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How to respond to senior academics after a public 'punching down' session
I commenced a Postdoc 1-2 months ago and recently presented my proposed experiments at a group meeting that was broader than my immediate team. After the short presentation I was met with a barrage of criticism from senior people in the group in front of my new team along the lines of whether the experiments would be relevant and that they were too experimentally risky.
However, I was never the architect of the research question, which ultimately came with the job. Sure I have scope to tweak the experiment design (and I presented a range of options during the talk), but ultimately the criticism they gave were for factors out of my control. What surprised me though was that I thought the academics attacking the project already knew about these sets of experiments, as they were proposed in a general sense as part of the broader project even before I commenced.
I did my best to defend the project during the question time without being defensive, but had a few junior academic approach me afterwards indicating the criticism was as severe as I had interpreted on stage. I felt quite humiliated, to be honest, in front of my new group.
So my question is now how do I approach this matter? Should I approach these academics individually asking them if they were aware of this research question in the planning documents that pre-dated my position? Should I tell them I was a bit upset and felt punched down-on? Should I remain collegial and let my science do the talking instead? I should note that I was the only one of the 15 or so people presenting that was met with this level of criticism.
I’m open to a range of feedback in your responses. I’ve also contemplated whether it was my communication style/persona on stage that attracted criticism, rather than the content.

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Don't take it personally, because the criticisms were "along the lines of whether the experiments would be relevant and that they were too experimentally risky" - i.e. they were criticizing the experiment design, not you. If they were criticizing you, they might have said something like "you should have done X instead of Y, why didn't you think of it?" or "an experiment as difficult as this one should have been assigned to [more experienced researcher] and not Tom".
Another thing is, if they don't think the experiment is well-designed, do you think they should tell you? They could keep silent, let you go ahead and possibly fail, but that would be a waste of resources and time.
Given that, the thing to do is sit down with the person(s) who developed the experiment design and discuss the criticisms. Are they valid? If not, why not? If yes, should anything in the design be changed? Is it still worth going ahead?
Again, don't take it personally. You are not being criticized, and the senior academics are not saying you are incompetent.

Thanks for your reply. I'll try not to take it personally. Hopefully they were not aware of these experiments, or not at a sufficient level, and so their response was more of immediate concern rather than finding an easier target to unleach at. I guess personally I would have prefered they came up to me after the talk to express their concerns.

I agree with everything in this answer, except for the last line: there comes a point where this kind of thing is personal, or at the very least not productive. It is hard to gauge from the description of the discussion, but if you feel like the senior staff were being unfair, it is worth talking to your supervisor about this. You are still a human being with feelings, and no "group culture" should be an excuse for mindless attacks.

Don't take it personally, but do take it seriously. Ever heard someone say 5 years after starting research that they failed because the task was set up for failure from the beginning? Well, here we are, possibly at that beginning. And a bunch of experienced people is telling you that they think you accepted a task that's set up for failure. (Might not be true, but you should investigate!)

Yes, the key question is: do they have a point? I always recommend to prepare a talk with the view that, if you, who knows the work best, wanted to shoot the talk down, what would you ask? What would your most devastating criticism be? It's rare for someone to find a more potent line of attack than yourself, but if they did - check whether it's real.

very easy to launch personal attacks while toeing the line of what is being attacked. OP said they were the only person out of many subjected to this treatment. I wonder if that will be a pattern, this one person's work will never be good enough. I wonder if OP has any protected characteristics, or if her PI / lab has a history of ostracisation by the rest. This minimisation and apologising for unprofessionally harsh treatment the likes of which would not be tolerated in other work environments in these answers troubles me. It is possible to give criticism constructively

Let us start with the meat of it: do you think these senior academics are correct that the experiments are irrelevant and risky?

If so, then you need to take ownership of this. Do not make the excuse that "I was never the architect of the research question." If your advisor is truly forcing you to run irrelevant and risky experiments, then you should not have accepted this position. Otherwise, you are in a position where you can and must make improvements.

If not, then it is irrelevant that you were not the original architect of the research questions; you agree with them and should be able to defend them publicly.

Now I have been in groups with this sort of brutal culture, and I know that defending ideas publicly can be very difficult. A few notes:

As you learned the hard way, it is not safe to assume that everyone in the group is on the same page. It is easy for people to "agree" on something vague that everyone interprets differently. Then when we dive into the details, the different views become apparent.
The sort of hard-hitting style you describe can take some getting used to. Some people become very good at parrying these blows; it is a wonderful skill to have. Others find that they never become very good at it, and they learn to seek out groups with a more diplomatic culture.
It is a good idea to get in the habit of meeting with all the different stakeholders regularly to discuss your projects. Showing them a completed proposal for the first time in public will naturally attract questions and concerns that, in some groups, will be expressed as criticism. But if they understand your project and feel like they contributed to it, they will be less likely to throw stones in public. And of course, some of their contributions may be truly valuable, and developing a network is doubtless one of your goals.
You are unlikely to be able to change the group culture, so I would not suggest complaining about the tone of the conversation. On the other hand, your advisor may have some practical tips in dealing with certain people and/or in preparing slides. For example, one thing I learned is that certain unimportant issues will start a huge argument that sidetracks everything, so, it is often wise to avoid mentioning these issues entirely.

Thanks. Some hard but potentially useful advice. I do wonder if openly discussing the risk (and how to manage it) of the project during the talk drew further attention to it rather them being relieved I was thinking about it. I agree with your 4 lower bullet points, especially the first. "...then you should not have accepted this position" is a bitter pill to swallow but potentially the only real thing I feel I could have changed other than presentation style. Tricky though during funding-cut COVID environment in Australia.

@tom - I suspect (or at least, hope) that you have more latitude than you think you do in terms of improving or pivoting the experimental plan. And I would highlight the penultimate bullet (maybe I should have placed it more prominently); building relationships and cementing buy-in requires lots of individual chats prior to the formal, public meeting. Without having done this, even a skilled presenter may have trouble keeping the train on the tracks once the punching starts.

@Tom: “I wonder…” That’s hard to say when we weren’t there. However, in general it can be a bad idea to dig into points that you thought through carefully, and which are probably only obvious after very careful thought - along the lines of telling your scuba students before their first dive “the one time one of my old students almost died, we had not yet implemented (rule A). So don’t worry, we have (A).” The result will be the opposite of what the instructor meant to achieve. It’s good to have more in stock than you initially share in a talk, and be ready to address questions as they come up.

@AnonymousM - quiet and professionally-worded notes rarely get one in trouble, so I agree that should be fine. But, I would focus it on how OP can adjust to the culture, not on how the culture can adjust to OP (barring actual abuse, which is never acceptable). Working in this kind of hard-hitting, sharky culture is really difficult for some people, but it's not inherently bad, it has its pros and cons like other management styles.

second set of bullets is victim-blaming apology for machismo that will surely go the way of the dinosaurs, as it already has for more progressive and ethical industries

I appreciate that, and of course I am not suggesting that no one should ever take a position unless they agree 100% with everything always. But if one (a) fundamentally disagrees with the direction, and worse (b) is forced to implement plans exactly as ordered without proposing new ideas or raising objections, then I would suggest that this position is not a credible option either. I doubt OP is really being forced in this way. I suppose it's possible that OP has no other options and would be homeless if they didn't take this position, but I didn't consider that scenario in my answer.

What surprised me though was that I thought the academics attacking the project already knew about these sets of experiments, as they were proposed in a general sense as part of the broader project even before I commenced.

Don't underestimate the degree to which academics focus on their own research projects and ignore/forget the details of projects done by other groups.  You will probably find that the other academics in this matter had absolutely no idea about the history of your project, either because they had never been briefed on it, or because it was not important to them and so they forgot all about it.  Hopefully you were able to make some of this clear in answering their criticisms, but if you weren't, you can consider that a failing in your own explanation that you can remedy in future.  For this kind of thing, you should treat it just like erroneous referee feedback on a paper --- i.e., misguided feedback should often be treated as an indication that you have not explained yourself clearly enough.
A corollary to this forgetfulness of acadeimcs is that you also don't need to be too worried about any long-term problem from this criticism.  Most of those academics will forget all about your project, and their criticisms of it, unless it is something that is presented on a recurring basis in the department.  If you do need to present on that topic again, you now know that you may need to start with some information about the history of the project and the constraints you were under when you took it over.
In regard to the idea that this criticism is "punching down", I find that to be an unhelpful concept in this context.  If you are a postdoc and they are professors then yes, you are "down" from them --- is that supposed to give you some kind of immunity?
Academic criticism, directed "downwards" is necessary and ubiquitous in academic work, and any critique of work by a new staff member by senior staff is going to fall into this category.  Consequently, my advice would be to mark this down as an instance where your audience did not properly understand the history of the project, assess their criticisms in light of your constraints, and proceed accordingly.  I do not recommend following up with those academics in the way you have proposed.

