228
votes
Accepted
I grade exams together with a colleague but disagree with their grading. What should I do?
Have each person grade different questions, not different students.
Consistency in grading is important, and it is unfair to the students if their grades depend substantially on the allocation of ...
- 71.4k
147
votes
Will declining a research award be problematic for me, or other people?
Don't give in to Imposter Syndrome!
Both your reasons are fundamentally not sound. Somebody nominated you for an award. The awards committee thinks you are deserving. You should not refuse the award ...
- 137k
141
votes
Accepted
How to deal with a colleague who won't accept they're wrong
Use impersonal language
Hopefully this is obvious, but make sure that your language focuses on the ideas rather than the people. Rather than
I don't think you're grasping the subtleties of the ...
- 12.6k
133
votes
Accepted
Colleague blames me for not spotting typos when I only reviewed the structure and content
"The only real critique I had on my thesis was that the chapter I sent you had typos. I went through this chapter again and found quite a few. In the future when someone asks you to review a ...
- 10.8k
122
votes
Two researchers want to work on the same extension to my paper. Who to help?
Work with both John and Sam on the same paper. You all have something to offer, so pool your efforts and work together.
- 40.9k
115
votes
How to deal as a PhD student with a working colleague who is doing private business during working hours
since it is none of my business
It's none of your business. Leave it alone.
I would expect him to explain to me the state of his research and how the methods work
Are you asking questions? If not, ...
- 127k
90
votes
Is it okay to work on colleagues' ideas after they leave academia?
Is it okay to work on colleagues' ideas after they leave academia?
I'm going to be blunt: yes, absolutely yes. What is the other option? That the progress of humanity should be stifled because you ...
- 701
71
votes
Accepted
Promised authorship was not given; am I supposed to get an automatic acknowledgement?
While we cannot conclusively determine whether or not you would have deserved co-authorship, for the reasons others mentioned (number of authors on the paper, the time you invested into this project, ...
- 12.4k
66
votes
Accepted
Will declining a research award be problematic for me, or other people?
Will declining a research award be problematic for myself or other people?
It's problematic in the sense that it would very likely be a mistake, and undermine the goal that the award is trying to ...
- 197k
66
votes
Colleague blames me for not spotting typos when I only reviewed the structure and content
You don't owe this person anything, were under no obligation to help them, and everything you do for them is done in a spirit of generosity and kindness. If they don't think you did a good enough job, ...
- 42.2k
65
votes
How to deal as a PhD student with a working colleague who is doing private business during working hours
It is absolutely not your business how other people use their time. The other PhD student owes you absolutely nothing. They're not your advisor, nor are you entitled to their time, or entitled to get ...
- 720
58
votes
Colleagues don't congratulate me or cheer me on when I do good work
You're right that many academics (and I suppose not only academics) somehow systematically fail to encourage their colleagues, and do not congratulate their successes.
Ideally, yes, at least "...
- 90.5k
57
votes
Accepted
A colleague who ignored my request for a favor is now asking me for a favor. How should I respond?
I strongly suggest that you happily agree to the favor. Happily. It is "in your lane". Every one will benefit.
And, you can also say that you are still interested in visiting their lab when ...
- 385k
51
votes
Is it ok to go on a swim with your colleagues while on a conference?
It happens all the time, and I see no problem whatsoever. I can understand that you might feel uneasy with your supervisor joining, but nevertheless, I do not think it is inappropriate in any way (we ...
- 5,032
50
votes
The IT department bottlenecks progress. How should I handle this?
This is a partial solution I've used myself, and it assumes a few things:
You access your clusters remotely through a connection (like other answers pointed, cloud servers or remote), so where you ...
- 665
47
votes
Will declining a research award be problematic for me, or other people?
In a comment, you say
The problem is I worry that accepting might shine a light on my research not being quite there just yet and people would look at my bibliometrics and think poorly of me, if I ...
- 9,912
42
votes
How to deal as a PhD student with a working colleague who is doing private business during working hours
"I want a working atmosphere" - Covid has done a lot of damage to the tradition of sitting together and sweating together. Some people are more productive at home, others less so. And this ...
- 50.5k
41
votes
Accepted
Should I remind someone of a previous invitation to give a talk?
It's certainly reasonable to send another email just saying that you would really like to visit, and that you would like to take up the old invitation. By far the most likely thing is that the ...
- 22k
41
votes
Accepted
How to reject a postdoc offer from ex-co-author?
It's your life and your decision, and it also seems that you already made your choice with the title asking how to reject the offer, not if you should accept the offer or not. There's no subtle way to ...
- 14.1k
40
votes
How do I professionally communicate to a colleague that I am not interested in helping with his project anymore?
Your project is nice, but I now decided for myself that I can't invest more time in it. I'm too busy with other projects which have priority for my current research interests (so, talking to my ...
40
votes
How do I professionally communicate to a colleague that I am not interested in helping with his project anymore?
I think the issue you are facing is an important life lesson I had to learn (just an opinion). I think the real root of this issue is you feel bad. You don't like the idea of letting the other person ...
- 501
36
votes
Colleagues don't congratulate me or cheer me on when I do good work
I think this is just the way academics normally behave. We tend to work in silos. Those in different silos don't understand our work. Those in the same silo just take success for granted.
Win the ...
- 385k
36
votes
How to deal as a PhD student with a working colleague who is doing private business during working hours
I understand and agree all the other answers, but I want to add the following: it sounds as if your expectations of the lab/working environment do not match with reality. And, going by what you write, ...
- 4,805
35
votes
Who should be first author? Theory person or Experiment person?
Shared first authors are listed alphabethically, at least that's what makes sense, otherwise they are not shared first authors!! I'd go with that no doubt.
From your comments I would say that your ...
- 4,082
35
votes
Sending a math paper to a journal and to experts
Pick the most appropriate of your mentors, write to ask if they are willing to look it over for you. Don't send it to "experts" you don't know, and don't send it to lots of people at once.
...
- 37.9k
33
votes
PhD: When to quit and move on?
This can really only be answered by you. But here are some thoughts.
There are two doors. One leads to a doctorate and the other does not. If there is no path to the first door, then the decision ...
- 385k
31
votes
Accepted
My colleague took my teaching materials to use as their own. What should I do?
Everyone's got a different take on politics, including office politics, so for what it's worth:
It's extremely common for members of the same department to share materials for a particular course. It ...
- 3,734
29
votes
Accepted
Can I offer to help a collaborator to finish a calculation which he's not having time to finish right now?
Yes, you can help in any way you can. It would seem very odd to me if there were a field or situation in which this would not be proper.
Of course, if you are taking a course and have been assigned ...
- 385k
28
votes
Colleague blames me for not spotting typos when I only reviewed the structure and content
That student's response is obviously unnaceptable and quite rude. You should gently remind the student that ultimately they are responsible for their own work when they submit a document and if ...
- 456
28
votes
Accepted
How can I have productive meeting with a very prominent researcher?
Rather than put forward your own ideas, which might still be a bit naive (as you suggest), ask for advice. Let the superstar take the lead. If you've read any of their papers, you can mention that.
...
- 385k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible