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Mentioning funding from previous research without direct influence on current paper?
Consider the following situation: A student is at a university U, funded by a certain stipend, with the ambition of pursuing a phd in research area X. After a year he drops out because things are not working with the professor. Another year later he starts work on a paper in the research area X that is not based on work he did while at U. Would it be
a) necessary (I don't think so)
b) appropriate (neither)
c) possible (maybe)
to mention that previous funding in an acknowledgement of a publication?
Before you ask:
Why not ask the professor? - He's a difficult person.
Is it really not based on work at U? - X mainly is an application of Y the basics of which you learn during you bachelor's and master's and which is easily enough to develop the idea for the paper. No reference to notes taken or things learnt while at U, only benefit is some knowledge of the literature on X, helpful in preparing a final manuscript. Which I don't think usually warrants an acknowledgement, does it?

It is difficult to assess, because your second work in area X was not done by your completely virgin mind, you surely learned something during your first work on X at U.

the more I read your quesion, the more I think "only benefit is some knowledge of the literature on X, helpful in preparing a final manuscript." means the question is wrong and there is a direct influence on current paper (explicitly said: you saved time for your current study because you did the literature research previously)

You save time on your current work because you studied, because, say, you attended a lecture on differential geometry during you bachelor's. Do you see people acknowledging there mom and dad funding their studies in papers? No. In a thesis, yeah, but not in a journal article. It's not customary as far as I know. So somewhere there is a line you draw for previous things you learnt in relation to your current work. I think what's mentioned in the question is beyond that line, but would like to hear experienced folks' opinion on it. What's wrong with that?

I set the line in "I was paid or I was provided equivalent non-monetary support to perform some research". So bachelor's courses are not part.
People should acknowledge mum and dad, if they provide funds, it would make explicit how crappy are fundings for PhDs and co. But people are too tight up and too naive to admit that, they prefer to acknowledge the 100$ grant from NSF instead of the 5'000$ from mom and dad.

Ok, but say you learn something during your phd while being paid for your research. In you book, at which point of your career do you stop mentioning the phd funding, how many years later? As soon as you're at the next university/on the next grant, and the results you publish do not directly stem from your phd work, right?

as long as you already published something while being funded by X, the fundings X exhausted their scope.
Afterwards you cite the research funded by X, instead of acknowledging the fundings, you can cite the product of those fundings.

Note that there are two quite different sorts of funding. First, there is general funding of a person engaged in some scholarship endeavor. Scholarships and many fellowships are like that. They are independent of the details of what you work on.
The second sort of funding is specific to a project. Some government grants are like that. A person/team is going to pursue a particular line of enquiry and needs funding for equipment, or students, etc.
For the second sort of funding there is no need to acknowledge it on other unrelated projects. For the first kind it is courteous if not always necessary to acknowledge old funding. Current funding of the second kind should probably be acknowledged.
Given the circumstances you describe, I doubt that acknowledgement of the early funding or even the first university is needed, though it might be courteous to do so, especially if it was funding of the first sort described above. That funding helped get you to where you are - in a position to do the current research even if it didn't contribute directly to the project.
It is probably better, however, to err on the side of acknowledgement in edge cases. You lose nothing by being generous.

Thanks for your reply. I consider making his research project look better than it is sort of a loss, given the experience I've had with him, but I think that might be worth accepting in being generous with acknowledgements.

The situation is not clear, only you can assess how much work (even preparatory work) was done at U.
A note of caution: since you are working on the same area X, there is a non-zero risk that your previous advisor at U find some part of your new work as plagiarized, or influenced, or done while you were at U, or said advisor may even think you are using some work/ideas/etcetc from them.
You state that new work is not based on old work at U, but if you did not publish anything while at U, there is no external, independent way to say "OP worked on X in a different way while at U".
You are also admitting that you earned some state-of-art knowledge at U, that you will use that knowledge in the final manuscript, so I tend to think you should not only put the U funding in the acknowledgement, but also both the current and the old affiliation at U in your author details...

Since you states the professor is a difficult person, keep in mind this: the later a problem emerge, the worse their reaction. You may think about being away and out of reach when the problem emerges ... that is a bad strategy: it means that when the problem explodes. you are not anymore on the same boat of the professor, so the professor will torpedo you without any second thought because you are "on the other side" and said professor will not procide you any kind of defense or support, on the contrary.

You are quite right, it's better to deal with this instead of publishing and seeing what he thinks when he finds out a year later. Of course, I wrote to him, but his "assessment" was based on ignoring parts of my e-mail, seemingly assuming the work was partially performed at U, while not knowing what I have actually worked on. He thought his "input" should be mentioned - non-existent as concerns the current work. While having published a work with a phd student where my concrete input on the manuscript (not much, but existent) was not mentioned. Not that I care, but...

And the part about only me being able to access how much work at U went into the current one is the fun part. Unless the funding at U is mentioned somebody can always try to make me look bad, right?

unfortunately, if the other side is a difficult side, it is better to err a bit on the safe side, putting the funding in the acknowledgments. Regarding affiliations and co-authorship, it is up to you. Since your old advisor already thought his "non-existent input" should be mentioned, I tend to be pessimistic and I think you are at serious risk of being accused of having plagiarized his work in the near future. Discuss this risk with your current advisor and decide for a common strategy with the current advisor, you may need a lot of support even if you are wrongly accused.

I don't think the risk is too serious, but I wouldn't rule it out. So indeed, maybe better safe than sorry. I have no current advisor btw., among alternatives in academia two didn't work out, the rest I didn't fancy or I had enough for the moment. My current research is funded by my day-job at a software company... Thanks for your advice.


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Should I put some useful information for phd students on my academic website?
I plan to put on my website useful books and useful journals related to my area, websites covering postdoc opportunities, in other words, information that I think useful in our area especially for phd students. But I am a newbie, not a senior. Do you think it is pretentious or unnecessary?
My motivation is I would be happy and find useful if I read these information on someone else's site.

Presumably, you mean titles, not PDFs?

Define "newbie".

Welcome to Stack Exchange! Here are some related questions with many potentially helpful answers: What contents should I put on my academic website? and Is web-presence important for researchers? It will be helpful if you edit your question and make changes there to address the comments above. The more details you provide, the easier it is for others to provide helpful answers.

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Is it too early to ask about the status of my paper?
I submitted my paper to an Elsevier math journal specialized in my research area on May 3rd. The paper is a bit long but on a fairly mainstream topic. The paper status is still "with editor" since then.
Because of my job situation and the job evaluation on the line, it is crucial for me that the paper is published promptly. I know that 17 days is normal for "with editor" status. But given the type of the journal and my situation, is it too early to ask for an update on the status or let the editor know that the time is very important for me? or it might hurt the process? If it is too early, how long more should I wait?

Even supposing that you do not harm, it's difficult that asking "for an update" will really help fastening the whole process.

@AlessandroDellaCorte, Number Theory.

"it is crucial for me that the paper is published promptly." Prepare a plan B: a paper may need major review, the complete process may last 1/1.5 years.

I would say it's reasonable to put in the comments/cover letter when you submit a statement like: "I will be on the job market soon, so anything you can do to expedite the refereeing process would be appreciated."  If you know the editor, you could still tell them this now.  BTW if you mean JNT, they try to get reviews back quickly, so I wouldn't worry about it.

Does this answer your question? What does the typical workflow of a journal look like? How should I interpret a particular submission status?

Yes, it's probably too early. Time to review varies by discipline (I believe maths is particularly long, while medical science can be relatively quick). In any case, two/three weeks is too short for anything other than an editorial rejection. I wouldn't start chasing a paper until two or three months had passed with no notifications.
Some journals offer expedited review, but this is usually for papers with urgent findings (e.g. on Covid), not for career reasons. You could ask, but be prepared for the answer to be "no".
Reviewing is a volunteer activity (lots of problems with that, but anyway...) Finding reviewers takes time, and it's unlikely you would incentivise them to speed up by saying "it would be helpful for the author's career if you did this quickly".

Thank you for your response. I understand and agree with your points. My question was about the editorial part of the process; if explaining the situation could help expedite this part (Asking the reviewers, ...) or might sound pushy in the early stage, which it seems you think is the latter case.

It's unlikely that you can expedite this part of the process much. Waiting for reviewers to agree to review the paper will form most of the time at this point. Again, you can ask, and if you're polite it could help by a few days (e.g. move your paper up the pile for editorial review).

