you get to have a say in what your relationship looks like with your mentor. The extent to which you have a say (or at least feel you have a say) will vary depending on your advisor and their mentorship style. So, go on this fact-finding mission to determine how you can set yourself up for success not only in your program but in this important mentor-mentee relationship.
Check in with other mentees. While on your fact-finding mission, be sure to check in with your advisor’s other mentees, especially other PhD students and postdocs. There’s a lot you can learn from them, including how to communicate and work with your advisor. To them, I would ask questions like:
How often do you meet with [your advisor] and what do your meetings look like?
When you have questions, how do you communicate them to [your advisor]?
What has your experience been like disagreeing with [your advisor]?
What do you see as [your advisor]’s “glows and grows” (where “glows” are strengths and “grows” are opportunities for improvement)?1
Again, there are many more questions you could ask (and should ask). Here, I share just a few to get you started on your quest to learn more about your advisor and how you can develop a good relationship with them. At the same time, keep in mind that experiences across mentees may vary. It is possible for you to develop a solid mentor-mentee relationship with your advisor even if another student hasn’t. We can talk more about how to handle a situation where mentee experiences differ greatly in a future post if you’d like. For now, be curious and open to learning from others about how to connect with your advisor.
Create contracts. At some point (usually the earlier the better), I recommend creating a mentorship contract with your advisor. This contract should include information like: 1) your joint plan for what your relationship should look like, 2) how you, as a mentee, can expect to be supported, and 3) your advisor’s expectations for you. Importantly, aim to be as specific as possible. For example, your contract can include expectations for work hours (e.g., how many hours you will work on each project), course load, response times for emails, and how to handle vacations, among many other things. And be sure to include when your contract will be revisited. It’s likely that the nature of your mentor-mentee relationship will change over the course of your doctoral studies and you don’t want to wonder when you’ll next need to discuss your mentorship plan.
Check out this graduate student mentorship guide from the University of California, Santa Cruz. Page 2 even includes links to other agreement forms from other institutions.
Final thoughts. This week, I’ve shared just a few ways you can begin to form a productive and healthy relationship with your primary advisor. Keep in mind that you will have many mentors (and already likely have had several) throughout your PhD experience (and beyond). For this reason, consider mapping out your mentorship network using a handout like this one created by the National Center for Faculty Development & Diversity (NCFDD).
Some homework. This week’s homework is simple—make a plan to connect with your primary advisor and go on your own fact-finding mission. Regardless of where you are in your program, aim to generate your own mentor-mentee contract for the upcoming term or year. Then, tell this plan to someone, especially someone who can help hold you accountable (like a trusted friend in your program). If you don’t have someone to hold you accountable, email me at letstalkgradschool@gmail.com with your plan and I will follow up with you.
SCHOLAR PROFILE #8: JANE LEER
The purpose of these profiles is to highlight and connect you to scholars at different career stages doing interesting and important research and service work.
This week, we get to learn about Jane Leer, who is a PhD candidate in the Joint Program in Public Policy and Psychology at Duke University.
Now, let’s learn about Jane’s academic journey.
What are your research interests?
I’m interested in the intersection between social inequality, child and adolescent development, and policy, in the U.S. and internationally (mostly Latin America).
With whom are you working for your PhD?
As a joint Public Policy and Psychology PhD candidate, I have two advisors: Dr. Anna Gassman-Pines (Sanford School of Public Policy) and Dr. Sarah Gaither (Department of Psychology & Neuroscience).
Why did you choose your PhD institution and advisor(s)?
I chose my PhD institution and advisors for three main reasons: (1) advisor fit – in terms of research approach, theories, and methods, more so than topic per se, (2) advisor quality (heard nothing but love and appreciation for my advisors from former advisees), and (3) location (cost of living, general vibes). I narrowed down my list of potential places quite a bit by only applying to universities in cities where I knew my husband and I could afford to live (he didn’t have a work visa, so we had to be able to make it work with just my PhD stipend and savings for the first 1 year+).
Please share more about your academic journey.
My undergraduate degree is in development studies, which is an interdisciplinary mix of political science, economics, and sociology. I discovered my love for conducting research while working on my senior honors thesis on Chilean youths’ perceptions of social class and social mobility (up until then I thought research = sitting in the library with a bunch of books).
After undergrad, I worked for 3 years as a research consultant at the Inter-American Development Bank in Managua, Nicaragua, where I contributed to the design and evaluation of large-scale social protection and early childhood development policies. Then, I completed a one-year master’s program in International Education Policy. After my Masters, I worked for 3 years with an international NGO to evaluate the impact of education interventions globally. My favorite project focused on promoting egalitarian gender norms among early adolescents, and through this project I became increasingly interested in social and developmental psychology. So, I sought a PhD in order to get more training in psych theory and methods, to move back towards a systems-level, policy-oriented research perspective, and to start working domestically.
How did you navigate the PhD application process?
I got a LOT of feedback on my statement of purpose from friends, family, and mentors. I also only applied to three schools so that I could spend time tailoring each application.
What is one bit of advice you'd like to give new (first-year) PhD students?
Don’t compare yourself to anyone else! Everyone’s path is different. For those interested in policy-relevant or applied work, I would suggest getting involved with local organizations and policy initiatives in your city—it’s a good way to get research ideas and network.
Many thanks to Jane for sharing more about her academic journey!
RESOURCE SPOTLIGHT
In this section, I highlight resources you may find helpful as you navigate the PhD application process as well as the PhD itself. This week, I’m sharing some helpful Twitter threads that popped up recently.
If you’d like to see a specific resource appear here, please share the relevant information via this survey. And remember, I maintain a running list of resources here.
Twitter Threads: Twitter can be a great place to connect with other folks folks in academia via #AcademicTwitter. I’ve had wonderful experiences meeting up with Twitter connections at conferences and have even formed some new friendships! It can also be a difficult place (think back to my post about social comparison). So, jump in when you’re ready, but never hesitate to take a break or even mute certain words and phrases!
10 practical tips for graduate students from @lucindaedoyle
Advice for when starting a PhD program from @skmcmena
A reflection on starting a PhD program from @jayvanbavel
Tips for applying to the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program from @jessicaegriffin
How to reach me: You are always welcome to email me (letstalkgradschool@gmail.com) or find me on Twitter @tweetsbymidge.
Let’s give away some books: Readers located in the United States and Canada are eligible to enter the book giveaway to receive a copy of A Field Guide to Grad School by Dr. Jessica Calarco. To do so, complete this survey and note that you only have to complete it once to be entered in all subsequent giveaways! I do hope to expand the reach of the giveaway; however, at the moment, the shipping costs are too great to scale. If you’d like to talk about ways your institution could secure an electronic (or hard) copy, please let me know (sign up for a 1-on-1 meeting below!).
1-on-1 sessions: Interested in some additional mentorship? Sign up for 1-on-1 sessions to discuss your questions regarding the social science PhD application process and/or completing a social science PhD more generally! Sign-ups will happen via Calendly and you can check periodically for updated openings. Sign up here!
Until next time!
Margaret
Thank you to Bryant Gomez for brining the “glows and grows” framing to my attention!
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