Thanks for your reply. I am hoping your first point is correct (and will be giving them the benefit of the doubt in this case). They are quite senior in the project and it had been developed over a number of years which is why I made the assumption, but no doubt they are very busy and probably hadn't thought through the details and were now speaking their concerns aloud for the first time. In terms of critisism, I am very open to ideas on ways to improve, but I didn't find any of the critisism useful, rather it was mostly negative.

In that case I would just ignore it; sometimes reviewers/academics make erroneous criticisms.

Think carefully about what was said if it is/could be true or not. You should try to work on non-risky highly important stuff; since this is difficult to come by you can also work on non-risky not so important stuff. If you like gambling (in a positive sense, but your career is at stake) you can work on high-risk highly important stuff.
Never work on high-risk non-important stuff, your career in science is over before it started.
Mandatory read is 'You and your research' by Hamming.

+1 for "Never work on high-risk non-important stuff" - it should be obvious, but unfortunately, this is can happen, especially if your supervisor sent you on a commando mission that turns out irrelevant.

@CaptainEmacs speaking from experience this seem to happen more often than it should.

Update. We've now pulled of this experiment 4 out of five times and aiming on sending it to a high impact journal.  Hopefully it gets in

@Tom fingers crossed!

I have been in similar situations to yours a few times in my work, and I know how difficult it is. It always helps me to ask myself exactly what my colleagues are disagreeing with. Do they disagree with my ideas, my work, or me as a person (i.e., do they hate me)? The answer is almost never the third, or the second; usually, and especially for newer folks, they're disagreeing merely with your ideas. It took me a while to get used to this fact, and in the beginning it certainly felt like personal attacks - but you have to remember that you're in a field where ideas are valued more than anything. Your colleagues are interested in your ideas, and if they're experienced professors then they're likely able to separate the person from the idea because they've been in your situation too.
Take it from me, as someone who is now on the other side of this kind of situation, that your colleagues do not think any less of you and they were not looking to criticize you or punch down on you.


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Can this be counted as a research experience for Grad school?
I've recently completed my bachelors in Mechanical Engineering from India. In my last year, I worked on two four-month projects in two leading research institutes affiliated to the government of India. Both projects needed tons of literature survey and calculations. However, I didn't make any prototype. Everything from design and analysis was on software. My supervisors found everything satisfactory. I was also responsible for designing certain things not related to my project too. I am confused if everything above mentioned counts as a 'research experience' for applying to Grad school and emailing to professors seeking students to apply for MASc. positions.

Sure it counts as research experience!
"Research experience" is different than asking for a completed research project or a publication. It just means you have some experience with some aspect(s) of the research process.
When speaking/writing about the experience, just be clear and honest about what parts you were involved with, and show your understanding of how what you did fit into the overall picture of the project(s) you participated in. The general format is roughly: "I worked on a project to improve multiple crop yields using modern furniture design. After reviewing the literature in the area of agricultural design and art deco stylization of farm equipment, I designed and analyzed the effectiveness of apple hammocks on crop yield, which led to blah blah blah. I also assisted with other projects, designing pineapple cradles, a hollow wine cork, and system for drying finger towels more efficiently."
The people evaluating your application want to know what you did and what parts of the research process you have experience with, so don't worry if your experience wasn't completely end-to-end from concept to publication, that's the norm.

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My postdoc advisor wants me to work on a topic that I don't have a proper theoretical background in. How to proceed with this?
My PhD involved using a commercially available software to carry out simulations. Now I am pursuing postdoc at another lab. My current advisor wants me to develop new complex models for which I don't have any academic experience in. I have 3-4 months before he starts expecting outcomes.
I am panicking as I don't have theoretical background to do the job. This will involve studying 2 courses right from scratch. (continuum mechanics, non linear finite element analysis). This, I have to self study right from basics and I am feeling that I will fail.
I never lied on my resume. I knew this project will involve more rigor than what I had done before. But now, I feel that I should have done more coursework during my PhD. My undergrad was in different  field, so never took classes for these subjects. Now, as a postdoc in a lab, it's impossible to do actual courses in a university. I feel miserable.
Do you have any suggestions on how I should proceed with this?

To have done what you have, you must be smart and capable. Now you need to apply that to get up to speed on these things.

Courses are just ways to make material found in books/papers accessible. Can you find the relevant literature? There's also a lot of excellent courses online - Coursera, EdX, Udacity and more. Are these an option?

Any idea why you expect to fail at independent study? Time management? Difficulty reading and understanding the books? Imposter syndrome? Something else? The problem is probably solvable, if you know what it is.

I guess it's more of guilt that's making me fear studying. These subjects are what every undergrad student in my current field know before their 3rd year. I am a Postdoc in the field. I should be an expert in this. But, here am I lacking the most basic of the skills.

Yes, there are courses online. But, I fear that I am too old to actually be good in understanding this.

I would say that your self-doubt is more a problem than anything else. I picked up a lot of skills during my postdoc that are "basic" for any undergraduate in the field. I now do research in this field!

If you never lied on your resume, you should'nt be ashamed of anything. Maybe there is a misunderstanding between you and your advisor about what your skills are? If you feel that it is really out of your capability to master those skills, better talk to him. On the other hand, can't you ask some colleague for help/ good reference books?  "what every undergrad student in my current field know before their 3rd year" it is easy to over-estimate what people truly know about something just because they had a course in it, maybe you are not so far-off as someone "in the field" would be.

I don't know enough to make this an answer, but is there the possibility of working collaboratively with someone else in the lab? Someone who's skills complement yours. You could then make progress and learn at the same time.

Getting a PhD only shows that, the first time, it took you some number of years to become productive in a new field. The postdoc is to show that you can pick up a topic and become productive in a 3-6 month time frame. And, as a staff/professor, you will keep on doing that over the rest of your career...

I started my PhD in computer science in 2002. My last prior formal education was a master's degree awarded in 1975. Everything I knew about the prior quarter century of developments in computer science I had learned by self-education from books and papers, as well as practical experience and a couple of industry courses. Although I did take courses during my PhD studies, my dissertation research depended on basic ideas in linear algebra that I learned from books.
I find it hard to understand deciding in your 20's that you are too old to learn new basic material from books, papers, on-line tutorials, and other self-education.
To proceed, I suggest discussing your need for more basics with your advisor, not in a spirit of expecting failure, but asking for advice on what you need to know and how to go about learning it. Your advisor may recommend books, or a course you can audit.
For your long term future, it would be better to learn now how to learn without courses, and get over your current block. Avoiding it by collaboration will just leave the block in place to stop you the next time you need to add to your basic knowledge.

You need to disentangle your expectations of yourself from what other people are expecting from you.
You have every right to feel uncomfortable about this situation, simply because from your life experience so far (as you have described it, at least) this is a new situation for you. You have spent a long time being educated. Education often works by teaching you how to do something and then asking you to do it. This is a comfortable situation: "We won't ask you to do something you don't know".
After this, having to do something that you really have not studied and really do not know how to do is naturally rather a shock.
First thing: eliminate guilt about not having studies these subjects earlier. It is not doing anything useful, and you can't go back in time.
The next thing is that this is going to be a good step in finding out who you are. Some people are at their best doing what they know how to do, becoming more and more expert at it throughout their lives. For others, the delight is to be always doing something that they do not already know how to do. I know a plumber who sorts out people's PC catastrophes for them: he has never trained for it, but he loves learning new things. I have just been proof-reading and editing some texts in Malagasy, a language which I do not know at all. It was tiring, but I enjoyed the challenge.
Some people are one way, some are the other way. There is no dishonour about being one as opposed to the other.
The one valid concern you have is that your advisor may be misunderstanding your level of knowledge. If you think your advisor thinks you are expert in fields that, in fact, you know nothing about, then you need to correct that impression. But don't do it in terms of "I can't do it because I haven't been trained". Do it in terms of "I don't know this or that subject, so I will have to get up to speed on them in order to get this work done". That way your advisor has been warned there is a risk that you may need extra help; but will also be encouraged by seeing someone who wants to learn and is willing to learn.
If I were you, I think I would go ahead with the job. But it is your decision. Just make it for the right reasons. Don't include any guilt about not having done the right courses before. That isn't relevant. And don't include too much worry about not being 100% successful, or taking longer than you should. As long as your advisor has been warned, you will not be letting anyone down.

You learn.
You've already done undergraduate studies, a Masters, a PhD. You've learned what it's like to learn. All you need to do now is self-teach. It's easier of course if there's someone else to teach you, but that situation won't persist forever. If you only ever learn when someone else teaches you, you restrict yourself out of many fields for which there isn't a convenient teacher. Further, at the edge of human knowledge there's no teacher; you must teach yourself.
This situation really isn't that different from finding an interesting research paper not in your specialization. For example when the first exoplanets were discovered, it was a very exciting result, and lots of astronomers were interested. You can bet that many of them didn't know anything about how to find exoplanets. They taught themselves. You can do it too (you've undoubtedly already done this too actually, when you did your PhD).
I'd start by going to the library and getting some textbooks/monographs on the topics. Read them, work through the exercises. If the topics really are elementary, then even better: you can ask undergraduates at your institution for help. There's no rule that a postdoc should know more than an undergraduate - in physics for example it's possible to earn a Bachelor's degree in most universities without ever taking a course on General Relativity, which means one probably knows less about the theory than an undergraduate who's taken the course. That's not a problem, since one undoubtedly knows more about other areas of physics than the undergraduate.
It's likely your supervisor is not expecting instant results, especially if they're aware you don't have the necessary theoretical background, so you'll have time.

