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How to deal with my former MA advisor behavior
I graduated last year with a Master’s degree in history at a top institution in my field and received a very good grade for my dissertation.
Unfortunately, my relationship with my advisor was not very good. He is known to have a particular personality but in the beginning, he was very nice to me and willing to supervise me although he was not a specialist in my field (he chose a co-supervisor from a different university and told me he would have no issue to supervise such a topic). However, as time pass, he became less and less supportive and told me negative things. It culminated at the end of the year telling me I should not waste 5 to 6 years of my life doing a PhD. After that meeting, I started becoming really depressed despite my +3.9 GPA. I didn’t talk about this incident with someone else because I was afraid of the consequences. He also told me that since he was not a specialist of my topic, he couldn’t pursue with me in PhD (while he told me no problem for my MA) and that supposedly, my field of research would not interest my university for a scholarship.
However, in my university, it is hard to switch advisor between MA and PhD. So I sent him a few emails (4 in 3 months) at the beginning of the academic year to ask him if we could met in person to discuss different PhD topics ideas despite what he told me. He responded and told me to send him my ideas, but never agreed to meet me in person while he supervised me for two years. I changed my research ideas frequently because he told me the research I love the most would not be of interest for the department.
I thus though he was really not interested in supervising me anymore since he didn’t want to meet me in person. So I went to my co-supervisor to explain her what happened. She told me she agreed to continue supervising me with another person she knows at my home institution but I should first make sure my first advisor was not interested in me anymore. She told me to write an email saying I understood he was not interested anymore and that I wanted to let him know I would contact his colleague if I don’t get an answer before the holidays.
So I sent him an email, copy my co-supervisor. And then, he copy / pasted part of my emails with my different choices of topics to show how confuse I am. He was very annoyed and even sent the email with a delivery receipt. I responded to this email saying I was sorry if i hurt him, it was not meant to, I just wanted to get a quick answer to contact someone else (I gave the other professor’s name) if he was not interested. Then, he responded with my co-supervisor in copy telling me that I needed to take a few years off and come back with my own 10 pages research proposal  that he could read.
I really don’t know what to do in this situation. I applied to a PhD abroad but my personal circumstances changed and it would be much better for me to stay in my home country. My co-supervisor wrote a recommendation letter for the PhD abroad but since I am not sure to accept the position if I get in, I am afraid she would not take it well (she doesn't know the colleague personally, but she is in the same field). I also gave my advisor the name of the Professor I wanted to contact so I am afraid he told him bad things about me.
Do you think that my former-advisor could destroy my will to do a PhD at my home institution? (He is on the committee to attribute the scholarship).
Do you think someone else would be afraid to take me as a PhD student now?
Do you think my co-supervisor will not be willing to take me as a PhD student again if I decline the offer abroad for which she recommended me or to recommend me for another program?

Update: I reached out to my former MA advisor to ask him if he had other colleagues to recommend me for PhD supervision (I got sick these last months) and he responded to me, copy my co-advisor and copy the head of my department saying he told me multiple times to do that by myself (which is not true) and wishing me "the best". I did not respond since I don't want to create new issues with him. Should I do something though? Why did he puts in copy the head of department?

To answer this question, we would need to know about the specifics of the personalities and political situation in your department. As such, it is not a good fit for this website.

Thank you for your answer, I imagine it is difficult to answer such questions. But do you think my former advisor behavior was professional? Is copy / pasting emails and refusing to see a former student who seeks advice common in academia?

I don't know your situation, I think if you near to finish your master, finish without changing advisor. And have a confidential talk with authorities, and tell them your concerns. Then if he will not give a letter you can carry this problem to the student office etc.

Welcome to Academia.SE. You may want to [edit] your question -- a good rule of thumb is that your question should be such that someone else might have the same question in future. We can't really give personalized advice when we only have your account of what happened. Also, there is not much point in looking back and deciding whether your advisor acted improperly; better to look only toward the future and your remaining options.

There are two aspects here that you need to deal with. The first is your mental state and I suggest that you talk to a professional counsellor about it. You are being treated unfairly and might need help to recognize and deal with that.
Secondly is the larger(?) issue of your future. Your best option is probably at a different university, whether in your home country or elsewhere. Spend some effort on the external/abroad option to try to see what is possible to overcome the issue holding you back.
But if all else fails, work with the co-supervisor and others so that you can avoid the one treating you badly. Let other professors who support you speak for you to administration if necessary. A faculty member undermining a student in emails to others is unethical. I smell some jealousy, actually, from what you write.

Personal note: I had a somewhat similar experience at a younger age. Based on a standardized test in secondary school, I was told that I probably had the ability to succeed in a two year (junior) college, but would likely be frustrated (a failure) if I tried to reach higher. I was pretty angry about that, and later earned a PhD in mathematics. I hope they don't tell kids things like that anymore.
There is no reason for you to accept, or even consider, statements that you aren't able or worthy to succeed. Get mad. Prosper.

Thank you a lot for your answer. You really understood well my situation. Some friends also told me that my advisor was probably jealous. My issue here is that my co-supervisor is not that nice with me because I am working in the same field than her and she doesn't want a new competitor to enter it. She accepted to recommend me for the PhD abroad because it's not exactly in the same field of my master's.  I would like to continue working on the topics I love the most, either in my home country or abroad but my two advisors are really powerful and have connections. I don't know what to do.

If you get a degree in a somewhat related topic to the one you most want to study, then there will be a lot of opportunity later to return to it. Think long term. You may need to compromise somewhat to get there. But only somewhat.

You are right. It is better to pursue in a related field rather than not pursuing in research at all. Thank you a lot for your advice, it is really helpful.

