I've read at least one career advice essay that calls out asking your PhD students to call you by your first name as unprofessional.
My coworkers and I always called our PhD advisor by his first name, and a graduate student calling any professor by their last name, much less their own advisor, strikes my sensibilities as quaint and old-fashioned (undergraduates are a different story, of course).
What is the standard practice for this?
Yes, a PhD is essentially an apprenticeship in academic research, so they should be treated as a colleague in potential (it seems normal practice for an RA to refer to their supervisor by their first name). Also I think it is a bad idea for researchers to be overly formal and deferential towards their supervisors; if you ware working at the cutting edge of your subject, not all of your ideas will be good ones, and the PhD student should feel comfortable pointing out where they feel this is the case. This sort of self-skepticism (being comfortable with the idea of being wrong occasionally) is a key component of being a good scientist, and it seems to me to be difficult to communicate this by example if the student is constantly reminded of their place in the hierarchy by making them call me "Dr Marsupial".
This is definitely a local practice. Here in Germany, it is not standard that colleagues call each other by their first names without specific invitation to do so. However, in other institutes, it is now standard policy that everybody refers to each other by their first name. So what is considered acceptable varies very much from location to location and group to group.
Within my own group, my undergraduate students tend to call me "Professor," while the graduate students and postdocs call me by my first name. This seems to me to be a reasonable balance—but I wouldn't really have a problem if an undergraduate who's worked for me for a while calls me by my first name.
A graduate student who isn't in my group, however, should not automatically expect to call me by my first name in an initial email. That would be rather presumptuous.
I recall a teacher of mine saying : "Dealing with different cultures is dealing with different expectations", and calling someone by his title or his first name is definitely related to customs.
Being a French (from Chinese parents) student myself, I have never called my teachers/professors by their first names, but things tend to change just as customs evolve. Maybe it is because of my chinese backgrounds, which implies a strong use of titles (even for family members) that is explained by the importance of respect for the elders in the society.
Then I got to study in Oslo for a few months, and people explicitly asked me to call them by their first names, which I did later. However, it still feels akward for me to call someone by his first name when he is "much" more older than me.
Now what I do is that I say "Monsieur" or "Madame", and use the first name if I am invited to do so.
I always have my students call me by my first (given) name. Currently, I'm teaching in Asia and the students have the local custom of calling everyone as Mr. Givenname or Miss Givenname (yes, even if she is married - strange, I know). This is completely different from my native culture but I bring my culture with me...for a reason.
I have no desire to introduce the formality of calling me in any sort of official way. I feel it distracts from the importance of focusing on the matter of education. As long as my students do not refer to me in a rude way, I'm quite flexible. I do, however, encourage (without insisting) them to use simply my first name, without any title, rank, or any other identifier. This is true not only for my graduate students but for my undergraduate students as well.
Others in my departments, most notably Asian teachers, do prefer to have the greater level of formality. To each their own. It really does come back to culture. For me, I allow my students to follow which ever culture they prefer, but I do let them I know I don't want formalities to interfere with the educational process in any way.
In Japan, graduate students generally address their professors as Lastname-sensei or just sensei. Using the first-name would be unheard of. Even faculty do not address each other with their given names (unless they are foreigners).
Faculty generally address students by lastname-kun or lastname-san.
Use of given names in Japan is generally restricted to genuinely close friends and family in private situations.
This question is to me about: "how to behave professionally". As a teacher and a supervisor, I chose an intermediate way. I play with three items: first or last name, Mrs./Ms./Mr. or casual, and you and thou (a distinction that still exists in several languages; in French tu and vous). My aim is to show both respect and equality of treatment. I dislike professional situations where someone calls a colleague by the first name without reciprocity. So (as an advisor):
And honestly, sometimes, I use "vous" and the last name when I meet students I have not met for a long time. Parental education.
