PhD Journey: Week 9

Building a relationship with my supervisor

I read in the book I’m reading about the PhD process (https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/How_To_Get_A_Phd/k-K8SzpEaRgC?hl=en) that building a relationship with your supervisor is one of the areas that is easiest to get wrong. I’m really enjoying my conversations with my primary supervisor, and we seem to be forming a pretty good working relationship, but the amount of time that I’m spending on campus at the moment is very low and there is a limit to how well you can build a relationship with someone over zoom.

So we went for an approach that I’ve found to be tried and tested in both my business and personal life and headed out for a few beers.

I’ve got to recognise that I’m in a very privileged, white male, middle class position of doing this, and for my supervisor to be of the same mindset might be more structural inequality rather than luck. Knowing that, and knowing how to do something different are very different things, though, particularly given that this one evening and a few drinks had at least as much positive impact on my relationship with my supervisor as two months of supervisions and zoom calls.