From your description, it seems clear to me that your former supervisor is not interested in supervising you for a PhD candidature at this stage of your development and does not think you are ready for this.  Indeed, he has explicitly told you that he thinks you should take a few years outside before pursuing this.  He might be right or wrong about this advice, but you should give it due thought and decide whether you want to pursue a PhD candidature at this time or do some other work for a few years first.  There are plenty of people who work outside the universities for a while and then come back to do a PhD candidature later, so there is nothing wrong with going down this route.
Assuming you decide to keep pursuing an offer of PhD candidature now, I recommend you take a broader approach and apply to other universities and other sets of supervisors within your own university.  You say that your Masters degree came with a good grade and was from a top institution, so that should stand you in good stead for applications to other universities.  Moreover, you can now proceed with discussing a candidature with this other co-supervisor, since your former supervisor is clearly not interested.
As to the interpersonal issues you raise, don't stress about these --- they are the types of peccadilloes and miscommunications that happen sporadically in professional work.  You don't need read receipts for these kinds of matters and some people take these badly, so I'd avoid these in future unless you have good reason to use them.  I see no reason that your supervisor would try to destroy your attempts at candidature, nor any reason that other academics would be afraid to supervise you.  Your supervisor might not give you a strong recommendation if he thinks you are unready for a PhD candidature, but he should still be able to comment on your work in your Masters program, where you evidently did well.

Thank you for your answer, it is very helpful too. Yes my PhD advisor is clearly not interested and I do not think it would be a good thing for me to work with someone who treats me like that. Concerning his supposed attempt to destroy a future candidacy, as I wrote, he has a very particular personality (some people know about it, but I also know that he is very different in public and in private), that is why I am concerned and now, there is written proofs of a "clash" between me and him (even though I was just asking for advice and telling him I would contact an other professor).


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How to communicate with my former co-advisor and professors I want to decline a PhD offer to re-apply next year?
Recently, I got accepted into a very top PhD program in humanities will full-funding in the UK (Cambridge). On paper, my situation seems ideal. However, I strongly doubt whether or not I should accept the offer.  My main concern is that I'm not that interested in the research topic. I do not see myself working on this topic for years and leaving my home country for it. I only applied to one PhD program this year due to personal issues (health) - and luckily got accepted into this program - but I don’t think this is the best fit for me. However, I am concerned for several reasons. First, I don’t know how to communicate that to the professors who wrote my recommendation letters. I am afraid they would take it badly (especially my former MA co-advisor with who I may like to stay working with if I am not going to this university) and will not be willing to write recommendation letters for me again if I want to apply to other PhD programs next year. I know it is better to refuse an offer than dropping out of the program if I don't like it but still, I am not sure how it could be perceived. I acknowledge that my research interests shifted a bit but I have no idea how to communicate that without making mistakes. The second reason is that I am afraid the university and supervisor will take it badly and that they will « blacklist » me if I want to apply again next year with another supervisor suiting my research interests better at the same university.

Would professors refuse to write recommendation letters for PhD applications a second time?

Would my former MA co-advisor - who is very cautious about her reputation - refuse to write a letter a second time for me or work with me? Should I tell her the truth about my situation or something else (such as my personal issue)? I've also asked her if I can talk to her about my future after receiving the offer, but she won't see me in person to discuss (« lack of time » she told me) and only wants to communicate via email. I don't know what I can tell her... I also explained my difficult situation with one of my ex-advisor in this post: How to deal with my former MA advisor behavior)

Thank you.

Too many questions here, but more importantly, too personal for a good answer. It depends on your own goals and values which are probably quite unique. But I doubt that blacklisting is something to worry about.

Thank you a lot for your answers. I edited my post to suppress a few questions and make it a bit "less" personal. It is just that my situation is a bit difficult and I try to make no "diplomatic mistakes" with my professors if I don't want to go there, even though I know I may not joined another program next year if I decline it.

They might not "blacklist" you but just because you got accepted one year does not at all mean that you can count on being accepted the following year. It feels like you are fixating too much on what you call "diplomatic mistakes" and not enough on the significant element of pure luck involved in such decisions. Don't forget that you are comparing a very hypothetical situation - IF you get accepted next year AND you don't again at the last minute decide that you don't really want to work on that topic after all - with the actual fact that you DID get accepted into a top Ph.D. program.

I know that being accepted one year doesn't mean I will be accepted another one. Since the beginning, I know I would prefer staying in my home country and working in the same field of my MA. But due to the difficult relationship I had with my main advisor, this option is compromised and I was obliged to look for other options. This one stood out, but I knew from the start that this research topic was not exactly in line with my main research interests. I just don’t know how to communicate this issue with my ex-advisor who changed behavior with me and professors. Any advice on this aspect?

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How to deal with a PhD student who is slow and disengaged
I am an assistant professor at a research institute (engineering discipline) in Eastern Europe. In our institute we operate a doctoral school. While our PhD students are required to complete coursework and earn credits, our program is mostly based on research and publishing articles. Last year, we got a PhD student from an Asian country who is assigned to work on a project for which I serve as the principal investigator (PI). While he has demonstrated proficiency in his coursework and exams, his performance in research is slow and lacks engagement. Since his recruitment, he has made minimal progress on his project and dedicates most of his time reading articles and going deep into the details (at the level which is not necessary at all). Despite multiple discussions and requests to expedite his work, he does not appear to be following my guidance. Our PhD program spans four years, and he will undergo a mid-term assessment next year. Given his current approach, I am concerned that he may struggle to meet requirements of this assessment.
Furthermore, he is now going to take a five-week vacation and go back to his country, which is permitted according to our doctoral school rules. I know that this break will slow his overall progress even more and upon his return he will need additional time to catch up to his current status.
I would greatly appreciate any advice or recommendations you can offer in this situation. How can I put him on the research track?
P.S. I know that as a foreigner life might be difficult per se, so I do not want to stress him out by consistently pushing him to follow my guidance.
Update
After the first year evaluation, he was officially informed by the doctoral school committee that he needs to speed up and produce his own results.

