I finished my postdoc and joined in a faculty position sometime back. My postdoc supervisor is not responding to my messages and not helping at all now. He is the developer of a program/code that I frequently use and am very interested in. I also have some older code in my postdoc which I want to extend to other problems. But it is hard to use the program without his help. I feel frustrated that after I worked hard and published well in my postdoc, he is not helping now. Perhaps he is very busy or does not take my work or interest seriously. I tried to politely let him know that I need his help but that had no effect. Should I quit the program and all the research work that I could carry out with it and instead focus on something else? How do I deal with the emotions? Need some advice.
-
17What are you offering in return for your former supervisors help? Helping document and maintaining a public repository for the code? Co-authorship on a paper? You are colleagues now.– Terry LoringCommented Aug 22 at 20:24
-
3What was the last thing that was communicated in this regard from the former supervisor?– Daniel R. CollinsCommented Aug 23 at 0:32
-
6Your ex-postdoc supervisor has stopped helping?– A rural readerCommented Aug 23 at 0:43
-
2Are you sure he gets your messages and they don't end up in spam? He may have health or family issues among other things that could explain this.– Christian HennigCommented Aug 23 at 23:42
-
2When it's 'Hard to use the program without his help…' does that mean hard technically, because you need his expertise or hard legally, because you need his permission?– Robbie GoodwinCommented Aug 24 at 0:02
4 Answers
I finished my postdoc and joined in a faculty position
Great! Congratulations!
My postdoc supervisor is not responding to my messages and not helping at all now
I feel frustrated that after I worked hard and published well in my postdoc, he is not helping now.
Your postdoc supervisor's obligation to help you ended when your postdoc ended and you took a new position. There may be some remaining expected obligations like providing a supportive recommendation letter when appropriate, but they are no longer your supervisor.
He is the developer of a program/code that I frequently use and am very interested in. I also have some older code in my postdoc which I want to extend to other problems. But it is hard to use the program without his help.
You're independent now; your previous supervisor is not obligated to provide you technical support. There is potentially a lot of professional credit to gain by creating useful software tools for the scientific community, but it's not always directly rewarded (certainly not financially, but also not necessarily in hiring and promotion). It is common that these tools do not come with much support and the people that use them are expected to bring a lot of their own expertise in programming. I'm sorry if you haven't developed those skills in your career to this point, but the time to get your old advisor's help in developing those skills has probably ended.
Some choices you have going forward would include abandoning this tool for another project, or finding a student that is willing and able to understand its use (though I'd be wary of putting a student on an impossible task that they cannot complete). You might also consider a time-limited, single ask rather than an open-ended request for support. It's possibly you already burnt out any chance for this, but "help me with your tool whenever I have problems" is a very different ask than something like "can I have access to the source code?" if it's not already public.
-
I do work on other projects independently. For this particular code, he is the developer and most developers do respond to queries about the code they have written. I suppose I should not think about our former relation and not expect any special priviledge and look at it from a user-developer perspective now. I think I need to take it professionally and manage my expectations. I do help others who are extending my previous work although I don't have any obligation. He has every right to not help me and in that case, I will move on to alternative codes and problems.– Rob91Commented Aug 23 at 5:25
-
11@Rob91 "most developers do respond to queries about the code they have written" - this is true for (for- or non-profit) companies, where there's at least one guy dedicated to customer support. Volunteer FOSS contributors respond because they're passionate and want the project to succeed. But there's no such obligation from a random academic who developed a code for their research, and were kind enough to share it with you. It's nice if they do, of course, and provides mutual benefit (they'll get citations if your project using the code succeeds) but it should not be expected at all. Commented Aug 23 at 8:54
-
19@Rob91 as a developer of scientific software, this attitude is a bit annoying. Most academics who maintain software do it knowing that its a sacrifice to their academic career, as its a ton of time and effort to maintain, and it brings almost zero academic credit. That time is better spent in writing new papers rather than fixing bugs. I do always go out of my way to help researchers get used to my code, but at some point I have the expectation that they will learn it and help with it, at least help themselves. Commented Aug 23 at 9:56
-
13@Rob91 The people who write this software are not wizards with dark knowledge of forbidden languages, but people who have put the time to learn how to write the code, and then write it. The difference between you and your advisor is that he put time, not some innate ability. At some point the expectation that you also put the time will arise, and it probably feels like its that time now. Commented Aug 23 at 9:56
-
8@Rob91 Are these questions that can only possibly be answered by the writer of the software? Or could they be answered with a bit of effort by someone with access to the source code (like you)? If the latter, this is probably something you should do yourself rather than expecting help from the person who wrote it.– Bryan Krause ♦Commented Aug 23 at 13:22
Just want to add one more point: You have a faculty position now and it means you are independent. Your new research direction may not be your advisor's interest, and he has the right to refuse to work with you.