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Second-guessing my decision to do a PhD and looking for opinions
I'm a Master's student that has recently been persuaded into transitioning into the PhD program.
I have been at this lab for a year and enjoyed the work I'm doing. I was scared of the pressure of trying to get an academia job and thought I'd work for a few years after Master's and have an idea of how real life is like before considering doing a PhD. I also felt like I could aim for a "better" lab at a more prestigious school than my own (50-150 on world rankings) and possibly a more hands-on supervisor as I feel like I'm on my own sometimes.
My supervisor is a nice guy and very hands-off. We have weekly group meetings where we tell him what we did and he makes comments and suggests things to try for next step. I could just tell him I didn't do much that week too if I had to. We had two PhDs & a part-time post doc where I was going to frequently for help. Both the PhDs graduated and left the lab recently.
Above was the background. My supervisor asked me late last year if I wanted to do a direct PhD instead of finishing my Master's. I said no because I wanted to try working in another country after graduating. He came back after a while saying he could support me on an internship at the country for 9 months if I did a PhD, so I took the offer because I can both do research (which I enjoy) and live in the said country with the option of moving back to my current country stay opened.
I was happy with this decision until a recent talk with some previous/recent graduates from my lab. While nobody said anything bad about my supervisor, their experiences confirmed that he's very forgetful and does not really lookout for the students because he's too busy. The students had to plan for themselves and sometimes push the supervisor in a certain direction that helps themselves. He seems more concerned with grants and his work than what the student wants to do. He is open to negotiations and does help whenever I ask for it.
I still stand with my decision to do a PhD because nothing is perfect and I don't get the internship opportunity with every professor. But I'd like to get some outside opinion on this, with the question being - how much am I missing out by staying with a supervisor that is more concerned with his success than mine but still provides assistance when I ask for it (given that I wouldn't always know exactly what to ask for)? He feels more like a senior colleague than a mentor, which I don't know if it's a bad thing.

There are many types of supervisors, but what you write about yours seems pretty normal to me and for sure not particularly bad. In many places PhD students are expected to work quite independently. I'd even think if you look at higher ranked schools that on average they expect more independence and have more supervisors that don't have much time (as high ranks are achieved by other things than using much of your time for your PhD students).

"staying with a supervisor that is more concerned with his success than mine " you are incredibly lucky, you will have a supervisor that is not only concerned with his success. Even setting up PhDs for a professorship in highly ranked university is a goal for many supervisors, with the only goal being that they can say "I put my students in a chair in a highly ranked uni".
Never understimate how selfish is the human nature, especially if "hardened" after a couple of grants/academic panel review ...

If you are second guessing, do not do it. It is a very hard job,


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Submitting an abstract to many conferences
I know that it is unethical to submit an article to many journals as reviewers spend time to read it. How about one abstract to many conferences? If you have specific time period to present your abstract and uncompleted work, do you think it is unethical to submit it to many conferences and choosing one of them to attend?

Why do you think it is any different?

Abstracts are generally one paragraph and no adjustment for abstracts in conferences. Moreover, conference deadlines and review phases are generally in the same time period for conferences in August for example. If you want to attend a conference in August and apply to one conference, you could lose other options after getting a rejection.

Is it common to be rejected from a conference in your field? I've literally never heard of someone being rejected from a conference in mine if you have a modicum of an idea where to submit.

You need to clarify what field this is about.  Conferences are very different between, for example, physics and computer science.

Yes, unethical. You are still wasting people's time. Someone needs to read them and make decisions. Their time is valuable to them and to the community.  If everybody did such things then conferences would become untenable.

"Hmmm, we had 30 accepted abstracts, but only 3 people showed up."

If you submit to a conference, expect to attend if accepted.
Workshops would be a different matter, assuming that you are able to attend them all.

This makes sense for computer science, but for large physics conferences, very little time is spent examining abstracts.


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Is it a good idea to give a very short time for a decision of a professor job?
I recently completed a final round interview for an AP job. I told the interview committee that I only have about a few days to respond to other offers and would appreciate if they could let me know the decision as soon as possible although I know that they are interviewing other candidates as well. Is it a good idea? The interview went really well.

What does A stand for? Associate, assistant, or adjunct?

It’s Assistant!

Putting on prior conditions isn't going to help you as they have constraints. If their rules require interviewing n (say 3) candidates they need time to arrange that and probably don't have a way to make it work as quickly as you require.
Asking for a decision asap and stating that you have your own constraints might be ok (or not), but anything beyond that will likely hurt, not help. Even Einstein wasn't recognized for his brilliance in his earliest days.
You can't always force the world into the lane you would like. Make your decisions at the point you need to make them.
Asking others for a few extra days to decide is another alternative that is probably less likely to be a problem if you have an offer. ("Probably", not certainly)

If this is in the United States, making a job offer will require multiple levels of approval.  You will not have a firm job offer in a few days.  If the committee thinks you are going to decline because you have accepted another offer, they will not offer you the job.  Communicate clearly if you are still seeking the job.
We cannot predict what they will do.


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Reaching out to professors in a new department for US PhD admissions
I'm applying to a brand-new PhD program at a well-known American university focused on an interdisciplinary area, and their website and application supplemental is encouraging people to reach out to professors. A few of them were just hired for this program, and the rest were drawn from other departments.
At least one prof is encouraging emails, while others have said to just mention them on the application so they see it. My PI has a connection to one of the affiliated faculty members, and said he'd introduce me at some point. As far as the other ones go, what should I do? I don't have anything to really say/ask that won't be mentioned in my application anyways, and I think it'll be easy to cross into the spam territory.

Are you looking to work with one of them, specifically? It would be good to avoid "noise" emails.

@Buffy Some of them are more connected than others to the research I've been doing/would like to do, but I think all of their main faculty (<5 of them) would be interesting to work with.


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Convincing my advisor to let me submit to a relatively new conference
I'm a CS PhD student, I'd like to submit something at a conference that has a deadline next year. I mentioned submitting to this conference in an email to my advisor and after looking at it, they told me in-person it was not a major enough conference to submit to. The conference is comparatively new, but it is maybe the largest one in the subfield.
I briefly mentioned to my advisor that I thought it would be good for networking (and that also I know a few friends nearby the conference). I didn't think of mentioning in the meeting that I've reviewed for the conference's sister workshop, and trust it's a good conference. Moreover, I think many of the organizers are well-known, and many of the proceedings are submitted by very well established groups.
Even if I don't submit this year, I'd like to convince my advisor that submitting there in the future will be beneficial. How can I approach this topic next time to convince them this is a good idea?

"maybe the largest one in the subfield" Based on what data?

@lighthousekeeper Nearly all qualitative data, it's a small subarea. Most quantitative data I honestly know of is Twitter follower count.

Twitter follower count is a poor metric for conference size. Followers can be bought, and established conferences (including in the broader area that includes the subfield) might be less interested in Twitter. That applies especially after the recent developments with Twitter's leadership.

I would wait and see what comes of the conference this year. You are probably getting good advice, especially if they suggest a better conference.
I assume, also, that you want/need financial support for attendance. That might be a steep climb, but if you want to finance yourself, I see little harm. Also, consider who the conference sponsors are. If it is a major professional society it would speak to its quality.
A lot can happen in a year.


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Is it possible to provide letters of recommendation later in the process because of an error when inserting them in the system?
For an application to a postdoctoral position in the US, I made a mistake when inserting the emails of my referees. Could the committee take into account my application, and then ask me to submit the recommendation later in the process?

They might. They might not. But only they know. Ask.

At least at some places the committee will only see application packets that are complete - the admins won't forward incomplete packages. And is a committee even involved in a postdoc application?

There should be a person named in the advertisement, or at least an email listed that you can contact with questions.  This is a reasonable question to email them about.

This will depend entirely on the institution and department where you are applying. I know in my department at my institution the answer is "yes", and in fact we've had letters of recommendation added to interview packages that were originally sent out a week beforehand, on the morning that we were conducting interviews.
So ask them. the worst that could happen is they say definitively say "no", and at least then you'll know.


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About writing survey papers in the Computer science field
I am confronted with the task of writing a survey paper, the advisor collected for me a number of papers to study and summarize and I suspect they would come up with the schema and structure of the draft.
my question is should I be explicit about the details of each paper in the summary of each? Will that be OK in the final version of the survey paper? In how many lines of text roughly speaking should i summarize each of the provided papers?

definitely not!

You are approaching the task incorrectly!  That's not how surveys are written. If it was about lines, I could write a robot to do it.  Why do I need you?

@Prof.SantaClaus Your comment is useless. To be useful, if you know how to write a surveys paper and you have a experience with that, you should write an answer to explain how to do it, how should we approach. Because there's many people who don't know to do it.

Your question seems to be mainly about the expectations and customs at your institution. However, you can take inspiration from a very high level journal, ACM Computing Surveys (CSUR), that is accessible from the ACM Digital Library. At this level, there is no fixed number of lines for each paper. Rather, the papers are organized into batches (which make up chapters), and within each batch, a linear story is being told. Fundamental concepts are given much more space and some heavy papers that might be the last word on an algorithm or implementation might have only a couple of lines.
Be warned that coming up with a good story to summarize the research is quite difficult. It involves really understanding the research papers, but goes beyond it. You might imagine having to explain to a new student what this field is about. (The new student is intelligent, but does not know a lot.) If you can explain, then you have started to understand the field.