Try to understand the root cause of his slow progress. Is it a lack of motivation, unclear research direction, or difficulty grasping the project's concepts? Providing guidance without understanding the root cause of the issue can be less effective or even counterproductive. Identifying the underlying reasons for a student's slow progress is essential because it allows you to tailor your guidance and support more accurately.

My intuition is that what exactly was said during the "multiple discussions" is quite important. Have you asked the student how he himself sees his progress, how he plans to go on, and what his reasons are for apparently not following your guidance? Have you told him him: "Given your current approach, I am concerned that you may struggle to meet requirements of this assessment"? If so, what did he say?

You should keep his vacation out of the equation, which is his legal right. The issue you should focus on is that he doesn't work properly in the time he's paid to work.

Have you explicitly told the student that they are currently not on course to pass the assessment? Are you prepared to set some number of goals with dates attached for completion? How closely do you manage the student curently?

@Timmetje Well, I think the reason for his slow progress is threefold: (1) he wants to go unnecessarily deep into the materials, (2) he is still not confident in computer programming, and (3) he is relaxed. The first point has been discussed with him multiple times. The second point is understandable and he needs time for this. Concerning the third point, I think he has not yet understood the importance of speeding up his progress (see also the updated post also).

@lighthousekeeper: I think it's also worthwhile to add the following to your point: trying to "speed up" work which is perceived as too slow by taking away people's free time or options for relaxation, is very unlikely to work out well in the long run (to put it mildly).

How much flexibility is there when it comes to the project topic? Maybe if the student goes "too deeply" into the material, this can be exploited in some way to add to the project, if maybe in unforeseen ways (such as writing a review paper). I have a student who goes deeper into the literature than I'd have thought, and it slows him down somewhat, but we learn a lot from this and it's ultimately valuable, if somewhat difficult to "use" in the project.

"I do not see the relevance of the PhD being from an Asian country"
What are you trying to say without saying it?
With all due unrespect, mentioning that the student is from another continent has no relevance to your question.

@EarlGrey "dedicates most of his time reading articles and going deep into the details"  In some Asian countries, that would be a highly valued skill.  The student's place of origin does put the question in context.

You have already given him advice and guidance and you have communicated to him that his progress is behind expectations.  He has also been given a warning at his first-year review.  You cannot force the student to meet the required standard for the candidature --- your primary role as a supervisor is to give him a candid evaluation of his work and offer academic support and guidance where needed.
It is difficult to see if you have already done anything effective, because all you have told us is that you have given some (unspecified) guidance and that you have had multiple meetings to this effect.  In any case, one thing that might be helpful here is to have the student create a scheduled plan for what he will achieve by the time of his next review, and meet with him regularly to get updates on progress.  You should ask the student to set out his own plan and schedule to achieve relevant research outcomes and construct a Gantt chart setting out the schedule (you may need to give guidance on this).  Be inquisitive about the student's own expectations and goals.  How does he see his progress so far?  What things would he like to achieve and by when?  How will his plan and schedule manifest in successful completion of his PhD candidature?  Is his plan realistic?  Has he included sufficient time for each part of research?  Will he be ready for the relevant milestones?  What does he plan to achieve by the time of the next review milestone?
Another thing that is worth considering is whether you might want to involve another academic to review present advice/actions and give their own perspective.  If you are giving the same guidance over and over and this is not being actioned then it is probably worth bringing in a "second opinion" from another academic.  Either this other academic will regard your advice as accurate and will reiterate this to the student, or they might come up with some other ideas that could potentially help the progress of the student.  Don't be afraid to lean on your colleagues when dealing with hard cases.

Furthermore, he is now going to take a five-week vacation and go back to his country, which is permitted according to our doctoral school rules. I know that this break will slow his overall progress even more and upon his return he will need additional time to catch up to his current status.

If the student is taking approved leave under the rules of the school then this should not be considered to "slow" his progress.  Leave always necessitates a period of catching-up when one returns (e.g., actioning emails, etc.) and this is part of the normal activities that surround the taking of leave.  The expected schedule for progress should take account of the fact that students will take approved leave and that this will necessitate certain catch-up activities on return.  If this is not properly taken into account then it is a managerial failure, not a deficiency in the student.

I know that as a foreigner life might be difficult per se, so I do not want to stress him out by consistently pushing him to follow my guidance.

Declining to give the student candid feedback and proper expectations for progress will not reduce stress in the long-term --- it will just set the student up for failure later, which will induce stress at that time.  It is generally a bad idea to try to calibrate your scholarly guidance to account for the presumed effects of some exogenous circumstance you don't understand well.  Either your guidance is giving good advice or it is not.  If it is good advice then it should be delivered irrespective of whether this student has a difficult life.  If it is not good advice then it should be altered accordingly.  As to "pushing him" to follow your guidance, this also overstates your role.  PhD students are adults who are capable of considering what guidance to follow and what guidace to ignore.  The student has been warned that he is behind expectations and he has been given guidance for what to do to catch up.  That is a sufficient amount of information for the student to make an informed decision of how to proceed.

This answer is quite complete and mature. Thanks

Here is a different possible take: - you are telling the student that they aren't doing it right - over and over - and in response they *are trying - by going harder and deeper... in the wrong areas/ways. Perhaps this student doesn't have a good sense of / can't respond to the framing of progress/success?
Might some explicit / worked examples of your perspective of 'good work' and discussion of how they might get there help? There is a gentle book called Stepping Stones to Achieving your Doctorate (Trafford & Leshem) that might assist (depending on the issues at hand) too if the student needs more scaffolding.

