Hi my name is James Arvanitakis and I'm
the Dean of Graduate Studies here at
Western Sydney University. One of the
bits of advice I'm always asked to give
is how do I manage my supervisor or how
do I get the best out of my supervisor.
So in this video, I want to give you
seven tips and how to establish a really
positive relationship with your
supervisor. So tip one, the first thing to
do is set expectations early on. It's
really important that you understand
that the chances are that your
supervisor has a number of students, has
their own teaching and also their own
research, so you're part of a big range
of things that they're doing, so it's
important that you set expectations
early on. How often you'd like to meet,
best way to communicate, how often you
will get together and certain timelines
that you'll set. You should do this in
the first meeting that you have. It's
really important that you set
expectations early. The second thing you
should do and this links with setting
expectations, is to set regular meetings
and set them going forward. Now how
regularly you meet with your supervisor
will change depending on what point you
are during your PhD, but it's important
that at the first meeting you set the
next three or four, five, maybe even
six meetings going forward. It gives you
really good structure and it helps you
plan ahead. The third tip and what I get
my students to do is about two days
before we meet is to actually send the
agenda, some writing, some thoughts and a
bit of a progress report to your
supervisor. So that way when you meet you
have something to talk about. You answer,
you answer the questions that you need
answered, you discuss the issues that are
concerning you. It's really important
that before you meet with your
supervisor they're aware of what you
want to talk about. The fourth tip in
managing your supervisor relationship is
to never cancel a meeting unless it's
really urgent. As a supervisor, if a
student starts cancelling meetings it's a real
warning sign. If you haven't prepared as
much as what you should
have prepared, or you wanted to
prepare, it doesn't matter. You're better
off meeting with your supervisor, having
those regular contacts and actually looking
at timelines and seeing if you need to
readjust them. The fifth tip about
dealing with your supervisor
is to never take feedback personally.
Whenever we draft something, whenever we write
something, whenever we research something,
we make mistakes and we make errors,
we don't quite always get it right.
If your supervisor picks something up and
they tell you to fix it, give you some
negative feedback, don't take it
personally. It's about making the project
better, it's about getting you to finish.
The sixth tip about dealing with your supervisor
is to always send a summary of the
meeting after you meet. That is an email
that basically summarises the key points
and the action items going forward. It's
a really important record and actually
helps set the agenda for your next
meeting. The seventh tip about dealing
with your supervisor and getting the most out
of that relationship is to actually not
be scared to raise any concerns or ask
questions if there are things you're not sure
about. Your supervisor's there to help
guide you through the journey and
they're generally really good at helping
you out. If you don't get the answer that
you need or you don't actually get the
guidance that you desire, don't be scared
to speak to the Higher Degree Research
Director within your School or in the
case of Western Sydney University, come
to the Graduate Research School.
So that's it from me. Seven tips about getting the most out of the supervisor
relationship. Good luck and I'll speak to
you soon. Bye now.