Could i write 10 lines of text to describe one paper involved in the survey?

@SSSOF That's not how it works.  It's not about lines.  It's about understanding, and how those 'lines' contribute to the central story or theme.

but eventually you will have to describe the papers! and to do, how far can you go describing one


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selected Phd student did nothing for the first year
What would be the fate of a CS PhD student in the US that wasn't able to implement something during the first year of their program? How the supervisors react to such students considering they selected them in the first place?

Only your supervisor would know what they think satisfactory progress is.

what do you mean by "not implement anything"?

What do you mean the "fate"?! God won't let them go to heaven probably because of their sin of "not implementing anything"...

fate = final outcome according to oxford's

Normally the early part of a US doctoral program is coursework leading to the comprehensive exams. There are a few exceptions. And starting with a masters, instead of the usual bachelors, can be a bit different, though prelims are still facing most students. Most students (again with exceptions) don't have a "supervisor" this early. The system is very different from the European one and some others. Doctoral students, in particular, are normally admitted by a committee, not by an individual supervisor (again, some exceptions).
There is also the issue of what it means to "not implement" anything. Given the above typical case, that would be pretty common, though good grades in coursework is expected.
But in the case in which a student is in a particular lab, working for a particular supervisor, questions would be asked and answers expected. Nothing specific would automatically happen. Students are students, not accomplished researchers.
In addition, some problems given to students are harder than others. No "visible" accomplishment might be a result of a research problem that turns out to be harder than initially expected. There are no guarantees when true research is undertaken. Some problems take years to crack. Some have never been cracked yet (or maybe ever).
But a lazy student, one who doesn't try, is another issue. They might be given some warnings about their work ethic.
I don't think the situation you describe says much of anything about the selection process. People make mistakes. It happens. Students with seemingly good prospects can have things happen. Anything from "hitting a wall" to medical/emotional issues or family problems can disrupt even a good student. People aren't perfect, either faculty or students, so some undesirable things happen. The system tries to make the bad things happen infrequently.
See this for how the admissions process works in the US for some background.

that's very balanced soft answer which i adhere, thanks !


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How should fair credit assignment work in this situation?
Person A suggested to person B that they implement a certain existing methodology, X, to solve problem Y. And offered to lead by advising while B be the driving force. Now B found another key question than the one offered by A, modified methodology X and got (new publishable) results. During the process, B did the coding, the testing, all the writing. Now how should the credit be assigned in the authorship of such paper?
Field: Numerical Optimization

My suggestion is that both authors be treated as equal contributors. That is to say that neither contribution seems "greater" than the other.
However, the contributions are a bit qualitatively different and if you want to spell that out, though not everyone thinks it necessary, write a contributions section (or acknowledgements) in which you mention the specific contributions of each.
This seems pretty close to pure math, actually, where the assumption is equal contributions. It is possible in math for someone to make a vital, indispensable, contribution to a paper in a five minute conversation in which they supply the key insight lacking in the other(s).
But your description describes the more normal back-and-forth in which each contributor advances not only the product but also the understanding of the other. Author order could be alphabetical as is typical in pure math.
I do, however, have a bias toward equal contribution in all but edge cases. And I am a co-author on one of those edge cases. It was obvious and so we made an exception.

I also fear there is a dispute lurking behind your question. I suggest you try to work beyond that. Such disputes don't lead to future collaboration that might be beneficial to everyone. Generosity may even be called for. Pistols on the Green at dawn isn't a good long term career strategy.

Thanks a lot. I'm inclined to put their name but not on the basis of ethics but, because I don't want to get into a lot of conflicts. I am a young female at the beginning of my career and he is senior to me.  At the same time, I don't want to come across as a naive person or somebody that can be used in my cohort. What looks ethical to me is that ethical collaboration should mean that everyone contributes equally in all endeavors. I am not going to collaborate with them again bc, I would not ask to be a co-author if I were in his shoes.


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Have money, but am old--how will these affect PhD application
In terms of academics, I think when I finish my masters (in two years), I will have a strong application with excellent grades, good recommendations, and a potentially very interesting project (albeit in an obscure, underfunded field).
I am going for a PhD because it is something I have wanted to do my whole life (like since I was eight), but I first had a lucrative career in a completely unrelated field.
I now have sufficient personal wealth to fund the costs of a PhD program, but I am also old enough to be someone's grandparent.
I want to be accepted on my academic merits and a good match for the institution, but I don't want to be rejected for a lack of funding (because it is truly a non-issue for me) nor my age.
How are these two factors going to impact my chances of acceptance?
Any suggestions for how to minimize the disadvantages?
Thanks much.

Welcome to Academia.SE. Interesting situation, but I think both of these have been addressed before. In particular: How old is too old for a PhD? and I am able to self-fund a PhD, how can I use this when applying?. If these links do not address your question, please [edit] your post to clarify why not, and we can consider reopening.


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Recommendation letter and conflict of interest
I have started a postdoc position very recently. I have funding for now, however I wanted independence, my PI encouraged this idea and we are working on a fellowship for me. On the other hand, I have been nominated by my PhD institution for a different fellowship that is by nomination only and is by far the best option I can imagine. I would like to ask my current PI to write a letter of recommendation for this application but I am afraid to render myself as opportunistic or misleading (since we were working on a different option together right now). I would be grateful to know PIs perspective on this subject:

Is asking for this letter appropriate or will I damage my relationship with my PI?
Is it possible that my PI writes a bad letter for me because I'm pursuing a different option?
What is the best way to approach my PI?

Thank you!

OP here! I just wanted to let others know about what I did and what happened! I asked my PI whether he is supporting my idea to apply for this fellowship! Not only he agreed to support the application by writing a glowing recommendation letter! He spent a good chunk of time to edit my proposal... I'm very thankful!

A wise, honorable, respectable postdoc advisor will recognize that for someone in your position it is absolutely necessary to consider all avenues for remaining and thriving in academia if it is your goal to do so. You need to be pursuing more than one thing because you cannot guarantee you will get anything you have to apply for.
A normal human being will also be a bit hurt and disappointed if you have plans with them and decide to go a different direction. However, disappointment need not lead to retribution, and a good advisor would not let this color their recommendation of you. Quite to the contrary: the best person to write you a recommendation to continue working in academia is someone who would like to personally continue collaborating with you.
If your advisor considers you negatively for pursuing your other options, that's a problem with them, not with you. However, you know your advisor better than we do: if you don't trust them, you may need to act more strategically. If you do trust them, I would recommend you just approach them directly with the circumstance and opportunity and ask if they could write a supportive letter. I don't think it's necessary to predetermine which opportunity takes precedence if you obtain them both; for now, you're just an applicant to two different opportunities.

Thanks for your answer! I do not know my PI long enough (3 months), it is not that I don't trust him, it is that I care a great deal about this opportunity. Any suggestions about how to "act more strategically" would be much appreciated!

@TheN The strategic advice would apply if you had reason to think your PI was a jerk, and would be coupled with trying to get out of there as soon as possible.

The answer to the second half of your first question heavily depends on the personal traits of your adviser. Both jealousy and magnanimity are natural and widespread human traits and without knowing a person really well, one cannot predict which one will prevail. Technically speaking, your request is completely reasonable and legitimate though.

It is possible but extremely unlikely. The general culture is just to refuse to write a recommendation letter if one doesn't intend to write a reasonably good one.

Just be honest and explain clearly why you prefer the other option. As a tactical step, you may even start with "I have that other option. What do you think of it?" and play it by ear from there.

My answer, as a PI, would be "{That option has such and such (dis)advantages (if I know them)/I cannot say much about that other option (if I don't know much about it)}; I can offer you this and this here, but it is your life and career, so the choice is yours and I'll respect and support it no matter what you choose." (Actually I was exactly in the position of such a PI once, so I am just repeating what I said back then. The approach of the postdoc was way more direct than what I am suggesting and went along the lines of "Will you feel betrayed if ... ?").
If you hear something reassuring like the above, you can proceed without hesitation, for whatever your PI feels in his soul, you can safely assume that he keeps his feelings under control and really wishes you the best. There are, probably, some responses that should make you back off immediately too but you'll easily recognize them as well.

Probably, depends on how much they invested to get that opportunity for you. I want to believe it will not go too far but you may lose any privilages that you might have.

Not unless they hold grudge so bad that they stake their reputation on sabotaging you. They may refuse to write a recommendation letter (even that might cause issues for them), but they cannot write a bad one out of spite. I personally will never employ (if I have the chance) someone in academia who has done this. Everyone passing through academic life require recommendation letter one point or another, anyone cheats this system has no place in it.

Best course of action is a passive approach. Tell them you want multiple options in case one of them doesn't work. If they ask what will you chose if you get accepted from both, tell them you have not made your mind yet and you will consider both options. Even ask them their opinion on the matter. Who knows maybe they will say you should chose the other one.