Only suggestion to you is overcoming the difficulty by yourself, or work on other things. You can consider your previous advisor as some researcher that you are not familiar with, and if some inquires/requests are reasonable to send to them, then you can also send to your previous advisor.
How do I deal with the emotions? Need some advice.
Consider yourself lucky! There are postdocs who work hard on their part of a project without any help from their superiors or peers. Not only your supervisor was generously assisting you with your work, they were most probably equally indispensable in helping you secure a faculty position, which should not be taken for granted. I suggest you focus on the emotion of gratitude and feeling lucky. There are many postdocs who would like to be in your shoes.
TLDR. You sound like you lack belief in your own ability to work without someone else supporting you or cannot differentiate between a professional relationship and a personal one. Maybe try counseling.
I finished my postdoc and joined in a faculty position sometime back.
Great.
My postdoc supervisor is not responding to my messages and not helping at all now.
Your former supervisor has moved on to other tasks. So should you.
Indeed your former supervisor is likely now moving on to supervise new people. Your former professional relationship is over.
He is the developer of a program/code that I frequently use and am very interested in. I also have some older code in my postdoc which I want to extend to other problems. But it is hard to use the program without his help.
You are now noticing a gap in your skill set which you need to address. Learn the required skills. They'll be useful.
It is unrealistic to expect a former supervisor to help you when they doubtless have new tasks to move on to.
I feel frustrated that after I worked hard and published well in my postdoc, he is not helping now.
He was your supervisor, not a personal friend. He did his job (you completed your postdoc successfully). That was all there was to it, unless you both developed a deeper connection, professional or personal, and I emphasize "both".
Perhaps he is very busy
There would be no "perhaps" to it. He is and was. All postdoc supervisors are busy all the time. You will be too in your new role.
or does not take my work or interest seriously. I tried to politely let him know that I need his help but that had no effect.
So move on psychologically. This sort of thing will happen throughout your life and career. Get used to it.
Professional relationships are not the same as friendships. Sometimes you get both, sometimes you don't.
Should I quit the program and all the research work that I could carry out with it and instead focus on something else?
That is a personal decision no one else can make for you. You do, however, seem to seeing this as a black and white issue, and my impression is that you lack the personal self-confidence to work without supervision, that you feel dependent on someone else. Or possibly imposter syndrome, or boundary issues with professional relationships.
How do I deal with the emotions?
Get some professional counseling. And that's a serious recommendation.
-
1You state, "That is a personal..." All of it is personal to him, yet you did some heavy diagnosing here, all of it just conjecture. My DV for the harsh negativity here. The OP may benefit from considering it, but it needn't have been given so harshly. The first post made similar points in a very helpful manner, so it can be done. The person reading this has real, personal concerns, as do we all. "Do unto others" and all that. Commented Aug 25 at 17:11
-
@anongoodnurse I disagree that StephenG is being negative or unhelpful in this paragraph; on the contrary, I regard it as very encouraging (and the phrasing had to be direct for it to be useful). To put this in perspective, if I were to comment on the same matter, I'd say that the free (or heavily subsidised) ride is over and it's time to roll up the sleeves and pull the weight, since there seems to have been a pattern of delegating work (to the ex-supervisor) and decision making (to this community). Perhaps, I'd use "this is a personal decision" as a euphemism. Commented Aug 25 at 20:25