As with all interpersonal issues - you should ask questions. "It seems to me like your progress has been slow. Do you see it this way? If so, why has your progress been slow and what can we do together to help? If not, can you help me understand what you accomplished that I'm not seeing?"

I have been that kind of student all along my doctorate, my problem was that I was lacking understanding of some concepts that were essential to proceed e with my research. I didn't fail any PhD course, because they weren't exactly aligned with my research and no one cared about my ability to learn while working on them, moreover I think my supervisor wasn’t well informed about the content of the courses. The guidelines of my PhD were confused and the faculty environment not exactly "kind". So what happened was that by the time I could understand something I was disengaged. Plus, the faculty started to put pressure on me to achieved results, which made me feel like I needed to fake assurance, and made me feel powerless.
So, this is the bad part of it, but there is a good news. Maybe you only need to check that your student really has the basic knowledge required to progress, both in term of hard knowledge, both in term of understanding of what is a Research gap, and what are the step necessary to conduct a good research. Maybe he is stuck o some point of his work, and he only need an external perspective. But please, first check that the the basics are there, you never know the background of your students (especially if they come from an another country).
It might also be that by this time he has lost interest in research and he stays there for the scholarship. Nothing bad, how many people do it on the work place? A PhD is not different.
So, just ask. That's my advice. When these things happen there is no time for regret or hate, sometimes it is only the way life goes.

Perhaps I can be this student. I really like to goo deep in details. So I think here the best advice is, give to him a couple of papers and work over those paper to produce his first results. Also write a review paper.
He won't change his mind, he is in that Way.

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How to teach to an adult person that is not used to study?
I'm trying to teach some basic things to my mother, such history, basic math and basic physics so she can attend a test.
But because of my mothers personality this has become pretty hard , since she has been influenced from the childhood by sayings  like "I can't study and can't learn", and trash like that.
This is so obnoxious , because to learn a small thing (v.gr.: add fractions) she takes a lot of time (2 or 3 hours) and the next day when trying to recall it, she don't solve the same problems of the day before and she fall in despair and trow out what already learn and stop to study.
I don't think the problem is some kind of disability, I'd rather say she can recall perfect it, but I have seen too that she doubts almost of all the things she knows, and don't write a thing because before she write down something, she believes its wrong!!!
I think too she has a hard time trying to focus on the themes explained.
I have exhausted each idea about trying to explain things: cardboards, games, using the videos of youtube, reading along the books, talking about the themes instead of a serious lecture.
Of course I'm aware I'm not a teacher, but whats does really matter is that she learn a bit of things, that's all.
This is more of pedagogy, but since there is no stack for that I have come here to ask.
Thanks in advance.

What type of test is she trying to learn to take? This sounds like an odd combination of subjects. Especially for (presumably) middle aged people to be taking.

Is she studying to get something like the GED (high school equivalent in the US)? What country is she in? In the US, school districts often have adult schools that can help someone prepare.

I'm somehow amazed by the title of your question because, well, university students are adult people.

The Mathematics Educators Site might be the better community for this, if you focus on teaching math to your mother.

@user2357 Indeed it works. My comment, which was not meant to be rude, was about the original title. But, most of all, it was a way to point out that sometimes here we tend to think at university students as kids.

Life is dependent many times on being motivated to succeed. There is not a magical formula for having no motivation and yet having success. If your mother cannot find the motivation to learn, it is rather hard to force learning down her throat. If you can make learning matter to her, she will want to learn.
Perhaps you should look into hiring a professional tutor if your mother needs to learn this material for her employment (or the like). Removing the family element could allow for her to feel more motivation. In certain countries, there are programs for adult learning. One can obtain an equivalent to basic high school education from these programs.