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4 weeks “with editor” normal?
I have submitted a math paper to an Elsevier journal. Before submitting it, I sent two separate polite emails to two editors (experts of the field) of the journal and asked them if they think my paper fits the standards of the journal, they both replied that the paper is very interesting and please submit to [..]. Moreover, I gave a few talks about my work and asked the people who invited me if they will consider reviewing my paper when later it gets submitted, they said yes. So when I submitted, I suggested appropriate editors and reviewers. However after around 4 weeks, the status of my paper is still “with editor”, I hoped since I suggested 4 reviewers and 2 editors my paper gets to review stage faster. Is it ok if I send an email to editor about the status? Can this hurt in anyway? Thanks for the help!

The short answers are: it's not normal, you can send a reminder, and it is unlikely to hurt.

It's a new normal. Just like reviewers, editors grow tired of unpaid and underappreciated work. With growing demands from teaching and research side of academic life, there is less time to dedicate to service. This is particularly true for early career academics,  who often spend unhealthy hours writing papers and teaching classes to boost their track record and establish themselves in academia.


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Can I contact the editor with relevant personal information in hope to speed-up the review process?
I have submitted a math paper to an Elsevier journal around 2.5 months ago, it is now under review (reviewer invited) for around 2 weeks. I understand that this is a relatively short time for a math paper. However, I am post-doc now and with huge amount of luck I found my ideal job in a national lab, its a junior scientist position and they promised me that if I have a first/single author paper then I will get this position, the window of opportunity will be closed by the end of this summer.
IS it appropriate to communicate this to the editor? and will this be helpful for speeding up the process?

Variants of this question has been asked before, e.g. How to ask politely the editor to urge the reviewers to finish the reviews in the best short time But even with a speedy review, your timeline seems quite tight.

Can you offer a draft for them to read in lieu of actual publication? Maybe being published is a bureaucratic checkbox they need to be able to tick off, but maybe having what they can consider publishable work would be sufficient even if actual publication is delayed or rejected for whatever reason.

There's nothing wrong in asking. A typical request would be written like this:
Subject: Request for Expedited Review of Submitted Manuscript - [Manuscript Title]
Dear [Editor's Name],
I hope this email finds you well. I am writing to kindly request your assistance regarding the review process of my manuscript titled "[Manuscript Title]," which was submitted to [Journal Name] approximately 2.5 months ago.
Firstly, I would like to express my gratitude to the reviewers and the editorial team for their time and effort in evaluating my work. I understand the importance of a thorough review process, and I appreciate their commitment to ensuring the quality of publications in [Journal Name].
However, I find myself in a unique situation where an exciting career opportunity has presented itself to me. I have been offered a junior scientist position at a national laboratory, which aligns perfectly with my research interests and long-term goals. The condition for securing this position is to have a first/single author publication, and the deadline for this opportunity is rapidly approaching at the end of this summer.
Given the time-sensitive nature of this career opportunity, I would be immensely grateful if it would be possible to expedite the review process for my manuscript. I understand that this is an exceptional request, and I assure you that I value the integrity and rigor of the peer review process. However, I believe that a faster review turnaround would provide me with the chance to fulfill the publication requirement and secure the aforementioned position, allowing me to contribute significantly to the scientific community.
If it is feasible, I kindly request your support in expediting the review process or providing any guidance that may facilitate an earlier decision on my manuscript. I am open to any suggestions or alternative solutions that would allow for a timely evaluation without compromising the quality of the review.
Please feel free to contact me if any additional information is required or if there are any updates regarding my request. I sincerely appreciate your understanding and consideration in this matter, and I remain committed to working closely with the editorial team to ensure the integrity and excellence of the publication process.
Thank you very much for your attention and assistance. I eagerly await your response and look forward to the outcome of the review process.
Kind regards,
[Your Name]
[Your Affiliation]
[Your Contact Information]
Since it's long, it'd help to highlight the important sentences with a yellow highlight or bold letters.

Reasonable letter, and I appreciate the importance of being appropriately polite/deferential, but I would say that the solution to "it's too long" is not "highlight or bold the important stuff" but "try to cut it down to two short paragraphs" ...

I agree that a short-and-sweet email is better, but in academic circles, I've noticed that the extra context and consideration added by this kind of an email does have value of its own.

Thanks for the letter, I used a similar but shorter email and contacted the editor, if anything good happens will post here…

My gut says this would not be inappropriate but it might not be effective. Everyone wants their papers published quickly. I can't imagine your situation is unique.
I suppose that if your potential job hinges on this paper being published in the next 2 months you could ask nicely to see if they can speed up the administrative portions of the publication/review. But even if you got a sympathetic editor (and one that had the time and authority to fast-track your paper), they can't control reviewers or whether or not you need to make revisions. So you would see limited benefits in the best case.
I think your best bet is to contact your potential employer and let them know that you have this paper under review. Maybe they will accept that in lieu of the final publication.

You can, and a sympathetic editor can probably speed things up a little. They could, e.g., invite more reviewers to start, pass your message to the reviewers and see if they can speed up the review, or simply send some reminders. But there will come a point where they cannot speed up the process any further - for example if a reviewer says they're on holiday for the next two weeks, and it's not plausible that a new reviewer will be able to review the manuscript within the next two weeks, then the only thing they can do is wait.
Which doesn't mean you can't ask. If it's really important to you, you might as well ask - the downside is minimal, if there's any downside at all.

Yes, you can ask, but it might not have any effect. It is unlikely to slow the process, but the reviewer has their own time constraints.
But the editor might be able to get you a decision some days or so earlier than otherwise. Asking is fine, but it won't affect the final decision, I expect.

I'm afraid it is almost certainly already too late. If reviewers have been found, they will probably have been given a three-month deadline, which is too late for your purposes, and the editor is not going to try to hurry them before that deadline. If not, then perhaps the editor can put more effort into finding them quickly, and suggest a slightly shorter deadline, but even this is likely to be too slow for you. (It could even backfire, if it makes finding reviewers harder.)
And a key point is: all this is only about the first decision, which is almost always "revisions required" (at best). Even if you could get to this point before the end of the summer, it is not clear that that would be any good.
If you had known this when initially submitting, it may have helped, as it seems there was an unnecessary delay in finding reviewers. But you would still have been asking for an extremely fast decision, so I very much doubt it would have happened in time even then.


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How to fix a non-trivial breakdown in a relationship with a former PhD advisor?
During the final year of my PhD, my relationship with my advisor experienced a significant non-trivial breakdown. However, for the years prior, we had a good relationship. The deterioration of this relationship wasn't due to anything extreme, and it wasn't a situation where all lines were crossed, but it was a serious clash of personalities up to the point that I did not ask a recommendation from him, and I told him I would make it on my own. I published my thesis work as single-author papers and secured funding to support my postdoc; I do not need letters or support from him, and he is aware of this. Now, I want to know if there is any way to repair this relationship. Partly, this is because we are still at the same institution, and it's awkward, but mostly because I genuinely want to mend things.
My question is mainly directed towards PIs who have had several students: do you think it is possible to fix this? Certainly, there will be some awkwardness to overcome, but would you find any incentive to do so? how should I approach him? I don't want to reach out only to be ignored or face a similar response, note that we are still at the same institution, which can make things even more awkward, at least for me.

We don't know either of you and so all we can do is guess. That might be harmful. I suggest you talk to someone you trust who knows both of you to get advice. But this is too personal for a good answer here.

Do you have a permanent position or a temporary one?

You will have to tell us more about what specifically led to the breakdown, and how that played out. In essence, all you're saying is the equivalent of "I got a divorce; is there any possibility to mend the relationship with my ex?"

Now I wonder what a trivial breakdown could be.

I do not think that real mending is likely, but still it might be possible in rare cases.
However, it does not cost you anything to be civil, courteous and polite, and maybe a tad more supportive and obliging than a pure neutral person would be at relevant occasions (whether in departmental decisions or other matters; though this is not a suggestion to compromise on core values, of course). This can rebuild trust over a long period. Do not expect quick fixes, though.
However, if you suddenly would switch behaviour, this will be a red flag. Don't do that, or they will wonder what you are up to or see you as opportunistic.
Depending on the case, you could also be upfront when you go to them and put the matter explicitly as a case to mend fences. This may work with some people, is however less likely for deteriorations that took longer time to develop and it bears the risk of direct rejection.
My recommendation is therefore the first strategy.

Is the main point of this answer that reaching out is not a good idea? The first strategy doesn't seem relevant, as I'm now in a different department and don't have a permanent position either.

@TheN If you considered not reaching out at all an option, you might not have written this question. Since you obviously want to mend fences, I gave you an option how to approach this. My option #1 is not saying "do not reach out". My option #1 effectively says "prepare the ground for improving relations". I do not know why you want to do that, but clearly it's important to you, so I suggested two options. There are many ways you can demonstrate a softened attitude (and gave examples for this) and with reasonable people, that can be infectious. The second option is "aggressive" with more risk.


