Advisor asked for my entire slide presentation so she could give the presentation at an international conference

Question

First, she never helped me on either my thesis or my slide presentation. After my presentation (which she did not attend), she asked me "how to present" it to her so she could use it in the international conference. (I don't want to do that, but I have no choice.)

Then, she asked me to send the whole presentation. I sent it to her as a PDF file.

Later, she asked me for the "power point presentation" with the script.

I really don't want to give it to her.

What should I do?

P.S. She never gives anybody credit. (She did this before with my senior.)

Update: After reading many comments, I realize that I might be over-reacting. In academic area, it is normal that advisor could use the entire presentation of their student in the conference. (If I am lucky, she will acknowledge me)

I feel so bad about it but I need to accept the reality....

Thank you for all comments.

Answer 1

From your comments, you seem to be worried not only about not getting credit, which others have already addressed, but also about the originality of the presentation itself. Here you write:

To be honest, I will feel much better If she create the presentation by herself.... What I feel uncomfortable is "she will present my entire presentation with my own script."

Here's something important to keep in mind: this being academia, the value is in the research itself, not the presentation. That's not to say that the presentation isn't important; quite the opposite: you need a good presentation is to present the research in its best light, ensure that both the it and its relevance are properly understood, and so forth. But remember, you do not get academic credit for the good presentation, you get it for the research that was presented.

In other words, a good presentation adds no extra academic value to the research: poor research with a good presentation remains poor research. However, a bad presentation detracts from the value of good research and may delay or prevent its worth from being fully recognised.

Thus, if you have a good presentation that's a good thing, but its only real value to you as an academic is to help keep your research from being misunderstood or going unrecognised. Therefore you should greatly prefer that your adviser (or anybody else), when they present your research, uses your presentation if that's the best one available so that your research is seen in the best possible light. Further, you should give them any help necessary to improve the presentation further or focus it for their particular audience and situation, including giving it to them in the best format for modification and helping them make changes.

(In case it's not clear; this is all completely separate from the credit issue; if your advisor isn't giving your credit you should deal with that as suggested in the other answers.)

Answer 2

As an advisor, I regularly use my students’ slides when I present my current projects. This is usually done within the context of high level presentations: I’m working on important project X; Alice and I worked on X.a which resulted in such and such, and with Bob on X.b which resulted in so and so. Claire and I are working with Alice to extend to X.c. If your advisor is supportive and showcases your work, she’s increasing its visibility and helping your career.

To conclude, presenting students’ work is not necessarily a bad thing and can help them a lot.

What is more concerning is that you seem to have serious trust issues with your advisor. She may be passing off her students’ work as her own but I honestly think that this is either a misunderstanding or something else. Advisors normally want to show that their students are doing well, not that they’re being totally shepherded by the advisor. This reflects badly on the advisor which is why I think it’s unusual.

If things have gotten to the point where you’re not harboring any goodwill to her, I suggest you rethink your options. If there’s a chance of a conversation to rebuild trust, try and have one.

Answer 3

It's pretty common in my experience for advisors to present their students' work, with acknowledgement of the students' contributions. They'll often combine slides from several students' presentations into one talk for a conference, but they can also present just one student's work. In that case they usually say something like "The work I am going to talk about today was all/mostly done by my student, Whoever McLearny", at the start of the presentation.

Prepare a version of the slides specifically for your advisor to present, with her as the presenter, and with whatever acknowledgement of your authorship you feel is appropriate. This could be as simple as the first slide having you as the first author and your advisor as the last author, with your advisor's name somehow highlighted to indicate that she is the speaker. Or it could be having your name and picture featured prominently on an acknowledgements slide at the end of the presentation, along with any other group members who contributed. Or it could be your name in the corner of all the important figure slides, to show you did that work in particular, if the slides are going into a longer presentation.

Then you can send your advisor a nice pre-made presentation, and she won't have to do any extra work to cite you, because it will have already been done. It also communicates what form of acknowledgement you feel is appropriate.

On the other hand, if you think you and your advisor have very different ideas about how much or what form of credit is appropriate in the presentation for your contribution to the work, you need to have a talk with your advisor about it.

Answer 4

One benefit of her giving your presentation is that she will be actively promoting your work. For example, my adviser presented my theoretical work 3 times at 3 different conferences, and found an experimental collaborator to show that my theories were correct.

The more exposure your research gets, the higher the possibility for citations, which then leads to better career opportunities.

Answer 5

Look, if she had done the same to the senior, there's something afoot.

Personally, I am uncomfortable with the length she is forcing you to go for her - like you've said, she wasn't present when you defended your thesis, and now, when there's an international acclaim in the game, she wants to have your work to present.

She is your advisor, which means she is not your mentor. There's an important difference between the two. Mentor is usually accredited professor. Advisor is usually a senior student, usually in a capacity of helping professor manage his workload, but rarely they are professor themselves.

You haven't cleared out if she is professor or not. If she is professor, then no, you got no recourse available for you, at least not at this point. But if she is a fellow student or just a person who specifically holds the title of 'advisor', and if there's a precedent - a bad one - then you can complain to the board of professors, but be aware you will have to have really good reasons and proofs at hand if things go south. In academic sphere that kind of thing can quickly go kaboom and influence your career later on in your life, never mind if you were right and she wrong.

So if you want to go that route, then save the emails, all the conversations, if you were talking over phone, write the dates down, etcetera. If it's an advanced level of research, what she is doing without asking for your input, it's an academic suicide at its finest - for her.

I find it strange she wants to present a topic she is (presumably) not well-versed in and you had to additionally practically dumb it down for her because she cannot be bothered to take some of her precious time and do her own note taking and research. Well, fine, she can present your thesis, but what about the questions that come after the presentation? If she doesn't understand the material and its nuances, she will trip all over herself because she won't know the particulars well enough to explain this or that facet of the experiments of wording or something else.

It would've been better if you were the one to go and present the entire thing, because you know it inside and out.