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Travel reimbursement for grant: The lab doesn't want to provide bank account details
I am a PhD student, who has been awarded a young researcher grant, which I intend to use to work at another (host) institute which my home institute is collaborating with. In order to accept the grant and get reimbursed, the institution which rewarded me the grant wants me to fill in a form. It includes personal details, travel/accommodation related information etc, and also requests bank account details (like name of the account holder, bank address, country, IBAN and BIC or SWIFT) for the home institute for reimbursement, as they prefer this.
My supervisor said he doesn't know this information and thus my supervisor contacted the HR head. My supervisor told me afterwards that the HR said that for the lab I (we) work at, they cannot provide that information. When I asked my supervisor why that is the case, he gave a bit of a vague answer that the lab doesn't have an account (or that there is one on a higher level) and he used a little bit of a "none of your business"-argument, which left me in a state of confusion.
For "normal" travel/stays, like conferences/workshops (funded by the lab/institute?), there's a system which takes care of the funding. Any travel related-expenses made by that researcher can be reimbursed after they return the bills at work and the travel/stay has been registered. So obviously there is a reimbursement system and thus a bank account.
My supervisor asked me to instead give them my own bank account details. I guess I wouldn't have anything against this, but reasonably the institute must have a bank account. I have been on more than one trip since the start of my PhD where I have not been reimbursed by my home institute yet, both my supervisor knows it and the HR which handles my requests. Should I try to push my supervisor again, or see some other HR staff/other members of the lab and ask if they can get the bank account details (and also keep my supervisor updated)? I am not sure I can buy my supervisor's argument and then feel ok on following his instructions. I have a bad feeling they are going to mess up again.
EDIT:
Thank you all in the community for being so engaging in this matter, and sending me a lot of suggestions and options on how to move forward. It has given me more confidence to confront the people in charge (and make some progress).
After reading the fine print for the research award and contacted the institution for additional information, we found that according to EC regulations, receipts issued from XXX beneficiaries (i.e. institutes participating in XXX either as a partner or as a third party) cannot be accepted, where the institute I work at belongs to XXX. This seem to mean that in order to not violate the EC regulation my home institute cannot send them any expenses (like receipts for paying the accommodation, travel or my daily expenses). I think this is weird...  For me this important information should have been mentioned somewhere more accessible or be more clearly specified.
The institution replied that in this case they will be in charge of booking and paying for the travel and accommodation, but they need to check if they can reimburse any daily expenses from me (as an individual). If they can reimburse me I will most likely provide my bank account details in the form in order for anyone to not violate the EC regulations (and my supervisor most likely will not need to explain why our lab/institute couldn't give the bank account details when we thought it was necessary). If the daily expenses (local transportation and food) cannot be covered by the funding, most likely my home institute will cover it (and most likely I will not need to fill in my bank account details in the form).
Let's wait for their response and I will give you a final update.
FINAL EDIT:
I would like to thank everyone in this community for the support, and for your suggestions in the comments. As several people have pointed out in the comments, since I am a first year PhD student, I should not spend time on acting as an intermediary, but get the respective financial staff in contact with each other. I tried my best to follow it:
The accommodation I am staying at is a university residence/student accommodation of nice quality which we all agreed upon (going for a hotel/airbnb would not be financially plausible). The institution did eventually a good job from their side and took the initiative to contact the student organization managing the accommodations, where they kept me in all email correspondence, and they paid for the stay and travel. However when I needed my supervisor with any type of support in this matter, such as resolving any misunderstandings (dates of the stay, type of payment, authorization of payment etc. ...), I sometimes forwarded to him the emails (financial staff was really out of reach for me, I was never really in touch with any of them during all this time), and he replied to me orally/wrote in the informal "work chat app" what I should email them back in such circumstances, which oftentimes lead me doing things multiple times. When we were both in doubt, I asked if we should contact the HR. According to my supervisor I/we shouldn't really contact ("bother") the financial staff/HR, as I don't speak the language fluently and we encounter oftentimes misunderstandings/no communication (and almost nobody speaks any decent English, yep, and I work in international research environment in a big city in Europe) and the HR staff is understaffed and very busy... According to this mindset, we must help them with their workload as much as possible, which can mean even outside our scope of work and knowledge, and preferably only the supervisor should contact the HR. This ended up with me being the intermediary and putting too much effort into this whole process... Should I have asked higher-ups for assistance?
More details, two events:
Event I:
The institution claimed eventually that the daily expenses could not be covered by them and said again that's due to the EC regulations, so my home institute will reimburse me for the daily expenses (which I think turned out to be the best outcome: I don't even want to think about sending receipts to the institution abroad, asking for reimbursement and acting as an intermediary again). At some point during this process I got introduced to a HR staff who speaks English quite well, who's been working longer than I have been at my home institute (which got me thinking why I wasn't introduced tho this person before...??) and due to my mistrust towards the specific HR from previous experience on reimbursement, this was perfect to me. She offered the alternative of requesting an advance and got me a form where you request money in advance for a trip, which I have never heard of before. I submitted the document and did get in fact an advance as requested before the trip. She also sped up the process for my reimbursement from my previous trips, which got me all the reimbursement in few days. Thank you!! Unfortunately she left the job recently :'(
Event II:
The student organization managing the accommodations, requested also that a home insurance had to be paid. If no home insurance will be provided on time, their policy doesn't allow for a stay. At this point I was too tired to ask the institute why (which in hindsight was maybe not the best option). I then asked my supervisor if the lab could cover it. He asked the HR for the lab we work at, where he informed it's not possible, moreover a reimbursement for this is not possible (The wonderful HR person has left the job by now). "The deal" communicated to me orally through the HR/my supervisor is that they reimburse me one additional meal, as it corresponds to roughly the same price (which is true, so not much money). I asked my supervisor how this deal will be assured, upon my supervisor replied: you will get reimbursed because you'll remember. Given the limited information, I found the offered solution by the HR to be appalling and unprofessional.
I have now arrived to the host institute, found my accommodation and started my work.
This whole experience has learnt me quite a lot about the institute's view on reimbursement/work. Conclusions? Ask AcademiaStackExchange for good advice. Thanks for reading and for any contributions made :)
TLDR: Rant on my home institute, the funding institution managing funding and trip and putting their work on me, and a wonderful HR worker.

I'm wondering if you've actually broken your home institution rules by applying for a grant without permission - and, more importantly, for a grant that isn't paying "grant tax" (i.e. "indirect costs") to your home institution - and this is the best way of fixing that problem.

In the first paragraph and the title you said "reimbursement". Did you, instead mean the original disbursement of the funds to your institution?

At least in here, financial departments mostly can handle money intake only (externally). When, say, a lab gets a grant, it is the institution-wide account that really gets it (indeed, there's no lab-level account), and then the lab has to ask the institution for money citing the income in the lab's name as the grounds for the request. No agreement (and, like @AlexanderWoo says, "indirect costs" cut given to your home institution), no money from them.

@AlexanderWoo: I applied for the grant, where the supervisor from my home institute and host institute sent support letters in the application. We did it together.
Could you elaborate on grant taxes? Maybe there is some, but I am not aware of the term.