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Postdoc position follow up
I had two Zoom interviews with a PI in two weeks. As of today, 3 weeks have passed since the second interview and I haven't heard anything from the PI.
I was expecting either position offer or rejection, but there was no update since then.
I wonder if it would be okay to send a polite "follow-up" email to the PI inquiring process update.
Thank you in advance for suggestions!

Does this answer your question? Should I send follow-up email one week after post-doc interview if interviewer said they will make decision in "week or two"?

Since two weeks have passed, you would be justified to ask.
Is there a reason on your side to ask now, such as another offer or the need to make alternate plans? People would understand such a reason.
Usually, there is some internal reasons for a delay. It could be as trivial as not getting a signature because a key person is on vacation. It could be that the offer was given to someone else, and now they are waiting for that candidate's decision, but they want to make an offer to you as the second-best choice. Or there might be some internal need to verify funding for the position. In these and similar cases, I do not see what an answer to the email can bring to you other than more clarity.
I would give it one more week to let them work out things internally, thus doubling their estimate. There have been cases where people just forgot to inform an unsuccessful candidate. In a case I know of personally, they forgot to inform the second tier candidates for a deanship.


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Can I submit a research proposal (originally made for a PhD) for postdoc fellowship under different PIs?
I made a research proposal for a PhD position. I was able to secure a conditional offer from a UK university but did not secure funding as the UK prof did not fund my project. After completing my PhD from another institution in my home country (on a different topic from the UK PhD idea), I have now applied for a postdoc fellowship revising the original PhD proposal which secured me a PhD position in the UK.
I applied for this postdoc fellowship from a different EU university. I want to ask can the UK institution and professor object to choosing another host institution for this postdoc.?

Yes, you can develop your earlier ideas. If others have contributed to them you need to, at least, acknowledge those contributions to avoid any charge of plagiarism. But no one can stop you from developing an idea (patent law aside).
If an idea is "out there" then anyone can work on it. It is only necessary to acknowledge others who contribute. Sufficient contribution earns others the right of authorship, of course.
I think it would be a mistake, for lots of reasons, to hide your future development from others you've worked with in the past. Collaborations are usually valuable to early career researchers. But those discussions haven't given ownership or control over the concept to anyone. If someone would object, it would be improper. If someone would ask to be part of your research it would probably be an advantage all around.

And, beyond this proposal, I suggest that you keep a notebook of research ideas that might bear fruit someday, but which you don't have time at the moment to work on. These commonly arise while doing other research. Put separate ideas on separate pages/documents and review them periodically. Some of them might be developed while you seem stuck on your current project. Some might be developed later when you are done and waiting for word from publishers.

You are still the owner of your original proposal, which was made without input from your potential UK host institution. Even if there was some discussion that improved the proposal, they were unable to accept your offer, and you are therefore free to pursue it in another context. If your denied Ph.D. proposal reflected a lot of contribution of the UK institution or your potential UK guide, then it would be polite to talk to whoever helped you with the proposal.
Of course, if the UK people did not like the idea, this fact might give you some feedback about the value of your idea.

Thank you for your response. There was certainly some discussion with the professor which helped me improve the proposal but all this was 4 years back. I have not had any chat with him since then. This time I have considerably revised the proposal myself (but the original idea remains the same) to suit it as per the postdoc standards. I am somehow bothered if I am doing something which is not per academic ethics by not letting the UK professor know about all this and if this could pose a problem for me later on.

"Owner" is too strong, but certainly the OP can develop any ideas they have. Acknowledgement of the folks who participated in the development of the ideas may be all that is required here. And there is little reason to hide the future development from those people.


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What are the typical components of job application packets for Lecturer/Assistant Professor positions at UK universities?
I come from the US academic system (well, mostly), so please pardon my ignorance; I couldn't find a lot of information online so I ask this here. It appears to me that most of the UK lecturer/assistant professor job posts are not asking for anything more than just CV and Covering Letter. Is this the norm in UK? I am used to submitting several other documents for my US academic job applications, that includes research statement, teaching statement, and diversity statement. So I was wondering whether such statements are expected for UK lecturer/assistant professor job applications, even if they are not explicitly asked for.
In case if the search committees of UK universities, don't require separate research and teaching statements and rather want to see them as part of the covering letter, how   much details do they expect (in terms of past research, future goals, funding prospects, teaching philosophy, etc.)?. I presume that the covering letter shouldn't be longer than 2 pages.

I don't think there is a universal answer for UK universities. It will depend on the university and department.
When I was applying some combination of the following were asked for (not necessarily all):

CV
cover letter
research statement/plans
teaching statement/plans

A specific diversity statement was never asked for (I would address this through the other documents if possible).
If no specific statements are asked for address research/teaching briefly in the cover letter (2-3 pages max). Include as much detail as you can (especially specific figures rather than general statements), but focus on future plans rather than past work. The idea is to show that your plans are realistic and achievable at the department you're applying to (and you could get them funded). I would balance research/teaching based on the priorities of the department/university you're applying to.
I wouldn't submit documents that they didn't ask for. It's always worth asking to make sure you know what they are expecting.


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Why do faculty often complain about teaching?
As a PhD student and a post-doc, I always liked being a TA, and I always considered teaching as a natural duty for grad students and faculty. In the end, universities are and should be mainly about transmitting knowledge to students. Sometimes, I even enjoyed grading and proctoring because it would give me a short break from a highly creative job (research) to a mechanical one, where I could partially switch my brain off.
While a minority of my colleagues would enjoy teaching as much as I did, the large majority would endlessly complain about their teaching duties, and boringly compare their teaching load to the lighter one that colleague X or Y got assigned by the department, shouting to the world how unfair that was.
I never understood why this is the case. In particular, I have two questions:

How can someone end up working in academia, if teaching is such a burden?
Why do people in academia (from grad student upwards) complain so much about their teaching load, often comparing it to that of their colleagues?

"In the end, universities are and should be mainly about transmitting knowledge to students." No. That is one mission of universities. Another one is to expand our knowledge through research. The two missions come into conflict because there is a limited amount of resources (most pertinently here, faculty time). Many academics are simply more interested in research than in teaching, hence the complaints.

Reading this post I can't help but share this article: "Graduate Students' Teaching Experiences Improve Their Methodological Research Skills"  https://www.jstor.org/stable/27978499    Indeed, though it may be true that research and teaching take away from each other, they also compliment each other.

I think it depends on the person, I am a PhD student as well and find teaching to be an annoying waste of time which breaks the day up when that day could be (and you could argue) should be dedicated to research and thinking about research problems.

@Tom if you look at the answers below, you will find out there exist
numerous institutions where you could have done a PhD without being bothered with teaching. Why did you choose a university instead?

I wasn't bothered with teaching, I did a bit and then chose not to do any more.

Why do  complain about ?

When you mention colleagues complaining, are you talking about fellow PhD students and fellow postdocs? Or faculty? The scenarios are very different.

@usul hear complaints from any level. Grad students, post-docs, professors. Note that in my uni, we would have a mandatory percentage of time to dedicate to teaching (typically 20%) - even for grad students

"universities are and should be mainly about transmitting knowledge to students" - what you think universities are/should be about may be distinct from what universities are actually about, which may be distinct from what others think universities are/should be about, which may be distinct from why others would take a job at a university (just because a university may be about one thing doesn't mean someone can't work there for another reason - do you think janitors care about the transmission of knowledge to students?). Also, where does this knowledge that should be transmitted come from?

@NotThatGuy I agree that we can discuss about my quoted sentence. Universities are about research as much as they are about teaching. The janitor example is pure whataboutism.

@G.Gare "The janitor example is pure whataboutism" - not even close. It perfectly demonstrates that {reason someone takes job = purpose of job giver} isn't always true, as your thought process seems to suggest, and as per the only reason you seem to offer for why someone shouldn't work in academia if they dislike teaching ("universities are and should be [about teaching] ... how can someone end up working in academia [if they dislike teaching]").

I'd start by considering that people complain about everything, especially to potentially sympathetic ears. When I was a line cook, I complained about cooking, as did all of my coworkers. My friends in software jobs complain about writing software, meetings about software, etc.
Similarly, academics will complain about the other parts of their work as well on the research and service sides (publishing and journals, peer review of their work, peer review of others work, grants, too many or not enough students, university administration, committees, etc).
While I agree with you that teaching is an important part of academia, it's often a forced/obligated part from the perspective of a professor's job. There simply aren't many jobs that are "research-only", so everyone who is in academia primarily to do research experiences teaching as an additional obligation. Even if they do actually enjoy teaching, it's still perceived and treated as an additional burden. Instructors may have a big influence on their individual students, but at top research institutions teaching doesn't typically get much "credit" in terms of hiring/promotion besides as a "checkmark", and doesn't have much influence in perception outside the institution. The most famous/influential/honored professors are labeled as such by their research output, not their teaching, and time spent teaching is time spent not researching.
If you put a child's favorite entree next to their favorite dessert, and instruct that they need to finish the entree in order to get the dessert, you're setting up a natural hierarchy that makes eating the entree a chore, even if it would be thoroughly enjoyed in another context.