I am panicking

First, try to stop doing that :)
There's nothing particularly alarming in the situation you describe. It's common not to have all the ideal conditions for a research project to succeed. Sometimes some of the conditions are our own level of knowledge in a certain area of expertise. It's fine, nobody knows everything. You are not required to be the best at everything, you are required to do your best with whatever the conditions are. If the PI chose to hire you for this job knowing your background they certainly had good reasons to do so.
There are two keys in this kind of risky project:

A good plan
Good communication with the PI

At the start it is crucial that your PI knows about your doubts and that you agree with them about a plan. The plan should be detailed enough with milestones and preferably an exit strategy if things don't work out. You should have a regular meeting with the PI to inform them of your progress. It doesn't matter if the plan has to be changed during the course of the project, what matters is that you and the PI know where things are at any time and discuss every option. The goal is to avoid high expectations due to a misunderstanding of the details, and to avoid discovering critical problems too late.

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Publishing papers seem natural to many, while I find it really hard to think novel stuff to pursue till publication. How to cope up with this?
I am a final year PhD student in materials science. My colleagues publish papers at a rate of 2-3 papers a year. By the end of their PhD, they would have around 8-10 papers (first authors) in their name. While I on the other hand, am struggling.... struggling hard.
How do people produce so many work in such a short time? I take around 3 months trying out some hypothesis and if it does work then I require at least 2 months to produce enough data. So, in all, it takes around 7 months to complete a work for a paper. Then it will get submitted and so on.
While my colleagues start a work and publish it within 7 months. Which means they conceptualize, run simulations, gather data and write a manuscript in 3 months! I am not able to comprehend this.
What am I doing wrong? How can one be so productive? I feel so inadequate and am thinking of quitting academia after my PhD. Probably, I am not fit for academic life. I love doing research, but I have realized late that, just loving research is not enough.
My advisor says my progress is good. But, having looked at my advisor's PhD thesis, she had 5 submitted papers towards the end of her PhD.

10 first author papers while getting a materials science doctorate? Each with actual new material, new ideas, a new hypothesis? That's just excessive, or let's say impossible.

Not worth an answer, but a comment from someone who basically let the chance pass that you still have: Publish. That's it. Generate papers for the sake generating papers. Nobody cares whether your research is innovative. Just publish. Swallow your pride and publish.

Is measuring something and publishing the measures an alternative too you? Something somewhere is definitively changing, some industry is using more of that, or less, or recycling better.

While all the advice to publish more is reasonable, I still suggest being careful about the quality. At least check that there's no mistakes and all the conclusions are fully supported by your actual results and/or references. I think publishing average papers is alright, but publishing bad papers is bad for your long term career. That aside, there's nothing wrong with repeating something that's already been done, as long as you reference the previous works. Checking both experimental and numerical results of other groups independently is as important as doing something new

@Karl The problem is that they do not do this with all new materials, ideas and hypothesis. Pressure to publish is so high that the type of papers most PhD students will publish, to achieve the 8-10 first author papers (currently quite common by my experience), basically consists of finding a niche for a particular combination of synthesis parameters, or characterization techniques, or slightly different results, that is still missing in literature and which is enough to tell a story. But then, most of times these works are quite uninteresting and lack long term strategy or systematic research

I almost guarantee that this level of productivity involves some level of data recycling, which isn't necessarily bad. You could probably generate a decent dissertation with one or two really good experiments. And recycling the data to explore different aspects of the same problem. Of course I am not a material scientist PhD so take that with a grain of salt. The point is that recycling data almost forces you to write related papers. And if that means that you are deeply investigating one topic/phenomenon all the better and it proves the topic you are studying is deep enough to form an agenda.

There are different legitimate styles: meticulous workers with few, but meaning- and impactful publications, and fast workers which write a lot, but possibly less deep (not necessarily bad) papers. Your adviser says your progress is good? You can expect that they know how to set the balance, especially if they have a number of fast publishers and they still let you work at your pace, then it's a good sign that they believe in the quality of your work.

If you publish 4 papers in a year, it doesn't mean each one took 3 months from start to finish. It probably means all 4 took a year, but when you got stuck with one you moved on to the next one to give yourself a break.

For better or worse, number of publications is increasingly seen as a metric for productivity and competence in some fields and countries. Depending on where you are (geographically and discipline-wise) it is more about producing and publishing papers than about having something novel and relevant to show, unfortunately.
As an early career scholar, it is important to find out if you are in one of those places where you should be producing papers instead of producing knowledge. If that is the case, try to learn what are the tricks used by people around you and emulate them. As much as I’d like to tell you to not do that, it may be the only way to stay in the game in the long run. How can you produce good and relevant research if you have been forced out of academia by the “publish or perish” system?
If it is the case that you are in one of those environments/disciplines where publication counts are inflated, you need to play along if you want to stay in the game. You need to strike a balance between doing the really interesting high quality stuff and doing the cookie-cutter low-hanging-fruit run-of-the-mill papers that increase your publication count.
Some people who publish a lot are truly doing cutting-edge research and publishing a lot due to that. Not everyone is that lucky or that good. If you look closely, many of those publishing a lot are compromising in terms of quality and impact. They may have their own tricks, perhaps involving dubious practices like fishing for significance, for example, or perhaps they are just really good at slicing the sausage really thin and turning one good study into a dozen papers. If your discipline in your country is one of those that only care for quantity (some places reward mediocrity in large numbers over geniality), you will only harm your career prospects by going against that system. Learn from how your peers do it, at least for the moment, so that you can get tenure. Once your place within academia is secured, then you can worry about the rest.
Lastly, once you have your research group and your collaboration networks, then you can further inflate your publication counts by co-authoring with your colleagues, PhD students, and post-docs, but that is something further down the road for you.

I think your answer shouldn't ignore the "My advisor says my progress is good." Statement OP made.

@Zaibis There are many reasons why the advisor may say the progress is good. The interests of the advisor and those of the student don't always align. 'Good progress' for the advisor often means that the student can graduate and move on, but good progress for the student should be graduating with a CV that is good enough for securing a job (post-doc or otherwise) given their career stage, country, and discipline.

Number of papers is a notoriously poor measure of research output. For example, is one major paper worth less than 2-3 minor papers?
Some people are really productive for various reasons. Sometimes people have been very lucky and their projects have worked out very quickly. Also, everyone develops as a researcher at different rates. As you get more experience you will be able to avoid many time consuming pitfalls and your publication rate (and quality) should increase. So maybe you're behind your peers and maybe you're not, it's impossible for us to say.
If your supervisor says your progress is good then I think you need to accept this at face value. If you're still concerned about it you should have a frank discussion about your concerns with your supervisor and/or another mentor in your field who can give you an unbiased view of your progress and prospects for an academic career.

I also work in a field where 8 to 10 first-authored papers are not unheard of for PhD students. This can be intimidating for early-phase students, as it feels like (and, objectively, often is the case) that the first paper is 2 years in the making. This makes it hard to imagine how one would end up with close to a double-digit number of papers by the end of a PhD.
However, one important observation is that paper production is not nearly the linear process you describe - students writing 10 papers in their PhD almost certainly don't generate a completely new hypothesis, generate completely new data, and write everything from scratch for every paper. Instead, they are probably working on an interesting family of related hypotheses, for which they collect a wide range of related data, about which they then write multiple related papers. Note that oftentimes the "costs" (in terms of time and effort) for collecting more related data is rather small in comparison of the fixed costs for starting to generate data at all (e.g., if you have all the measurement infrastructure in place, collecting data on some more types of subjects is much smaller than starting from scratch with a completely different setup). This model means that ultimately the student probably takes longer to produce the first paper, but is paid off when latter papers can re-use much of what has already been done. Most of my students publish little in the first years of their PhD, but get a seeming burst of outside-visible productivity after around the half-time point in their PhD. A nice side effect of this model is that one ends up with a clearer "story" for the PhD dissertation than if one just writes X completely independent papers.
Another question, of course, is how many of these 8 to 10 papers are actually full-blown original research papers. Again, speaking from my field, a subset of papers of PhD students are typically either more expository work (say, articles in scientific magazines which do not have the same level of expectation regarding novelty) or work-in-progress reports of some sort (e.g., published in academic workshops).

It's about problem selection.  Doing laser studies of air sensitive compounds with a non-commercial laser, involves many ways the experiment can be derailed.  Doing oxide phase diagrams is like taking candy from a baby.  I'm not arguing which is better or worse for society or which is more fun.  (Although I have an opinion.)  But if you decide to do one of these butt hard topics and don't at least know the disadvantage, you are not a careful thinker.
-Cynical view but with insight.
P.s.  And yes, real analysis, caveat-lovers, there could be other reasons (lack of effort, lack of skill, poor writing ability, etc.)  But I want to emphasize the key issue for a researcher...there are always more things possible to try than time.  You should have an independent assessment of that as a researcher.  Yes, even with a very hierarchical advisor.  It is easy to be passive aggressive and spend time on what you believe in and not what you don't.  Your time on this earth is limited.  Use it strategically.