Are you sure the grant money was supposed to go to a university account in the first place? At least in Germany, similar grants for PhD students (e.g., DAAD) often directly go to their private account

@morxa The website states: The preferred alternative is that your institution is reimbursed. Down below it also says: Costs in the name of the researcher will not be accepted. Although down below it also says that according to EC regulations, receipts issued from XXX beneficiaries (i.e. institutes participating in XXX either as a partner or as a third party) cannot be accepted, where my institute belongs to XXX which is somewhat confusing.

Don't talk with HR.  Talk with whatever officecdeals with sponsored projects.

Can you post the solicitation if it's public? Usually restrictions on eligibility are posted in solicitations, but in this case they may not have meant anything to you at the time of application.

It may well be that the department and even university do not have a bank account. In Germany, the only bank account that the university uses belongs to the state, and the amount owned by each department is recorded internally. Transferring money to a department is a complicated process that, at a minimum, has a high risk that the university administration keeps a considerable chunk as overhead (and wonders whether they should also withhold taxes). In this situation, reimbursing travel costs directly to the traveler is the much easier way.

I can't advise on foreign countries, but in the US, a reimbursement is a protected category under tax law. We could never give an "advance" -- that would be taxable income.  A reimbursement is by definition after the fact to make one whole. If it were me, I would probably be consulting an accountant to help me understand what is going on and if everything happened legally.

@yourfriendlyresearchadmin Thanks for your feedback, and your earlier comments in this post. Do you mean me as a Ph.D student should consult an accountant, as I might get in trouble or a research administrator/lab/supervisor can get in trouble?

@Atom1667, in the US (all I can speak to), when you ask for a business reimbursement, you are required to request it after the expense is incurred.  This is according to the IRS.  If you give payment prior to an expense being incurred, it is classed as income. In the US, if your taxes are not done correctly, you are at fault.  If your employer screwed up the determination of reimbursement/income, technically you can be liable as the individual. If you were in the US, I would advise you personally get an opinion from an accountant about your own taxes to make sure this was done properly.

Assuming all the institutions involved are legitimate (that is, you're dealing with an actual known educational institution and not some scam), I'd recommend you not act as an intermediary and get the respective financial staff in contact with each other and let them sort this out.
First step is to find who those people are: you may already be in contact with someone at the granting institution, you may need to ask your supervisor or office/HR staff in your department who the right financial person is on the other end.
Once you have the contact information, I'd do this by sending an email to both of them together, introducing them and stating the situation and asking them to figure it out. It might look something like:

Dear Bonnie and Clyde,
Bonnie is the financial specialist for the Dept of Things at U of A.
Clyde is the treasurer for the Bag of Money Award at UB.
I am a PhD student with Prof X. I received the Good Student award from
UB and therefore UB needs to transfer funds to Dept of Things. I am
not sure how best to facilitate that transfer, but I hope you each can
help me coordinate.

I suspect what's going on is similar to the "XY problem" common on StackExchange, where it's better to ask about your problem rather than how to implement a proposed solution, which might not be a sensible solution in the first place.

Yes, this. Supposedly, all these administrators exist for a reason. This is very much Their Job and not Yours.

"I hope you can help me coordinate." is a wonderful phrasing of "Get this sorted out yourselves!"

Thank you for sharing the XY problem and the link with me, I was not aware this had a name. Indeed it seems to be a bit of a XY problem (I couldn't really follow the example given in the link but I understood the gist). I followed your advice, but my supervisor was a bit stubborn and seemed a bit stuck on that I should give my bank account details. After some time passed however, we seem to slowly converge to that maybe the institution which has offered me the grant can send me the money in advance if we provide the expected cost. I will update you on this.

I'm a big fan of the "you've given me the runaround, now sort it out amongst yourselves" approach. It's one to remember for the rest of your academic career. Fantastic at unblocking things from stubborn IT people, administrators, or really any place that you suspect someone is gatekeeping because you're the only one affected or blamed if the thing doesn't happen.
Other great approaches are "working groups as punishment" and "strategic naivete about why emailing someone's boss might cause problems for them"

@Atom1667 What sorts of things is the money specifically paying for, and what ballpark is the total amount of funds? I.e., are we talking <EUR5000, or >50k, or something in between?

@lupe While a similar strategy might be used as "punishment", I don't intend for this advice to be applied that way nor do I think anyone here is deserving of it. Rather, I'd like to get the people together who are speaking the same finance "language", rather than playing a game of 'telephone' with someone (OP) who doesn't really need to understand the fine level grit of the process. If your physician has a question for radiology, it's better for them to talk with the radiology technician directly rather than asking the patient for details about contrast settings and spinning protons.

@BryanKrause I'm mostly joking about the "as punishment" bit. to be clear! I've had a career in IT on the researcher's side, and as such have a slightly cynical view about getting people to do the things that we need to happen.

@BryanKrause It is less than 5000 EUR, which is aimed for housing, travel (and what we are hoping for) and daily expenses (food and local transport).

@Atom1667 Got it - I guess in my experience those things are usually paid directly to the person incurring those expenses, which is probably you. Is there a reason that doesn't work here?

@BryanKrause Before reading the fine print and contacting the institution, we followed the guidelines given at the website which says that the home institute is preferably reimbursed. After my supervisor contacted the HR, he gave a vague reply there's no account at the lab and none of your business argument, and I should provide my bank account details. This left me in confusion and made me a bit uncomfortable, I wasn't sure what to write to the institution. I was (and still am) worried that the reimbursement might not work out, as I have little to no experience with handling these things.

@BryanKrause Following up with a new comment: now as we have contacted the institute, we got new info (see edit in the post). In case of problems related to reimbursement, I will try to cc financial HR staff at my institute, however as I mentioned in my post, they have been quite slow... i.e. any possible risk/burden is basically put on me with little experience, why I would prefer someone with experience (works) to do it. The institute is most likely not a scam, but it's far away and could be time consuming.