Entering an industrial research department from academia (same country), the most refreshing change was that people complain way less than in academia. There's a bit of complaining (management, food at the canteen, colleagues), but that's very mild and almost never public. I have the feeling that nobody wants to be perceived as the person who complains, as it is a rather toxic attitude to have on a workplace, which may lead to less promotions and a general perception of being less trustworthy. I think there's something special about complaining in academia.

"I'd start by considering that people complain about everything" I have a complaint about this absolutely true statement.

@G.Gare My personal experience is that people in industry complain as much if not more than people in academia, but that's based on the sample of my specific friends and family. If you've found a place to work where there is little reason to complain, then it sounds like you've found a good fit! :) I think one special thing about complaining in academia is there's often no other option - in industry, most skilled workers can find another job and quit their previous one if they're unhappy. In academia, switching jobs is not trivial, so the balance may shift to improving the job you have.

I know some academics who are there to teach and complain about being forced to write papers, but even they complain about teaching. In some cases, they complain about having too light a teaching load if they fall below the full time pay threshold.

@infinitezero I have a complaint about your comment since you aren't complaining but rather agreeing with that statement :)

There is also the disappointment of learning that most "teaching" time is not actually spent in front of students but preparing material, exam questions etc.. And making tough decisions about what to teach. This time is not so enjoyable, and under big pressure from other tasks. If you can't justify spending more time preparing than lecturing, and end up in front of students less-prepared then you wish you were, that can really take the fun out. A well-prepared and well-delivered lecture/lesson, though, is an amazing thing, especially if you notice the students like it, too.

This will depend on the institution, country, etc. But at many/most research-intensive universities career progression is largely dependent on research productivity (grants, papers, etc). Teaching takes (a lot of) time away from research and since it is largely not used for promotion decisions is often seen as wasted time.
I enjoy teaching but I also want to keep my job and advance my career. It's a difficult balance and I found that I must carefully defend my research time lest teaching and administration completely take over. It is very easy to be envious of a colleague who has managed to get themselves a lighter teaching load (sometimes by being intentionally bad at teaching) who gets promoted more quickly than those who deliver a great learning experience for their students at the expense of their own research.
This is obviously a huge generalisation. There will be academics who are great at both teaching and research, institutions that do reward teaching, etc. However, this is essentially the way teaching has been viewed from my experience in academia.

"who has managed to get themselves a lighter teaching load (sometimes by being intentionally bad at teaching)" ... does this make the case for a separation of careers (people who are predominantly researchers or teachers) being needed in academia?

@G.Gare: such a separation already exists. There are places where you can focus almost exclusively on research, and possibly "teach" some Ph.D. students, or give some graduate classes. There are institutions that focus much more on teaching and have much lower expectations as to your research output. And places in between, where you might get higher or lower teaching loads, depending on your role, grants and other responsibilities In the German system, these would correspond to the Max Planck Institutes, the Fachhochschulen and the universities, respectively.

True! In Switzerland you may think of the PSI or the ENPA, the Fachhochschulen, the cantonal and the federal (ETH and EPFL) universities. In France, you have the INRIA, the CEA, or the CNRF that are purely research institutes (even though researchers often teach at neighboring or hosting unis).
In Switzerland a research position at a university (involving teaching) is often perceived as more prestigious than a research-only position, though. Would it be the case in other countries, too? If yes, why?

@G.Gare On the other side of the coin, there are primarily teaching positions (even at primarily research universities), but they often do not have the respect (among the other faculty in the US at least) and advancement that they quite frankly deserve.  If you're looking at public university salary data, these positions are usually named "Lecturer."

In my university we would even have "Teachers", who are contractors hired to teach basic classes as calculus, linear algebra, etc. Unsurprisingly, their ratings were very high (given by students) and their students performed at least as well as students who were taught by chaired professors (when given the same exam).

I maintain they should have two separate systems of universities: One system for undergraduates, where professors are primarily concerned about teaching, and one system of graduate schools.

I agree with Bryan's observation that people have a tendency to vent about their work to sympathetic ears, even if they are complaining about fundamental aspects of their work.  Nevertheless, there are some understandable reasons why academics tend to complain more about teaching than about research:

Time on teaching has an opportunity cost that impacts research (and career advancement): Career advancement in academia is still primarily determined by research output, so time spent on teaching detracts from time available to pursue the research that will drive your career in the long-term.  This is one of the primary reasons that academics complain about high teaching loads or inequity in the allocation of teaching loads across their school.  Many universities are taking action to allow career advancement within a "teaching stream" but it is still easier to advance your career with research success.  For those academics who are interested in climbing the professorial ladder, time spent teaching may be suboptimal and therefore excess time on this may induce complaints.

Teaching the same topic repeatedly can become less interesting over time: This is not always the case, and it can even go the other way, but sometimes repetition of teaching the same topic over a long period of time (e.g., decades) can cause some ennui, even for academics who are passionate about their subject.  Students tend to make the same types of errors again and again over different student cohorts, so much of teaching work is repetitive.  (There are only so many times you can correct elementary calculus errors by students before some of the gloss wears off that activity, and similarly for most academic topics.)  Academics sometimes move around courses to add some variation to their teaching, but even with this variation, teaching in a field over a long period of time can become less interesting over time.

"These young people are strange and scary to me": Professors age, but their student cohorts stay the same age.  As this age gap widens, the academic has less in common with his/her students, will (correctly) view them as more immature/child-like, and will be more removed from their culture, habits, ways of talking, thinking, acting, etc.  In particular, younger students may have ways of behaving, thinking or talking that are off-putting or even irritating to some older academics, or which cause them to despair for the future of the human race.  This can cause academics to find teaching less enjoyable as they get older, and it may also be a contributor to greater focus on research.

I was about to make a comment about the Simpsons "It" speech. But then I noticed there was a mysterious link in your post...

The third point you make is really valid and does not only apply to older faculty members. I've seen 25 years old grad students complain about how the 19-year-old next-generation of students have changed with respect the "good old times"... to be honest, I've done it myself :)
The pandemics has changed very rapidly how students behave though, at least that's what I felt.

Plus one for this from me, especially the last paragraph. One of my personal sayings: "Kids these days." Unfortunately for me, kids these days includes people into their 40's. :p

Many academics do not have much time to spend on research.  As a PhD student or post-doc, your primary duty is research.  In our case, we would like a 'break' from teaching and governance so that we can get back to our research.

In many universities, teaching is not valued as much as research. At my university, even if you teach well, it is very difficult to gain promotion to a high level.

Teaching gives you zero notoriety. It only works backwards: like being able to say you attended a lecture by Carl Sagan. Who is notorious not because of his teaching, but his (actual) work on Voyager and of course, Cosmos. Surely, it's more fun to decide what goes on a Golden Record than to teach some 19yo's something from 100y ago. But it looked like he was having a pretty good time showing 9yo's pictures of space though. And that's why my mom never taught above 7th grade; it's a lost cause after that, with ever quickly diminishing returns.

@Mazura Or Feynman.

Complaining can be tactical
As many excellent answers above have noted, teaching, while it may be great, funds the institution, and is one of the vital goals of university existence, rarely helps with promotion, as opposed to research, which does. As a purely self interested lecturer, therefore, your goal is to do as much research and as little teaching as possible.
However, job assignments in academia are extremely arbitrary. Heads of department often divide up teaching load, and often have to ask staff to take on more teaching than they'd ideally be allocated. There's a huge disparity between teaching needed, and teaching that staff are willing to take on.
It therefore makes sense to, at all times, seem horrifyingly overworked. If you seem like your teaching load is fine (or, in many places I've worked, not literally killing you), you will be given more teaching. This hurts your research time. Academics that are good at managing this split get promoted, and so tend to be around for a while, still complaining about their teaching load, as a kind of pre-emptive defence at being given more of it.

That's brutally true and toxic

@G.Gare it gets even worse when you realize that there's a great burden to seem competent and organized on women and minorities, so the amount of "complaining about overwork" they can do is much lower. Super messy, terrible incentive structure

As you say, complaining about teaching can be quite off-putting.  But why do people do it? I have two short answers: incentives are not aligned, looking for a connection with others.
Promotion, school rank, and influence depend heavily on research. Teaching, while deeply satisfying and beneficial in a number of ways, typically does not lead to promotions. It also is important to being hired.  For an anecdotal example, this new PhD received 6x the clicks on their research than their teaching page.  There's no doubt some self-selection going on but it is illustrative.
As a result, Professors sometimes see teaching as something that inhibits their personal progress and career. There are great complementarities, however. Communication skills are critical for researchers, and repeated teaching of the same material gives new understanding.
On the other hand, sometimes this is a common way of 'talking shop', some people are just looking to connect through complaining. This is perhaps a human instinct, but certainly not best practice.