Re: Struggling hard..
You're not alone. I am in the same situation. But it shouldn't disappoint you and you should never look down at yourself and your research. If you like your field of research, then that's the important thing, you will definitely reach a point that you have many publications.
Re: How do people produce so many work in such a short time?
In my experience, there are different reasons:

They are continuing a research and they take different approaches to
solve it.
The papers are not sent to quality journals.
They are based in a strong team that helps them.
They are familiar with the tips and tricks of publishing in a
specific journal.

Re: Publishing in short time
Unfortunately sometimes people are not very honest, so simply don't listen to them. Like so many things in life, stick to your idea and don't criticize yourself by comparing yourself with what other people claim.
Also, when you want to publish, you can check the editorial process time; it can save you a lot of time (you can check my response here: How to find Elsevier journal-specific average publishing time).
Also make sure that you're sending your paper to the right journal. You can do this by reading the abstracts and conclusions in some of the articles in that journal.
Re: What am I doing wrong?
You are doing nothing wrong; like me, you are in a learning process. Publishing papers requires its own skills and we are both learning it. Nowadays there are some online courses that can teach you the skills. I haven't checked them myself, but we can get some ideas from them (e.g. https://www.udemy.com/publishing-in-impact-factor-journals-tips-and-tricks/)
Re: My adviser says my progress is good
My two journal papers during my PhD was rejected and I was so disappointed. But same as you, my supervisor liked my research and contribution. Since it wasn't mandatory for me to publish journal papers to get my PhD and I just had to submit my thesis for external examiners to review and comment, my supervisor asked me to focus only on my thesis. Now the thesis is finished, I have time to learn how to publish.
Besides, I personally don't agree with 'Publish or Perish' idea. I didn't publish anything, but I managed to demonstrate that I like doing research and I have other skills. With that, I didn't get an academic job (with no publications), but I manged to stay at university for a part-time research assistant job, so I can have some time to learn and publish.
Last humble advice:
I'm reaching out to people and I talk about my research field and I'm asking if I can contribute in their articles; it will give me a chance to learn how to publish and also have my name as co-author.
I hope it helps and I wish you all the best.
Just don't give up :)

I completely agree with all the other answers, but one thing I would like to add is to start to publish your paper in a more narrow domain in your field, although it may not have as impact as other papers that are applicable to a wider domains, It will make some impact, and best of all, boost your confidence to take up writing better papers.
I am in a similar situation, although I am not a PhD, but a researcher in an industry, recently I published a paper limited to a very small domain in my field of work, it was just appreciated by a small group of people whom I know, but that was sufficient for me to get started.

Have you spoken to your PhD supervisor and colleagues about this?
Maybe you need to help co-author and get regular mentorship and structure to help you get some papers out?
Sometimes contacting editors with publication ideas from your current work can be helpful. Editors are usually helpful and provide some practical and useful advice.


text:
How can I get an idea on relevance of my data?
I have a lot of data from my PhD, which I believe confuses my supervisor quite a lot. Therefore, he is hesitant to publish them for now. How can I get good academic feedback on this data without submitting it as a paper?

Do the data confuse you?

In some way yes, it confuses me but I believe we can make a story out of it. As I am not experienced that much, I don't know what would be missing to support my story.

Seems more like a time of reflection than publication. Especially if you are both a bit confused.

If it confuses your supervisor, chances are that it will confuse other people too. It is your job to extract a meaningful story from those data, and then present them. If it makes sense there is no reasons why he would refuse to publish it.

Talk to as many people as possible about your work
This can be in formal settings, such as a poster or oral presentation at a conference. You could also ask to give a presentation to colleagues within your department. Or it could be informal, such as chatting at a coffee break or after a seminar with fellow researchers.
It's often tempting to hold on to your work and only present it when it feels "finished", but these early stages are often the most useful ones to get feedback. So you need to be brave, and accept that there may be flaws or complications that you've not yet thought of. That's why you are doing it.

If you don't have a good feeling for the relevance of your data, and your advisor is "confused", then now is not the time to publish.
Also, "data" itself isn't necessarily what you're looking for. To quote Alan Wilcox, former editor of Epidemiology:

Data do not speak for themselves. They need context, and they need
  skeptical evaluation.

It sounds like you don't have that context, or that skeptical evaluation. I would suggest that the first thing you need to do is get with your advisor and come to a coherent understanding of your data before you try publishing it. An attempt to just dump data you and your advisor don't fully understand into the literature will do neither you nor the field much good.


text:
My original data is in someone else's thesis without my knowledge or consent
I encountered in a Master's thesis some of my original and important findings. I finished my experiments and left the lab to home to write and while I was writing my supervisor put my data into someone else's thesis.
Funnily enough the data is also in my thesis but masters thesis came earlier. Even though, I am the original observer, I have the position who did plagiarism.
What is the best action to take?

Could you clarify what you mean by "I have the position who did plagiarism"? Was the other thesis published before yours, and have you been accused of plagiarism?

yes it did published before mine. I wasn't aware that that thesis was including the data. However, no one accused me but I feel responsible.

Did you talk to your supervisor about this? It looks like they are the first person to talk to. The other student should probably cite your work, maybe in the form of "....., to appear"

Let’s be clear here. If your description is accurate, then it is absolutely the other student who plagiarized, not you. The fact that their thesis was published before yours is irrelevant, and your statements “I have the position who did plagiarism” and “I feel responsible” are misleading. Of course, the order of publication means that outsiders may have the perception that it was you who did the plagiarizing. But they would be wrong, and you need to have a clear idea of who is actually the guilty party here, and be prepared to defend yourself if you get accused of any wrongdoing.

I don't know what field you're in, but this would be totally fine in mine, as long as you were properly cited. You don't say whether or not the second thesis cited you correctly, or whether that student claims they collected that data (which again, wouldn't necessarily be needed in my fields).

In a case like this, the most important first step to take is preserve all written records. In particular, you need to have the proof that you were the one who collected the data—perhaps it’s in the form of laboratory notebooks in your own handwriting, emails showing that you were the one who collected the data, or anything else that unambiguously shows that you were the data collector. This protects you from any charge of wrongdoing.
The second step is deciding if you want to take action in this matter. If you feel the use of the data is sufficiently problematic and you are willing to deal with the fallout of reporting your advisor and a fellow grad student for plagiarism, then you should cautiously proceed. However, if no one has raised any issues and you don’t want to make an issue out of it, it is understandable that you might want to wait until you are no longer directly part of the group before taking any action (or doing so anonymously).

Many thanks for the answers. I have the photocopies of my lab notebooks. I am curious if this has any ethical implications on me for the future if I do not speak about it now? Or what can be the ethical implication of this situation to the group leader and the master’s student?

What is the best action to take?

It depends. What problem are you trying to solve? What goal do you want to achieve?
As your question seems to imply, you are concerned that the data you obtained in the experiment were analyzed in the publication of another team member in the same research group. This may or may not be an issue, depending on how you answer the questions below.

Are these data "yours" or "group's"? You obtained the data, that's great. But did your superviser contributed to designing the experiment? Who is responsible for setting the research aims and formulating the problem? Who financed the lab, got the correct equipment and performed the risk assessment? These are non-negligible tasks, and that's why in many labs the obtained data belong to the PI's group, not the person who first observed them. For example the team in CERN responsible for collecting the data and eventually "observing" the Higgs boson includes 200+ researchers.
Are results the other student published exactly the same as yours? The same dataset can be analysed differently, with different goals, methods and approaches, leading to different results. Some classical datasets are used as benchmarks and analyzed in hundreds of papers, without constituting a plagiarism.

Well in my opinion, this data belongs to me and the PI. Initially, PI designs the project and in meantime I contributed by designing the details and actual experimental work. If contributions wouldn’t matter, what is the matter of being involved in research. If all data belongs to PI what happens to the rights other experimenters, basically you can work like a slave and PI can decide who will be recognized for the hard work.

About the second question, yes they are totally the same. Basically they are the partial repetitions of my findings.

You didn't mention anything about discussing the problem with your supervisor. In my opinion your first step should be to ask them about this, and request to have your work duly cited. The fact that your work is not published yet is not an issue, it can be cited as a work "to appear".
I think this is essential even if you think your supervisor will not listen: making a formal complaint without giving them a chance to fix their mistake could be construed as disrespectful and hostile, given the potentially serious consequences.

My supervisor can not duly cite this as he made repeat my experiments partially(by using somethings that I already created) and they put the same findings directly to the results section of the masters student.