@Atom1667 Might be some language/translation inconsistencies here, but as others have pointed out "reimbursement" implies there's been some expense incurred. So, it doesn't make any sense that funds for "reimbursement" go to your home institute unless your home institute has spent some money (for example, if they've purchased a plane ticket or have paid for your lodging).

@BryanKrause Thanks for your patience, I'm finally starting my work at the host institute. I am not sure what you are aiming for. At that point in time,  we were thinking that the home institute should be reimbursed for paying the stay and travel (thus asking for bank details), however my supervisor gave me a vague answer it's not possible to give it, so I wasn't sure if I was to answer the funding institution with the same vague formulation or what to do (I preferred of course to not give a vague answer). Fortunately it got solved, that they took over managing the booking of stay and travel.

There are two issues. The first is how your institution gets the money from the grantor. That can probably be handled by the grants office at your institution and they will provide necessary banking information to allow for a direct transfer. But you won't be involved in that and the two institutions talk to each other. The grantor and the grants office are well experienced in this.
The second issue is how you get the funds. They will come from your institution in most cases, not directly from the grantor. The grants office will have established an account on your behalf from which you can draw the funds. And they will subtract an amount from the grant for overhead in most cases.
Part of the reason for the overhead charge is that your institution takes on the responsibility for correct usage of the funds.
In the US, at least, the system for you to get the funds is pretty ubiquitous. The individual pays and gets reimbursed later after presenting all receipts. This avoids lots of surprises for the institution and makes sure that disbursements are according to the rules.

It follows that if your department "does not have an account", then that's because your department has managed to stay outside the "overhead" system, and wants to remain that way.

Research administrator here; there are two main ways fellowships get awarded.  One is directly to the recipient; i.e., the bank account they want is in fact your personal bank account.  Please note that any income from this fellowship may be taxable to you.  The other option is to make the institution you work at the awardee, they then issue a check to you, presumably as a stipend instead of salary.  This is a frequent point of confusion, even among trained research administrators.  We always need to see the terms and conditions of any award to decide how this will go--it's not up to the researcher to choose.
As an example, the NSF GRFP and NIH F31 programs award the funding to the institution, and these are received as grants to the institution for the benefit of named individuals.  On the other hand, some fellowships award directly to individuals, and when those folks come to the institution, we don't see anything involved with their funding.  All of their terms and conditions are between them and the sponsor.  We do expect them to disclose information to our graduate aid office.
Which bucket are you in?  Contact your research administrator by going to your local department administrator and asking how to contact a research administrator or whoever is in charge of graduate financial aid.  If you can't figure this out, ask the person who processes those "normal reimbursements".  The institution you are at will have a very specific setup which I can't possibly advise on, as the range is huge, but one of these position types will exist.  The key is getting someone who is trained to identify this language to tell you which direction this goes.  Either you do in fact fill this out yourself, or this needs to be passed on to another entity to process on your behalf.  Make sure you have your terms and conditions and correspondence handy for this person.  If your fellowship contract is in another language; no matter--provide anyways.  The institution should pay for translation services.
Here's an example of terms and conditions for the Swiss NSF Postdoc fellowship (in English).  Notice the terms on page 20 dictating who gets the money (an institution).  Look for information about who the awardee is, and this will help answer more of your questions.

Sounds very familiar to me: Getting any funds transferred to my lab account (which is essentially just a virtual PO number) is a hassle that I (as a PI!) have no control over.
The university has a bank account and money can go there, obviously, but to make sure those funds are then actually attributed to me/the lab is much more of a hassle than one would expect it to be.
All this is to say: I can see where your supervisor might be at and also their (what to you felt like) "none of your business" response...
That being said, I think you should follow up with the advice handed out by others that this is something you should get help with/let the financial administrators sort out.

The situation is a bit unclear.
Are you asking for a reimbursement (i.e. you have already paid some invoices/bills and want to be reimbursed?) or a disbursement (i.e. you have not yet incurred any expenses but will do so in the future?).
It seems the paying institution wants to disburse the funds to your institutions, and thus need banking details to proceed with the transfer to your current institution.  These funds are unlikely to go to “one” account as I’m willing to bet your institution has multiple accounts so that - as a trivial example - salaries or other current expenses are not paid from the same account as research equipments.
Likely your current institution can set up for you a research account, with a credit to the amount disbursed by the paying institution, minus some administrative fee (sometimes called grant tax) if this admin fee is not paid directly by the paying institution to your current institution.
Normally, HR does not handle this but there will be some office for grant services or research services, or someone from financial services, who can set up this research account.  Your university will then credit an research account or a budget code or whatever terminology they are using for the amount disbursed from the payee.  You then get reimbursed real money by your university after they debit this account/budget code/whatever by the amount of the reimbursement issued to you.
When your lab has a guest, expenses will likely be billed to a research account controlled by your lab.  Which one may depend on a variety of factors: if the visit was related to a specific project, the account for the funds of this project will be billed. It’s likely your lab has multiple research accounts  because different granting agencies have different rules for allowable expenses, so keeping funds from different origins in different accounts makes it “easy” to make sure the funds were spent correctly.


text:
Article supplement is longer than article itself
I am writing an article in numerical mathematics.
I have been working on this for a long time and I think I cannot cut down on any part of the main article anymore.
Yet, my advisor tells me to expand and clarify some points.
I think that the only way to accomplish this it to move some ancillary proofs to a supplement, and only report the results that are used in the main argument in the article. I cannot eliminate the ancillary proofs altogether because, even though they are minor modifications of existing literature, it does the reader a better service to at least sketch the necessary modifications.
This way, I estimate to have a supplement that is between 1 to 2 times the length of the article.
Is this bad? Are there alternatives that are not as drastic as not publishing or publishing two papers?