I agree 100% with the "connect through complaining" bit.

Wow, 6x... I would have expected students swarming the teaching page.  Oh, I see, applying for jobs, that's a different case indeed.

I will briefly give my two cents, as a person that actually likes teaching but complains a lot about it.
The reasons I complain are:

Overloaded with teaching. My time should be split (according to my contract) 50-50 on teaching-research. Unfortunately, I find that I have to spend way more time on teaching/preparing new courses that the department randomly assigns to me.
Teaching things that do not interest me. This goes without saying. Unfortunately, only few of us can teach what they really like. Most of the time, we tend to fill in holes that someone else left behind. Imagine if you are a number theorist and they ask you to teach continuous optimization on a business department.
Teaching on the wrong level. Most people would prefer to teach something close to their expertise and this means naturally more advanced courses suitable for upper undergraduate/graduate level. Unfortunately, I will not get a lot of satisfaction if I am assigned to teach Calculus to 1st semester students.
Teaching the same thing over and over. While for specialized courses close to your expertise it is easy to update them to include new material, not much can be changed in, for example, Calculus. The material and the way of teaching is pretty much the same and very likely to continue be so.
Not interesting audience. It is different to teach calculus to math students and different to liberal arts students.
Also, a valid concern is that indeed some people do get much better teaching schedule and that is a fact. You may ignore it, but it is also easy to invoke some envy feelings that lower your enthusiasm.

Maybe I am forgetting something here, but you get the idea. Enjoying teaching does come with conditions.

Often teaching loads are way too high given the time allocated, and no matter how much you enjoy teaching and associated work (prep, grading, student support etc) you don't want to it to be eating into your home and family life.
So it's natural to complain when you see others being asked to do less than you.  Also the more teaching you get the less well you will do any of it, and academics are kind of perfectionist as a rule.
Making fair workloads was one of the most difficult things I had to do as a senior academic, and you quickly realise when you start to add it all up that most of your staff are being asked to teach way more than they should be given all of the other activities that they are also judged on.

This. I love preparing good teaching materials. I love trying to figure out ways in which I can explain complex concepts simply, intuitively and efficiently. But I find that, if I want to prepare a lecture on a new topic with custom illustrations/animation that indeed showcases the intuition behind it, I need anywhere upwards of 3 full working days to prepare a 2h slide deck from scratch. However, my University actually allocates 1h30mins prep time for every hour of lectures. And what I could produce in 1h30mins would not be simple or intuitive.

Of course, if I am reusing my materials from last year, 3h prep time is kinda just about enough to update my 2h lecture If, like this year, I'm delivering a mixture of pre-prepared a new materials, I'm finding that I'm sacrificing my "update time" to prepare new slides for different modules. Hopefully, next year, I'll be able to spend my time updating and improving my slides (and doing some research, as currently my evenings and weekends are all taken up by lecture prep).

This answer will be STEM related.
In STEM, at least in my experience, all most all time prior to being a faculty member is spent doing research: I had never stood in front of a class of students until I was appointed to a faculty position. Thus, the people who make it through the hard years of PhD and postdoc are those that are committed to their research. But by the end of their time as a postdoc, the only option to stay in the research world is to get a faculty job.
Most enter a faculty job thinking that they will continue to do research, and spend a little time teaching the occasional class. They are initially excited about this, as they see the nobility in teaching the next generation.
But it turns out that most people at a faculty level are given teaching responsibilities that would require full-time work to do well. But they must also be successful at research to make tenure/get promoted/keep their team employed.
They are effectively expected to do two full time jobs. One of which they have spent 15 years training for and already know they love and the other which they may feel is important, but have zero training or experience in.Nobody tells them which bits of research they should or shouldn't be doing, where as the teaching is dictated and micromanaged. Given this is unsurprising that many come to dislike the teaching. Everyone likes to be good at the things they do, but being good at teaching takes a lot of time, time which they may feel they owe to their research (and in particular, their research team, who depends on the lab's success for their livelihood). And even then on the probabilities, they are unlikely to be as good at teaching as they are at research.To add insult to injury, university administration often tells them that something that a teaching load that is taking them 40-50 hours a week should only be taking them 20 hours.
I don't mind the actual hours with students, and I tend to think that if teaching was the only thing I had to do, I might actaully enjoy it (although probably not as much as research).

As a mathematician: I stood in front of a class of students as a grad student. PhD years were not that hard after all. There exist research institute that do not have students. Most professors I know still mostly do research - and complain about that 20/30% of the time they have to devote to teaching.

Different fields I guess. I was in the lab 9 hours a day as a PhD student, and was not even at a place that had taught students. Now I'm faculty, I spend more like 60% of my contracted time on teaching related tasks (research happens in my non-contracted, non-paid hours). Where I am now, the students would riot if we tried to get them to accept PhD students as teachers.

Agree. I think the situation is exacerbated by the way teaching happens in 1-2 hour chunks scattered through the week, making it difficult to focus on other things; by the large amounts of generally-unrewarding administrative overhead to the actual teaching: assessments, marking etc; and by bureaucratic constraints that tend to make it place barriers in the way of dynamic and innovative teaching (e.g. deadlines for setting exam papers that are before the teaching has even started!).

In STEM, my experience is different. I stood in front of students since I was a PhD student, and even before as a TA. And I certainly give my PhD students the opportunity to have at least some teaching experience in electronic labs.

An addition to the comments on rewards (status, career advancement, faculty positions) being better for research rather than teaching, I would expand a category that could be summarized as future Return-On-Investment (ROI) from research focus vs teaching focus.

Your chance of becoming a celebrity / famous are better with a publication in Nature / Science / (Prestigious Journal of Choice) than they are from years of teaching students.
Your chance of becoming wealthy from research grants (and secondary benefits) is greater.
Your chance of having a successful spin-off company is greater.
Your chance of lateraling into a lucrative/prestigious industry/government job is greater.
Your chance of being chosen for an influential steering or advising committee is greater.
Your chance of becoming "management" (dean, provost, faculty chair) are greater.
Your chance of lateraling to a better (read: more prestigious) institution are greater.
Your chance of having students compete to work with you is greater.

Thus, directly addressing the two questions.

How can someone end up working in academia, if teaching is such a burden?

Short, that's not why they're in academia.

Why do people in academia (from grad student upwards) complain so much about their teaching load, often comparing it to that of their colleagues?

Teaching load goes opposite almost all the ROI concepts that lead to what Americans value (celebrity, wealth, control)

Edit 12/16/2022
Responding to comments here because its too long for comments.
@G. Gare - (A) "Nobody?" Beyond the Labs: Pathways to Wealth for Academics and Social Capital Ii: Determinants of Economic Connectedness "Note Figure 5b, top research schools" and Deep Class and Wealth Divisions Between Faculty and Broader Society "PhDs are in significantly better zip codes, and their children start in better zip codes" (B) Wealthier PIs Submit Way More Grants and The Rich and the Rest "Somebody's looking at grants as a path to wealth"
@Bryan Krause UC Faculty Salary Scale vs Dean Salary Scale or look at Higher-Ed Executive Pay vs Faculty Pay vs Non-Tenure Pay Especially anything with the word "Research" in front of it.  Computer and Information Sciences and Engineering show especially enormous disparities.
@Morgan - What are "most" academics trying to do?  Do you have research or surveys to support your views on the career objectives of 12.5 million tertiary education faculty?  How many are attempting to have a spin-off such as in Urbana-Champagne, UC Davis, or All Sacremento.  Perhaps the number who advising, documenting, or promoting-1 2 spin-offs? Perhaps just ref these stack exchange academia answers and topic.

"Your chance of becoming wealthy from research grants (and secondary benefits) is greater": (A) nobody's goal in academia is to become wealthy (B) the purpose of grants is not making a PI wealthy.

I don't believe you're involved in academia if you suggest that the chance of becoming "management" is a pro of good research output. Those positions are mostly associated with no longer being able to do your own research (dean, provost) and high undesirable administrative burden (chair). There are even departments where the chair specifically rotates to different people in the department because no one wants that horrible job.

Many (if not most) people in academia choose to be there at the expense of more lucrative industry jobs. Academia is not a great choice if someone wanted to maximise their monetary (or fame or career advancement) ROI. You seem to be trying to find a lot of very indirect reasons why someone might prefer research, while seeming to disregard the obvious one: they just like research.

I'll answer both questions, through my own context.

How can someone end up working in academia, if teaching is such a burden?