This does not change the fact that you are the original author of the work: repeating an experiment done by somebody else using the same or a similar method (and especially if using something the original author created) requires a citation. I don't understand why you consider that your supervisor can't cite you, and I understand even less why you can't ask him to do so. In my opinion, If you don't even address the topic now, he can easily pretend later that it was a simple mistake and that you should have told him.


text:
How to prevent an idea / innovation from being stolen or plagiarised
I have come up with an innovation to obtain linear motion without using any external source of energy. The idea arose from a paper I wrote on an alternative model of magnetism. I have built and tested the innovation and have written a paper describing it, which I wish to submit for publication.
My worry is that considering the novelty of the idea, it may get stolen or plagiarized. How do I prevent this from happening?

Don't worry about it, every physicist and engineer has already run into thousands of people exactly like you. You all have so many ways to get free energy that we couldn't keep up with stealing them if we wanted to.

I never mentioned anything about free energy so I don't see how you have jumped to that conclusion. You also seem to assume for some reason that i am not a physicist or an engineer. Thanks for your advice about not worrying.

@VH.Ryan knzhou is being sarcastic

@VH.Ryan if there is no external source of energy, in what sense is the energy not “free”?

Publish it. This will establish primacy.

@knzhou, Dan Romik - please don't...

Exactly what do you mean by "stolen or plagiarized"?  Are you afraid you won't get credit in the history books?  That someone else will commercialize it and you won't get anything?  It would help if we knew specifically what it is that you don't want to happen.

Dan Romik, I don't claim to have invented a device that produces usable energy without putting any energy into it.  Magnetic and gravitational fields exert force which lead to motion.

David Thornley, what I mean by stolen and plagiarized is the same that it means to other authors,  that some one will claim my work to be theirs. I don't seem to be the only one to have this concern. The device in its present form has little commercial value, but the idea behind it is certainly novel.

@VH.Ryan thanks for the clarification. There’s still the tricky issue of the second law of thermodynamics that would eventually cause the motion to cease unless external energy is provided to the system, but I assume you are aware of that. In any case, good luck with your invention.

Dan Romik This is not a perpetual motion device. The issue with magnet motors is the need to overcome the "neutral position" ie the point where the attractive and repulsive forces cancel each other. Is it possible to obtain a linear force with no "attraction" or "repulsion" involved? Apparently it is possible.

@VH.Ryan I understand. I deleted my earlier comment making reference to perpetual motion devices. Obviously devices that involve motion that is not perpetual are perfectly possible, and no doubt there is room for innovation in the world of such devices. As I said, good luck with the invention.

If you have an invention, patent it. It's an expensive and long process though. But it may be dangerous to publish the paper first. Your patent could possibly be denied if the paper is deemed "prior art". This varies by jurisdiction, of course. Keep it as a trade secret until you file the patent.
You can't actually "prevent" plagiarism. You can only try to reveal it.
If you publish the paper without obtaining patent on the "invention", then people are free to use the idea. They just can't legally violate your copyright nor morally plagiarize the paper. But, ideas are free to use.
If the idea is valid and novel, you might be able to partner with some company to exploit it. Don't reveal it, however, without non-disclosure agreements in place first.
Much of this requires a lawyer, of course.

Inventions are only worth patenting if they have potential for significant commercial value.

You can apply for a patent after publishing at an academic conference in some countries. (So, it isn't generally true that "If you publish the paper without obtaining patent on the "invention", then people are free to use the idea.") That said, I'd strongly recommend filing a patent first.

@user2768. True enough in general. It is an expensive process. A partner can help and then the game changes a bit. Patents can be filed just to prevent competitors from following up on certain lines. A friend "has" a patent on a tiny-tiny idea that made for a strategic advantage for a large company.

Indeed, large companies certainly have more options (regarding patents) than individuals!

But don’t publish the paper first. Your patent will then be denied. That’s not true - see here or google “patent grace period”. You really shouldn’t be offering legal advice about things that are not within your expertise. This may not matter in OP’s situation but other people may read what you wrote and be misled.

If this is, as it seems from the description, an example of a "perpetual motion machine", then it is going to be very difficult if not impossible to patent it in most countries; patent offices typically refuse to allow these, since they are invariably delusions or illusions. Reference - Europe, Australia, US

@DanRomik. I was giving the most conservative advice I could. As reported elsewhere on this site, in some places a prior publication by a patent filer can be taken as disqualifying prior art. Better to be safe than find out later.

My complaint is that you were giving factually incorrect advice. How conservative it is, or whether there is some element of truth or wisdom in it, is irrelevant to that particular issue.

Thank you for all your comments and responses. I don't see why "free energy and :"perpetual motion machines" have been introduced into this discussion when I haven't made any reference to these at all.  The paper I wrote seemed to indicate that a constant linear force could be obtained using permanent magnets and the device constructed was to test this theory. This linear force is not an attractive or repulsive force.This is neither free energy nor perpetual motion.

@Buffy, I did think of filing for a provisional patent, but the device as of now has little commercial value and as you mentioned the process is tedious. However the idea behind the device is novel and that is what my concern is

@VH.Ryan, if you make the idea public it may not be patentable by others (prior art), but that isn't the same as not being able to be exploited by others. Remember that copyright doesn't help you here. It only protects your words, not your ideas.

If you have a truly new idea, it's very unlikely anyone will want to steal it.  You will have to sell it, first.  Think of Steve Ballmer's reaction to the iPhone.
But to take your question a bit more seriously, you have basically four strategies for protecting your intellectual property:

Trade secret.  You license your IP to licensees who promise to keep
it secret as well.  Your protection is that your IP is so clever
that you don't think it's likely anyone can independently recreate
it without knowing how you did it.  Works surprisingly well (think
formula for Coca-Cola).  But if your idea is recreated, there's
nothing you can do about it, especially if they decide to patent
before you do.
Patent.  This applies to inventions, like what you're describing.
You publish your idea by submitting it to the patent authority in
your country.  If your patent is granted, you can prohibit others
from using your idea without licensing it.  But it's expensive, both
to get the patent and to enforce it and whether you got the patent
or not, everyone can read your idea.
Copyright.  This applies primarily to written, audio or video
material and would include, e.g., any computer source code in your
product.  Copyrights exist from the moment of conception, though if you
want to sue someone for copyright infringement you must first
register your copyright (very cheap).
You can give it away.  You can publish it with, e.g., a GNU or
similar open source license.  This lets anyone use your IP but that
also ensures you can always use it as well.

Or Woz and the idea of a desktop computer. But those ideas were so far outside the consciousness of the listener that they were dismissed as ridiculous.

In its present form the device has little commercial value, my concern is of someone claiming my work to be their own especially since it is "a truly new idea"  as the OP in this question has experienced :https://academia.stackexchange.com/questions/100071/a-reviewer-has-stolen-my-idea-what-can-i-do?rq=1

@Buffy Yes, unlike a linear motion machine with no external power source, which no one has any problem with.

I have no idea what his machine is. He speaks of magnetism, That could imply using the Earth's magnetic field as a "power source". I withheld judgement, not knowing more.

Perhaps one should ask: What's OP's priority? Business value? Or recognition? In the first case, options 1 and 2 (and to a lesser extent 3) apply. In the latter case, options 3 and 4 apply (or 5, a publication).


text:
Is it possible a post-doc position for a specialist in medicine without PhD?
I graduated from Medical Faculty ten years ago. I got my degree as a Microbiology Specialist in 2015. I have been working as a Clinical Microbiologist in a hospital since then. I completed all my education and working in Turkey.
Last month, I attended a conference. I met a professor from King's College London. After discussing some issues about bacterial interactions this professor offered me a postdoc position in his department. I want to accept this position but I don't have a Ph.D. degree. The professor also doesn't sure and he advised me to search this issue.
Does anyone know if it is possible or can you address me an organization to ask this question?

It's very strange that the professor would ask you to find this out.  It depends entirely on the rules of his institution, and so he's the one best placed to talk to administrators and find the answer.  But even if it's not allowed to hire you as a postdoc, it may be possible to hire you with some other job title instead - and it's the professor who would have to make the decision as to whether to do that.

What @NateEldredge said, but also note that many of the positions that are colloquial described as "postdocs" do not actually mention doctoral status in the formal job title (often Research Associate or some such). Not everybody in academia has a PhD, although anecdotally those without are becoming rarer.

There is a significant chance that they could hire you as something like a "research scientist", "assistant researcher", etc, instead of using the inappropriate "postdoc" title. It is actually up to the University/department as to how the professor can use their funds. So long as the funds aren't specifically required to be only used specifically for a "postdoc", they can probably hire you as staff on a contract basis.

The organization to ask is the organization that wants to employ you. The name postdoc suggest that a postdoc starts after you became a doctor, but there is often some leeway in interpreting those rules. However, how much leeway depends a lot on the specific country and institution. Even within institutions departments can differ quite a lot in the extend to which they are willing to make use of the leeway offered by the rules set at the higher levels. So the only advise we can give you is to talk to HR department of the university that wants to hire you.


text:
Under what title should I list my graduate program on my CV?
I'm a PhD student, but wish to leave my current institution and am applying for PhD positions elsewhere. I'm not a PhD candidate yet, since I haven't still finished the courses and qualification exams that are required for candidacy. I was wondering if I should list my current program on my CV as
University of Stackexchange
Stack Exchanching, PhD

or just something like "graduate program" or nothing at all instead of "PhD".
I thought maybe I should list it as "MSc", because our department awards an MSc degree to PhD student if they complete the Master's courses, and I'll complete those courses before I move to my prospective PhD program.
Also, should I write an "expected" date? If yes, should that be the date I'd finish my PhD if I was staying here, or should that be the date I'll finish my 'integrated' MSc, or what?

