Commentary: Advise with heart!

Graduate school is a formative time for young researchers, and advisers play a key role in shaping that professional and personal growth. Advisers have two primary roles: They work with students to produce the research results required by the grants that also cover the tuition and stipends of the students, and they help students learn technical, professional, and interpersonal skills. Those dual priorities can clash with each other, in some cases leading to the relentless driving of students to sacrifice everything for the pursuit of research progress.

About a third of graduate students suffer from depression or anxiety,¹ and the adviser–advisee relationship can be an important factor in determining students’ well-being.² Advisers can also have longer-term impacts: The experiences of graduate students may set the tone for their future work habits and research approaches and the advising styles they adopt for training the next generation of scientists.

Below, we offer 12 recommendations for bringing care and empathy into the advising of graduate students. The recommendations are inspired in part by our Teaching with Heart project, which aims to infuse those values into the higher-education STEM classroom (see our commentary in Physics Today, March 2023, page 10). We hope that by following these practices, advisers can increase the well-being and motivation of students, assist students in their growth, and help grow a next generation of researchers who bring empathy and compassion into the science community.

1. Learn from your graduate school experience. Reflect on your time as a graduate student—and on what has changed in the years since. What was hard for you? What were the “wins” that you enjoyed? What did your adviser say or do to empower you or lift you up? And what did they say or do that discouraged or disappointed you? The goal is to use your experiences to lay the foundation for creating an inclusive and supportive environment while also adapting to the reality that today’s students face different challenges than you did.
2. Consider the personal situation of students. It is natural to focus conversations with graduate students on research. But do you know what else goes on in the lives of your students? They may have health concerns, a spouse for whom they cannot afford health insurance, or financial stress. Do your students have passions, such as sports or social engagements? Taking time for conversations about topics beyond research can be revealing. It is essential, however, to ensure that such conversations respect personal boundaries.
3. Prioritize students’ growth over their productivity. In many cases, advisers cannot ignore the reality that they need students to produce research results. On the other hand, students go to school to learn. That learning process takes time because it involves participating in classes and workshops. Also, the skills for doing research are often best learned by trial and error, which can be time-consuming. Harmonizing the need to produce research results with valuing students’ growth can be a challenge. Yet the growth of students in the long term often benefits their research skills and ability to communicate their research, which benefits the adviser too. Therefore, advisers can support students, and their own long-term goals, by making the growth of students a priority.
4. Empower students to overcome hurdles. Factors such as poor communication skills, procrastination, and self-isolation can hold graduate students back in their research. Those hurdles often are more restrictive for students’ research than is a lack of intellectual skills. Advisers can assist advisees by identifying the hurdles and working with students to overcome them.
5. Build students’ self-confidence. Advisers can help students grow more confident, but they can also undermine that growth. Be aware that every interaction with advisees can either empower them or make them feel less secure.³ Words, body language, encouragement, and enthusiasm (or lack thereof) contribute.
6. Guide students to interdependence. Although it is important that graduate students learn to not be dependent on others, they also need to learn how to be part of a network of give-and-take. This is the mindset of interdependence, a combination of self-reliance and a sense of being part of a community.⁴ Assisting students to grow into interdependent researchers is one of the greatest gifts advisers can give.
7. Connect students with other mentors. Someone who is a wonderful adviser still may not be the best person to guide students in certain aspects of their development. For example, an adviser may not be able to teach students a technical skill from which they would benefit. Advisers can encourage students to work with mentors and assist them in connecting with other professors, colleagues outside academia, postdocs, or even other graduate students.
8. Educate yourself about cross-cultural issues. Work expectations and hierarchical relations can vary among cultures. It is important for advisers to be aware of such differences when working with students with different backgrounds than their own. Having conversations and doing your homework about the adviser–advisee role in the context of cultural backgrounds can be essential for developing a productive and harmonious collaboration for research and learning.
9. You are not almighty. Advisers likely know much more about research than their advisees do. They also hold power over advisees. One can easily be seduced by a sense of superiority and power. But maintaining a healthy dose of humility can prevent advisers from taking on an air of superiority that can be intimidating to students. And humility also allows them to learn from students and to admit when they are wrong.
10. Discuss two-way expectations. Much is often left unsaid in the collaboration of students with their advisers. How often will they meet? How does the adviser want students to prepare for meetings? How much time does the adviser expect the student to spend on research? Having an open conversation about mutual expectations can help avoid confusion and frustration. Templates for agreements between students and advisers can be useful to guide that conversation.
11. Promote students’ well-being. Eager to succeed and to please their advisers, graduate students often work extremely hard. Taking care of themselves while dealing with the demands of work is an important skill for students to learn. Help them acquire this skill. In the long run, good self-care not only promotes mental and physical well-being; it also helps students to be creative and productive.
12. Take good care of yourself. Advisers’ patience and understanding likely diminishes when they are tired, overworked, and stressed. To be caring, they need to have the energy and patience to be supportive.⁵ And by taking care of themselves, they also set an important example for their advisees.

References

1. Council of Graduate Schools, The Jed Foundation, Supporting graduate student mental health and well-being: Evidence-informed recommendations for the graduate community (2021).
2. M. Becerra et al., Int. J. Community Well-Being 4, 505 (2021).
3. D. Mummery, Br. J. Gen. Pract. 71, 512 (2021).
4. S. R. Covey, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People: Restoring the Character Ethic, Fireside (1990).
5. S. R. Cavanagh, “ ‘They need us to be well,’ ” The Chronicle of Higher Education, 2 May 2023.

Roel Snieder is a professor of geophysics and of professional development education at the Colorado School of Mines. Cortney Holles is a teaching professor in humanities, arts, and social sciences at the Colorado School of Mines. Cynthia James is a speaker, transformational coach, singer, and multiple award-winning author at Cynthia James Enterprises. Qin Zhu is an associate professor in engineering education at Virginia Tech.