Academia is more than just teaching and a lot of people have very strong misconceptions about academia, including the teaching part. Academia is also research, it is, to many people, a chance to take a topic that you have a deep, passionate interest in and really explore it. When people pursue it, their ultimate goals can be starkly different. Some want to teach students in the best way possible, some just dream of somehow getting tenure while teaching in a passable way, some dream of getting funding for their passion projects. None of these things are inherently wrong and not all academics need to be a glutton for teaching. There are some very smart people out there, who don't have the right mindset or skills for that part of the job but whose brilliant minds will surely bring prestige to the institution and a lot of newfound knowledge and observations to the field.

Why do people in academia (from grad student upwards) complain so much about their teaching load, often comparing it to that of their colleagues?

Because these loads are very often uneven or feel uneven, because sometimes you have a nightmare class or a nightmare student, because teaching while you also have to do a bunch of publications is... it's a lot. The thing is, in most jobs, as time passes and your career trends upward - your lot gets easier. In academia, that is not always the case. You may be a great teacher, but if you don't do the right publications, you end up handling everything yourself while someone with better people skills, a savvier approach to research, etc. will have assistants doing everything.
That said, teaching is, like it or not, an essential part of the experience and I think anyone who actively wishes to never do it again simply won't cut it in modern academia. Now, whether that's a problem with them or with the inherent structure of academia... that's a whole other question.

They are showing their true colors.
In reality, those faculty members are just people like anyone else. They do not have above average interest in helping others or the over-the-top altruism laid out in the university brochure.
They are interested in their next grant. Teaching simply interferes with their interests. Teaching only advances their respective careers as far is it is a requirement.

It seems rather despicable to suggest that people primarily interested in furthering humanity's body of knowledge only care about themselves and their own interests, and quite narrow-minded to suggest that people are "over-the-top altruistic" for being predisposed towards explaining things in front of a group of people, and setting up and marking tests.

@NotThatGuy and yet the poster has evidence contrary to your assertion.

@NotThatGuy your comment is precisely why i loathe academia. I am somehow the despicable one for pointing out that academics arent actually better than anyone else. Despicable is correct.

@G.Gare no worries here. I standby that experiment and my diagnosis.

@user156207 There is a philosophical argument that, regardless of how selfless they may seem, any given person would only do what (they think) would make them feel good in some way (if that's roughly what you're arguing for), but that doesn't seem to relate to the question at hand. "the poster has evidence contrary to your assertion" - What evidence? What assertion?

@NotThatGuy your assertion "people primarily interested in furthering humanity's body of knowledge".  posters observed evidence "the large majority would endlessly complain about their teaching duties". It doesnt add up outside of the academic echo chamber.

@penelope my point exactly. I could not have articulated it better.

@user156207 Ok, what I should've said was "people primarily interested in furthering humanity's body of knowledge through research" (I figured that would've been clear, but I suppose it wasn't). This does not translate to them necessarily also wanting to further humanity's body of knowledge through teaching (and perhaps this is nitpicking, but teaching doesn't further/expand humanity's body of knowledge, it shares it, in order to further the knowledge of individuals, which doesn't mean it's not important, but it's different from what I said).

@NotThatGuy imagine an ego so fragile that being assigned as human and not-above-average-interest-in-teaching translates to threatening to the point of "despicable". Imagine that for a moment. Now imagine that ego is head of a classroom. Now imagine that a bunch of these egos got together and work together. I can keep going but i wont.

@user156207 I literally couldn't follow any of that. Don't keep going, but maybe try again, but this time with just directly saying what you mean, instead of saying something so indirectly that you entirely got rid of the personhood of those involved. But I suspect you don't do that because you know it'll get you banned from this site. Or maybe I'm not inferring whatever you're trying to imply, or maybe you just want to throw insults around while maintaining (not-so-)plausible deniability.


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Is my paper "better" or "worse" than the journal it is published in?
Is there a pseudo-quantitative way to determine from the impact factor, Cite score, or similar, whether an article I published in a journal is an "(under/over)performer" with respect to the journal it is published in?

Well the impact factor of a journal is essentially the average number times a paper published in that journal was cited in the previous two years. I suppose you could check the number of citations of your paper over the same time period and see if that exceeds the impact factor of the journal. Although I don't think this would be a very meaningful criteria for variety of reasons. Number of citations is also not a very good measure of the quality of a paper.

@atom44 it’s not a measure of quality but somehow it’s how the “performance” of a paper is measured in academia?

in some contexts it's used to measure 'performance' or 'significance', but it's a poor measure of such things. For example, a paper with a major error could get a lot of citations with other researchers criticising it. Review papers also tend to get cited a lot, but they don't really contribute any new knowledge to the field. How meaningful would the citation counts be in these cases?

I agree on the first part. Well-written review papers can IMO be very influential (in my domain Acta Numerica's papers are often must reads).
Anyway, this diverges a bit from my question, which was more "statistical".

Perhaps if you knew the distribution function of the citations per paper you could see if you were more than 1 standard deviation away from the median (although be careful with the statistics since 0 citations is a hard stop on one side). But, really, why bother even thinking about it?

Mere curiosity! I received an email from Elsevier, I published in one of their journals, giving me the stats for the bibliometric indices for 2021 of that journal. I wondered then: did my article stand out? was it average? was it below average? no greed or desire for more citations, I was simply curious.

Maybe this helps: https://www.nature.com/articles/srep01649


text:
Problem with adding PhD co supervisor
I just started my PhD in physics. It has been 6 months. I have had a mentor for sometime and I have wanted to add him as a co-supervisor. My university told me he cannot be added as a co-supervisor because he works in the same field (physics). The co supervisor can be added only if he's from another discipline like biology for example. Is this how these things work? I am confused and also angry. My supervisor says that I can still collaborate with him. But I still don't feel good about it.

Presumably your university is correct about their own rules. But there are many other places  where a cosupervisor being in the same field or even department would not be a problem.

Presumably you want someone from the same field so that in case something happens to your principal supervisor, there is a backup.  You sure your university's policy says that?

Exactly. Also since this co supervisor is at another university, arranging funding to visit him would be way easier if he was a co supervisor. Unfortunately, the university policy apparently says that. I don't understand why this policy is in place as well.

Seems to me a strange policy... No, this is not how things usually work, in my experience.

Can you clarify what you don't feel good about?

Having co-advisors is not common in my department (also physics), but a close analogue might be having someone on your PhD thesis committee. At my institution, one member of the committee must be from a different field. In any case this doesn't sound out of place to me.

In the US, at least, every university sets its own policies in such things so you need to ask them for reasons if you really want to know.
But a typical reason might be to optimize (in some sense) faculty usage and efforts. Another might be to assure that you don't get conflicting advice. Some questions here relate to problems with co supervisors. In the case of a dispute between "advisors", should it arise, having a single advisor makes it clear whose advice you need to follow and the dispute can't be used to block you. It happens.
And your assumption about funding travel might be erroneous. Funds don't magically appear and if the place doesn't allow co-supervisors they are unlikely to have funding for such.
External supervisors are another issue as they may get no credit for advising you.
That said, you can certainly seek advice from whomever you wish, local or otherwise. A co-supervisor formal relationship is mostly just an administrative acknowledgement, unless funding is supplied.
The exception for cross-discipline co-advisors is likely there to encourage such things, as is appropriate.
But, as your advisor suggests, you can get advice and collaborate with others. The policy doesn't prohibit that.
There is one caveat, however. You say that the prohibition applies to co-advisors in the same discipline, but your definition of that seems very broad. Physics covers a lot of fields. Make sure you understand the policy. Different physicists in different specialties do quite different things. Maybe different enough in your case.

Hello! Firstly thank you. About the funding situation. I think there is a misunderstanding. What I mean is it would be easier for the co supervisor to arrange funding for me to visit him. About external supervisor, he is happy to supervise me. The idea is here it would help funding. And also I would have a backup supervisor. I also need his expertise for my research.

You can get any expertise from him that he is willing to give. That isn't an issue. If you have something to offer, it might be possible for him to fund you for a visit to give a talk. See edit, also.

@Newuser7: So you're saying that your "mentor" could obtain travel funding for you from their institution if they were officially designated as your co-supervisor? You might want to lead with that the next time you bring this up with whoever denied the request before. I cannot guarantee that it will help, but IME "I could get external funding for this, if only…" are often the magic words that can convince administration to find some way to make things work.

This is very much institution-dependent.  Actually in many examples I’m familiar with, the co-supervisor must be a member of the same (graduate) program so a would-be co-supervisor from biology would first have to become adjunct in physics to be granted co-supervision privileges, effectively becoming a member of the graduate department (here of physics) in addition to their regular duties in their home unit.
As a result, “sharing” students between faculty in the same unit, subject to some formal agreement (which may include sharing the funding burden if required) is not that uncommon.
There is really nothing you can do.  In my experience units have (usually good) historical reasons for this or that policy, often driven by the desire to rectify some previous abuse or avoid some tricky situation.