Can you distinguish the terms [PhD] student and candidate? (It seems they are country-specific.)

You're applying for a PhD and you're on an MSc program (at least, the MSc part of a PhD program), so list your MSc program on your CV. (We could quibble over details, but MSc will be easily understood by all, whereas your precise situation seems overly complicated and possibly country specific.)
Write the expected completion date (for the MSc), because the reader of your CV wants to know when you're available to start a PhD.


text:
How can I contact potential PhD advisors without jeopardizing my position in my current PhD program?
(Sorry for the long question in advance! If it's too long, you could skip the first two paragraphs.)
I'm currently enrolled in a PhD program in a relatively prestigious school, which is very well-known in my field and in the specific area I'm interested in. Despite the department being a very good match for my interest, for some very personal reasons, I really need to move to a different place. (I assure you that my reasons are absolutely convincing, but unfortunately are too personal and complicated to explain it here, so I'd appreciate it if you could suggest answers to the question I'm asking and not discuss whether I should change my mind about leaving my current program).
Before I explain where in the application I could get into trouble, I need to say, that I can't explain my reasons for leaving my current university to my professors. Although the reasons are not at all about the department (I'm actually pretty happy with the program itself), and are only related to the location, since understanding them requires some background on what my reasons are about and some familiarity with me at a personal level, I have very little hope that they could actually sound convincing to my professors. They're the sort of reasons that I could explain to a friend and I'm quite sure they'd find them absolutely convincing (as those I explained to did), but I can't explain it to a colleague or a professor unless I establish some level of friendship with them beforehand. So, I prefer to reserve that option as the last option.
Although I'm trying to go and continue/do my PhD somewhere else as soon as possible, I'd want to do that next year if my applications weren't successful this year (especially because next year I'll have more publications, could possibly get a little closer to my advisor here so I could get their help and explain my reasons to them, and will have a higher chance in general). That's why I don't want to jeopardize my current position at all, because I might end up staying here one year longer. I'd appreciate any suggestions to solve the problems explained below.
I would consider my problem to have two main parts:
Part 1:
Since I'm going to apply for PhD positions, mostly in Europe, but possibly a few in the US, I need to contact potential advisors (in most of the programs I'm considering, the department-level admission is almost just a formality and any PhD student has to be accepted by the advisor first). I'm afraid that the prospective advisor might know a professor from my department (especially because they work in the same field and my department is very well-known in the field), and they might contact that professor and ask about me, which could get me into trouble in my current program (possibly resulting in the school cancelling my scholarship). I do try to make sure that they haven't published a paper together recently, but sometimes it's hard to figure out for sure if they're collaborating on a project at the moment or not, or if they're going to meet at a conference soon.
Part 2:
It could be difficult to justify why I want to leave this department given my interests. The department is a great match for my interest and I'm assuming that whoever reads my statement letter is not going to ask "why won't you complete your Ph.D. with prof. X or prof. Y at your own department then?!". Any suggestions on how to minimize the amount of annoying personal explanations, while trying to explain why I want to go somewhere else?
I'd greatly appreciate any solutions you'd suggest. Also, do you think these stuff are actually something to be worried about or am I just overthinking it?!

I don’t have an answer to the first part, but the only possible answer to the second part is to say something along the lines of:

Due to unreconcilable personal issues, I’m unable to complete my PhD at the University of Stack Exchange. I have the highest regard for the faculty there and Professor Advisor was an excellent supervisor, but I could not continue to pursue my studies there. These issues would not interfere with my ability to pursue a PhD at the University of Overflow.

You shouldn’t lie and pretend there was some kind of problem with the university. I think that making it clear that you have no issue with the university and your professor is probably the best thing you can do to avoid accidentally starting any rumors or make it seem like you’re besmirching the old university. I think it’s important to simultaneously stress the the issues are personal and that they won’t follow you to your new location.
I do think that being forthright and honest, but vague, is your best approach. I would seriously recommend putting this in your statement of purpose as well. At the end of the day it’s never not going to occur to the people reading your application to ask, and you’re usually better off heading off and explaining obvious worries than letting them sit there in their mind.
I know someone who was sexually assaulted by a community member at his university and found himself in a similar position. This is along the lines of what he did.

"personal issues" is a useful phase in this situation.

This advice will add, I hope to that of Stella Biderman here. However, you will have to evaluate its wisdom in light of what you know of your own personal situation.
I actually changed universities in the middle of studies, but for a different reason. Switching can, as you suggest, raise issues with the places to which you apply.
If your situation is intolerable, it is probably more important that you protect your overall reputation than specifically worry too much about the word getting out locally that you wish to leave.
In my case it was made possible by another professor in the school I was leaving (not my advisor), with whom I had a good academic relationship. He believed in me and my abilities and his recommendation made it possible when it might not have been otherwise.
So, if possible, find a person (or a few) at the current institution whose support you can depend on and who will be trusted in the profession to help you with letters, assuring the recipients that your move is necessary and appropriate. It may not even be necessary to reveal all to such a person (people), though they likely need to know that it is a personal need of great importance.

I was also in this situation as a graduate student. Ideally, the people you trust to be supportive include your advisor and other faculty in your field, in your department. At least in the US, anyone trying to move from one PhD program to another without a strong recommendation from their advisor is viewed with suspicion. Are they leaving because they are being kicked out? Because of a serious personality conflict with their advisor? Because they find their current program too demanding? If we admit them, are they going to struggle / cause trouble here too?

I was almost in a similar situation a few years ago. I will describe what happened to me and that may inspire you in some way.
I started my PhD several years ago at some European university and a year later my wife had a terrible car accident while pregnant. The emotions were tense and we were under a huge urge to change countries. You know, we needed to clear up horrible memories ... etc. Due to the accident, I lagged behind in my PhD programme and catching up was not easy. So, as you see these are very personal reasons that not everyone would understand.
At that time, my supervisor was a very big shot, well-known in the field, who at some time was the editor-in-chief of one of the top journals. So, you can imagine how hard it was to convince anyone else to accept me. In any case, I had a stellar profile as a PhD applicant and started contacting other universities in Europe. Never received back for obvious reasons. I went to conferences and met in person a couple of the professors I already contacted. The first question they asked: "but why do you want to leave Prof. X?" I explained my personal reasons very professionally and one of them actually was happy to accept me subject to funding confirmation that unfortunately didn't happen.
The lessons learned at this stage:

People do understand personal reasons are a valid motive for drastic
change.
Talking to people openly and professionally can help.
Given the  reputation of your supervisor/school, you may not have the chance to even make your reasons known to prospective supervisors (They ignore your emails and assume whatever).

At this point, another year of my PhD has passed, and was so helpless.. but at the same time, I realized that my current supervisor's name is a big hurdle, and being in Europe where everyone pretty much knows everyone in the field was not of really much help. So, I decided to move afar... very far away, and that is how I ended up in Australia.
I started applying to professors here, and after three attempts I was accepted in a good PhD programme with a generous scholarship and a nice supervisor.
Telling my previous supervisor about my departure was not the most pleasant thing I did in my life, but he was fine and understanding. And to be honest, I don't think he cared much about it. Now in your case, you're worried that if your supervisor knows about your plans, it might jeopardize your current scholarship. Of course, I don't know him/her, but any decent and reasonable professor in his/her position will come to you and discuss why, or on the other hand, just won't care. You are just a PhD student to him, and his career or life don't depend on you. Moreover, I'm not aware of anywhere in the world where your intentions to leave a PhD program would result in cancelling your scholarship. Anyway, back to my story. When I told him by email about my resignation from the programme, he sent one of his seniors research fellow to talk to me, and when they realized I was determined to leave they accepted it and life went on. No hard feeling or anything. We even co-authored a paper together later.
I have just finished my PhD in Australia last year with a good standing and looking back, I couldn't be happier with my decision to leave.
PS: apologies if anything seems unclear. I wrote this while sick, lying in bed.


text:
Informing my potential PhD supervisor about an offer from another PhD program
Last year, I reached out to several potential PhD advisers as I prepare for my PhD applications. One of the potential supervisors (let's call him supervisor A) with ties to the industry responded and offered me a short-term research position at their company (which I accepted) while I prepare for my PhD application at university A.
However, I was recently contacted by another professor (supervisor B) at university B. I was able to interview with his team and successfully received a PhD offer. I am inclined to study at university B, but am hoping for a scenario where I can still work with supervisor A as an industry partner or co-supervisor. What is the proper etiquette in informing supervisor A about my other PhD offer at university B?
Note that at this point, I have not formally committed to a PhD program yet despite having accepted the short-term research position with supervisor A. But there is the expectation that I would apply at university A and pursue my PhD there (to be fully funded by supervisor A).
Will I be burning bridges if I decide to pursue my doctorate at university B? Considering that PhD is a major commitment, I would hate to turn down the opportunity out of decorum/politeness. What is the best way to bring this up with supervisor A? Would it make sense for me to invite him to be my co-supervisor at university B?
Edit: I'm particularly curious about the ethics of switching gears when I've already given the impression to one supervisor that I'll be pursuing a particular PhD program. What's the best way to bring this up (email, direct 1/1 conversation) and how should I word it so as not to burn bridges?

" I can still work with supervisor A as an industry partner " is it because you think about your future after PhD? do not do that: it is premature to think (worry) about that at this point of your career.

@EarlGrey Not necessarily; It's just that I believe both supervisors have mutual research interests and this might be a great way to bridge academia and industry (i.e. research and direct application).

I suggest that you don't inform anyone about other possibilities until you are ready to make a choice. This assumes that the choice isn't dependent on what A would say.
But, take a good look at your priorities as well as your options.
Keep your options open until you need to make a decision. Don't take actions that close out your options prior to your "decision point". If you choose to accept an offer from B then the advisor their will have a say in whether also working with A is advisable or not.

Will it appear as if I'm playing a double game if I suddenly switch plans without asking for A's feedback? I'm just worried that I may have given the impression that I'm set on pursuing university A and going back on my word may be unethical.

Until you make a commitment you have no obligation.  There is no ethical concern. Look to your own interests.

By commitment, do you mean accepting the actual PhD offer? Or does this include informal commitments (e.g. conversations, email, etc. based on hypotheticals) as well?

No, it needs to be something formal. A real mutual agreement. Not necessarily in writing, but definite. People understand that. Don't feel coerced.

I guess the closest to a mutual agreement would be the clause in my short-term research contract stating "potential enrolment at university A", but even that sounds indefinite. I'm assuming this doesn't count?

Correct. Relax. You aren't bound. Consider what is best for yourself.

"Burning bridges" does not so much happen by the fact that you accept an offer (accepting something always mean refusing all the rest!), but how you do it. There is a world of difference between disappearing one day and the advisor learns by accident that you are working with somebody else ... and having a polite discussion in which you explain what you want to do with your career and why you prefer offer B over possibility A...

Do not worry, do not overstimate the importance of your profile: you are just the preferred candidate if your supervisor will obtain fundings for the PhD position you have been somehow "promised".
Take the best for you, other people will find the best for them without depending on you, because it does not depend on you.
Reasoning by absurd: if you were so fundamental and relevant for the research you should perform for your PhD, you would have been a PhD student now.
About inviting supervisor A to be co-supervisor of your PhD at B: yes, good idea, but first discuss it with supervisor B, then invite A (you may anticipate to your current supervisor A that you are going to accept an offer for a PhD from B, but you would like to keep him/her, if it is of mutual interest).


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Applying to another phd program after securing a pre-PhD research position at another institute
I've been searching for suitable PhD programs for me since last year, and I came across a fully-funded PhD program at University A with ties to the industry. Unfortunately, I had missed the PhD application deadline so I won't be able to apply until the next cycle, but the potential PhD supervisor has generously offered me a short-term research position (which I accepted) in the meantime as I prepare for my PhD application.
On the other hand, I was recently contacted by a potential PhD supervisor from another University B who is also doing similar research. I am drawn to this particular university since they are very well-known for their research in my very specific field of interest. Since I haven't committed to a graduate school yet, is it ethical for me to apply to both PhD programs at the same time?
PhD is a major commitment in terms of time, money, and energy. I want to work and study at the place that is best fit for me. Will I be burning bridges if I end up applying to multiple PhDs positions while doing a pre-PhD research fellowship at another institute?

I think that this is a reasonable question to ask these mentors. If they get so upset with you simply asking a question, you might want to ask yourself if they are good mentors (in the sense that they have your best interests in mind). In my experience, open communication is going to be best. We often worry far too much about someone having a negative view of a question we want to ask, when it is actually a reasonable question to ask. If you frame the question as you are "naive" to the typical process, and are unsure how it works, I don't think anyone will get upset, but they might tell you no (worst case scenario) or yes (which is what you want) - and why not ask for what you want?
But I am not in a field that mixes with industry very often so I, myself, am very naive to this subject.
Also, see Quitting PhD program during a probationary period and applying for other programs and Is it dishonest to start a PhD with intent to leave it and transfer to another program? in case they are helpful.

It is fine to apply to multiple universities at once. After all, you are looking to maximize your benefit from the school search, and so are others who are willing to hire you or admit you to grad school. I would suggest, applying as many as you can and seeing it as a good fit lab/university for you and choosing the best offer considering research, funding, location, reputation, flexibility, independence, etc.


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How to return to academia after "don't walk, run"?
It seems the phrase "don't walk, run!" is somewhat of a meme on this site. It roughly means "leave your current advisor/university/PI/whatever and don't look back".
While this at times may be good advice, although most often controversial, I'm wondering how one should handle the running if one remains willing to work in academia. (Just somewhere else) I mean, the suggestion sounds a lot like 'burning bridges' (with only one person at best, but with an entire department at the worst). Burning bridges is commonly understood to be a quick way to kill your career.
So, I'd like to have a well-thought answer to the question:

How (if it even can be done!) can I run from an abusive professional relation or otherwise unmaintainable position without ruining my career?

Perhaps this is already explained in some post given the "don't walk, run!" advice, but I think it is worthwhile to have answers to this particular question. Advice from academics who have in fact 'ran away' and proceeded within academia is very much appreciated. (this would at least answer whether it can be done)

Finally, to prevent any confusion: I'm currently not in an abusive professional relation or otherwise unmaintainable position. I'm merely interested in how one should act, for future readers in that situation. (Who knows, I could even be unfortunate enough to end up in such a situation one day!)

To clarify, this is a question asking for general advice for after leaving. To be clear, the 'running part' refers to 'not leaving in a nice and orderly manner' (Imagine a grad student literally running away from the campus, leaving a trail of thesis papers behind, if that helps). Most answers to the question suggested as duplicate essentially tell to 'walk', but here I have assumed to have already 'run' (whether that is a good idea is besides the point) and with that given, want to know what the best course of action is and the advice on the other question is too late.

Personally, I never liked that kind of advice, said in such a blunt way. Along my career I saw a couple of critical cases where the student had to walk away from an abusive adviser, and these required quite delicate negotiations between the former adviser, the PhD programme chair and the new adviser. The students had to start with a new research topic with the same deadline for graduation (that given by the funding), causing additional stress. None of the students remained in academia.I think that such an advice can be given only when knowing very well the context and the required procedure.

@MassimoOrtolano: Of course there are going to be difficulties.  But what's the alternative?  Do you believe that things would have been better if the student had stayed with the abusive adviser?

@NateEldredge I think Massimo Ortolano suggests that sometimes 'walking away' (i.e. discussing the matter, usually with help of a university appointed mediator), is sometimes preferable to 'running'.

Possible duplicate of How do I change schools/advisors without making my advisor angry?

@NateEldredge I disagree on the dupe. This is a question asking for general advice for after leaving. To be clear, the 'running part' refers to 'not leaving in a nice and orderly manner' (Imagine a grad student literally running away from the campus, leaving a trail of thesis papers behind, if that helps). Most answers to that question essentially tell to 'walk', but here I have assumed to have already 'run' (whether that is a good idea is besides the point) and with that given, want to know what the best course of action is and the advice on the other question is too late.

@NateEldredge No, but at least by walking and not running away they could finish their PhD. Had they run, they'd have never completed their PhD. In one case I suggested a student to suck it up until the end of their PhD, to avoid any future consequence, and the strategy worked. So, what I'm suggesting is to tread carefully: there are maybe countries where you can run, but others where running would simply destroy any chance of completing the PhD. I run from my former PhD adviser when I had already secured a permanent position, but I had to endure anyway the consequences for more than 10 years.

We also have another famous phrase: Don't run, walk!

Burning bridges with the "right" (actually, wrong) people could maybe even help your career, as it can be a sign that you recognize some bad behavior and are able to get yourself out of a bad situation instead of enabling people that might not have the best standing in the community anyway.

@skymningen Perhaps. But how will anyone recognize that when you've 'blown up' a large part of your professional network?

“Don’t walk, run” is a shorthand for taking immediate action to extricate oneself from a rapidly deteriorating situation.
Note that this may not require leaving academia altogether, or even one’s current institution. You may be able to find a workable solution where you are by switching projects, advisors, or departments, as appropriate.
But sometimes it is necessary to leave, for economic, personal, or medical reasons. You may want to return. In that case, it’s not really all that different from other cases. The critical step is explaining to whom ever you’d like to hire or admit you that whatever situation caused your previous departure will not affect the present situation. You’ll need to make that case clearly and convincingly so as to reduce the “risk level” of your potential boss. If you can’t make that case, then you may want to reevaluate if returning is the right move at the present time.

Your advice on what to consider when 'returning' is useful. I do wonder what would be wise in a particular situation: what if your only real problem was with one person, but you did have 'radio silence' during the time you were 'absent' after leaving rather abruptly, should/must you contact the university and/or explain your motives for the abrupt leave and return (just explain, no need to justify yourselves I think)? (how to do this if this is wise seems out of scope, but the degree of 'recontact' with your previous 'problem' is on-scope, I think)

Also, I explicitly take 'running' to mean leaving very abruptly, bordering on sudden disappearance. I'm not sure whether you definition of the phrase agrees on this. Could you explain?

Just running away is very problematic, especially if you’re getting paid by the university. You need to take the time to make sure things are squared away. “Don’t walk, run” does not mean “drop everything and go” unless your life is literally in danger.

Well, one reason for asking this question is that how exactly one should 'run' isn't entirely clear to me, so I simply assumed the worst possible method. But I suppose if one can prevent this, this should be done

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


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Undergrad researcher frustration with PhD collaborator
I'm an undergrad doing summer research in a CS lab. For the past few months, I've been working closely with a PhD student. I initially contacted his supervisor and his supervisor connected us to work together.
However, as time goes, I've noticed that the PhD student is rather incompetent at the field of research and doesn't have a big picture view of the project.  For example, during our four months working towards a conference publication, he spent first three debugging an algorithm that's not theoretically grounded on a set of contrived settings. Even during our meeting with his supervisor, his supervisor pointed out the same thing - but he kept on going in his direction, ignoring what we say.
We could have changed our project direction much earlier, but because of his "perseverance" we are now trying to squeeze out a publication from something very contrived in the final month (out of the four months).
The consequence to me is that I'm asked, by the PhD student, to code up things / explore things that make no sense to me whatsoever. Obviously, I do not enjoy research with him and I'm not learning anything. My main contribution is a set of softwares for the lab that's not directly related to the project.
Is there something that I can do in this scenario? Should I communicate with his supervisor (I hope to get perspective from people who are themselves supervisors)? The PhD student is a nice person outside research, but I find it hard to restrain my frustration when talking to him about research.

Is this your first research experience?

@Richard It's actually my third. Previously, I've done one summer research (yielded a reasonably good publication with a PhD collaborator) and one during-the-term research.

If this is a summer research project, you don't have a lot of time left in which to change the situation.
Most likely, you'll end up having to accept that this research experience didn't turn out well. That happens! Try to look back and determine when you could have seen warning signs and what you could have done to change things. Use this learning to avoid or better manage similar situations in the future.
Charitably, learning to do research well is challenging, as is managing an undergrad, and maybe your PhD student has biffed one or both. With any luck they've learned something and won't do this again.
Beyond this, there are still several things you can walk away with:

Your lessons learned, as above. Any experience is valuable. At your level, the act of participating in research is, by itself, something of a differentiator and you are credited for having done it when applying to future endeavours. Also, interviewers for both grad school and industry are often interested in times when things went wrong

A letter of recommendation. These are key if you intend to pursue graduate study and are, I think, weighted much more heavily than a mere count of publications. If you're advised by a PhD student it's often the case that the professor will use their input (sometimes verbatim) to write an LoR. Note that this means your relationship with both the professor and PhD student is important.

A co-authorship. This is nice to have and you should pursue authorship within reason (don't pretend you can do much work during the semester). However, even if you were first author (it doesn't sound like it in this case), the LoR would still be much more important since it contextualizes you and your work.

All three of those take-aways seem very do-able from your description. Maybe the paper won't be as impactful, maybe you've learned less directly the things you wanted to, but you're not leaving empty-handed.
So what should you do with the time left?
Both the advisor and the PhD student know that you were not responsible for strategy on this project. Their opinion of you is based on the ideas you've brought to the table, how you've comported yourself, and the quality/quantity of your work. Even if the project itself has gone poorly, you may have been and should continue to be exemplary along all these axes.
If you have good relationships with the PhD student and advisor you might meet with them, separately or together, to try to do a post-mortem. If you do this, do not blame the PhD student or harp too much on what might have been. The only reason to have this conversation is for you to learn, not to confront anyone, so be sure to figure out ahead of time what you're interested in knowing. Perhaps the ideas you see as exciting and achievable are, in their estimation, too big/hard to accomplish in the timeframe available? Perhaps they prefer an incrementalist approach? I wouldn't suggest asking these questions directly, but they're ways of thinking about the problem.
EDIT
You say you know what you're doing. This provides an additional avenue you can explore.
Many universities have programs which pay undergraduates to do research they propose.

At University of Minnesota this is called UROP and provides a stipend of $1,500 for 120 hours of research, paid through financial aid.
At MIT it's also called UROP with a maximum funding award for fall and spring of $1,995 (140 total hours) and $6,840 (480 total hours) for the summer.

Typically the applications for these programs are easy: a page or two of writing covering the background, what you plan to do, maybe a timeline of milestones, and what faculty you plan to work with.
Since you say you have good ideas and have brought them up, you could try to arrange a UROP to work with your professor independently (not under the PhD student). Alternatively, you could bring your ideas to another professor and work with them (this lets you see another lab in action and sets you up for another recommendation). The only tricky point is if the PhD student feels like they somehow own the ideas you've brought up.

Thanks for the answer! I might have equal experience as the PhD student, in the sense that I've started self-reading, attending lectures and doing projects on this subject since freshmen year of undergraduate (I'm now a junior), while the PhD student is just starting his second year and he's from a different background. Therefore, when I say that he's investigate things in a contrived way, I'm actually being realistic. Even when I bring this up politely, it seem to make him unhappy. So, I'm confused about how to keep a good relationship with him - should I just agree with him?

"Both the advisor and the PhD student know that you were not responsible for strategy on this project." - I think you are right. For this reason, I might choose to be passive to keep a good relationship with the PhD student. After all, pain will be over in a month.

@Wiza: I have edited my answer at the end, please take a look.


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Am I responsible for reproducing results if open-sourced code is bad?
In computational research, authors of publications are often required to open-source their code. However, while having open-sourced one's code improves chance for journal/conference acceptance, reviewers in general do not read code (for obvious reasons, as reading code is very time consuming). As a result, code are usually poorly written / badly documented.
If I'm unable to understand/run a codebase (provided that I'm quite familiar with the language/framework it is using) even under good intentions, and my own implementation fails to reproduce its results, who's responsible?
This is a real concern since, as students/researchers, our time is a scarce resource and we all have a life outside academia. I don't want to spend an unlimited time on a codebase that I cannot understand.

If you can prove the correctness of your own, perhaps that will solve the problem without having to prove the incorrectness of theirs

Have you contacted the authors and provided a bug report including error messages or seemingly incorrect results that you obtained?

At first I thought this question was opinion-based, but then I remembered why peer review exists.

@LukeSawczak That sounds like a good idea. Open-sourcing my own well-documented implementation, even if it doesn't work as claimed, allows others to identify potential problems.

@AnonymousPhysicist I'm not sure if I get what you mean. If I'm interpreting correctly, I agree that open-sourcing code is just like saying: "look review I've done it" but it doesn't hold any more value than that.

@BrianBorchers That's a good idea, and I've encountered authors that respond timely. Having said that, a lot of open-source codebases are poorly maintained, and few even claim that they are academic labs, not software companies, and are hence not responsible for answering questions.

If you cannot reproduce a result as a student, then that can mean two things: the code is wrong or you are wrong. Both are likely: mistakes happen and students are students because they don't know everything they need to know (otherwise they would not need to be students). Authors are obviously not responsible for a lack of skills of students, but they are responsible for their own mistakes.
What the consequences are, or should be, are two completely different questions. If you are responsible, but there are no consequences, then ...

No, you aren't responsible for reproducing the results of others. You are responsible for producing good and accurate results. Reproducing the results of others is good if, but only if, those results are correct.
It is possible that the code you found has led to an incorrect result. The code, per se, isn't the issue, but the results.
If your code produces different results, they may be correct or not and your own code may be good, or not. But if you want to know why there is a divergence a well designed set of tests might tell you exactly why. They may tell you where the results diverge and if you can use that to call the paper you've found in to question then you have the basis for a publication.
The diversion, of course, might also show you where your own code went wrong.
And, even if you don't have code yourself, you can use such a set of tests to verify the validity of the found code.
But, at the end of the day, it is hard to trust results produced by crufty code.

... reviewers in general do not read code ... fails to reproduce its results, who's responsible?

Peer reviewers and editors are collectively responsible for ensuring published work includes enough information that the work can be reproduced.  If the code is deterministic, already published, and it does not reproduce, that is a failure of the reviewers and editors.
If the research in question is statistical in nature, it's normal for small samples not to reproduce.  Only physics is responsible.
If the typical PhD student in the field does not have the expertise to reproduce the research, it has been poorly presented and the peer reviewers should have pointed that out.
If the code does not reproduce because the PhD student does not have typical PhD student skills, then the faculty who should have trained the PhD student are responsible.
My advice:  peer review better, when it's your turn to review.