Important forgotten detail: I have a 20 page limit for the main article, coming from the target journal.

Have you already switched to the journal style? Your page count could be off in either direction if not. I had a ~17 page paper recently that was over 20 when switched to the journal style.

@CameronWilliams yes

What does your advisor recommend that you do regarding the over-length problem? I'm asking because your advisor is (hopefully) more familiar with your paper and the customs in your subfield than we are.

My main worry would be that the editor may consider this (perhaps with some justification) an illegitimate way of circumventing the 20-page limit. I would making an inquiry beforehand with someone from your target journal.

@AdamPřenosil I feel like that should be an answer, as it was my immediate reaction as well. Math journals, at least in my experience, tend to treat proofs as part of the page count no matter where they're sorted by the author.

I second the suggestion of asking an editor if this is acceptable. The answer will likely vary from journal to journal.

In my field (physics) it’s become a bit of an in joke that “letters” are more like two page abstracts for 20 pages of supplementary materials

I have read a 7 page paper on the error analysis of Gaussian elimination. It was a condensed version of a 30+ pages technical report. The report was a condensed version of a 130+ pages thesis. This was some time ago. Perhaps it is viable to put the majority of the material on arXiv before you submit your paper?

It's always hard to judge without knowing the details of the work, so I would recommend discussing this with your advisor. That said, my (physics) perspective is that having a supplement that's longer than the paper is perfectly fine as long as the split between main article and supplement makes sense. Yes, I've published such papers. Indeed, there are often lengthy details that only a subset of readers would be interested in, expanded expositions of ancillary content, etc. that can make sense to put in a supplement. The main question to ask yourself is whether the main text can stand on its own legs or not. As far as I can tell from your description, that does seem likely in this case. Of course, some content might make more sense in appendices than in a separate PDF.

If the journal supports appendices of course (re. the last sentence).  Also in physics, I'd say the supplemental information being slightly longer is reasonably common, much longer not unknown particularly in experiments involving image data

@ChrisH It also happens when there are many tables. I think there's a topological quantum chemistry paper that's 10 pages long, but has 180 pages or so of supplemental material as it covers a lot of symmetry groups.

From a chemistry/chemical engineering perspective, the supplement being twice as long as the main text is not surprising or outlandish. For completeness and reproducibility, we must report even the most dry and boring parts, such as purification procedures, analysis techniques (both physical and computational), reactor design down to part sources, data that is summarized in a table but someone may still want in graphical form (like NMR results), etc. It is sufficient for the main text to gloss over many of these ("a 8 mL foo reactor" or "analyzed via H-NMR") if that step is in itself not particularly special or surprising, with the full details relegated to the supplement.
It can be polite to direct readers with a note ("See supplemental material for details.") Ultimately your editor and reviewers will have their own opinions about whether or not the main text requires those proofs, or if a reader will take your word for it.

[as a nonpublished reader of scientific articles] I'd love if all papers were this way
If the actual novel stuff was condensed down BUT all the anciliary work, the base proofs etc. are nevertheless present in the supplement (instead of me having to dig through all the cited papers and try to manually convert their work into what exactly you used).
So while I can't speak on how it's received "properly academically" I'd personally be a huge fan.

I cannot eliminate the ancillary proofs altogether because, even
though they are minor modifications of existing literature, it does
the reader a better service to at least sketch the necessary
modifications.

There lies the conundrum: even if you move the ancillary proofs to the supplementary material (and you should do this, since they are ancillary, they belong to supplementary material...)  you have to squeeze down to the bare minimum. Do not fear the scientific community will not trust you if you do not show all the passages, the "share or did not happen" mentality belongs to other activity having inifinite bandwidth to say nothing, science is the opposite, striving to using minimal bandwidth to convey dense messages.
So go ahead with your publication, but in the ancillary proofs show the path, not the full demonstration. If you are describing succintly the path, most of your readers will be able to tackle the demonstration on their own, with your minimal guidance.
Good luck!


text:
How to decline or take time with a PhD offer
I have inquired about a PhD position at a group. After a chat with the supervisor, and some time, I was invited to apply to the doctoral school (they never said they'd take me). Then holidays came and afterwards, a message asking if I had sent yet the documents. My reply was no, that I let them know. Then many other many follow ups from them: they had secured funding, they would start soon to advertise the position, the summary of the advertisment, mentioning a new,  earlier deadline for applying...
And now, them asking again if I have sent the documents. At this point I think it would be best to let them know that I will be sending them only when I am sure about committing to the project, and that I have other options to evaluate.
Do you think this is a good idea? In any case, do you have any advice for doing this "the right way"?
My message is: I consider this project, but I haven't made up my mind.

I needed references to formally apply for the programme. One of the professors that could write a letter for me, also offered to me a position (spontaneously). That's why I can't just submit the application.

Have you tried just asking if they can waive your application fee?

@ScottSeidman No, but the application fee is not an issue.
The isse is that I need too many referees, and whoever I ask, one is involved in an offer I have received.

Do you mean references??

@ScottSeidman I do, yes. What would you advise in this rather delicate case?

Am I understanding correctly that the problem you see is that the people you would ask for references are people you are separately applying to work for?

@BryanKrause Yes and no. Those references offered me a position spontaneously but I don't want to accept them yet, I am trying to find better and other options. I have not asked them to work with them, they offered that to me.

My suggestion would be to look for alternative letter-writers. Your advisor might help you to find such.

This is very risky. They may have other options and will pass you by if you show no interest. And your other options might not work out.
I'd suggest that you make the application formal, just to keep your options open. An application doesn't imply a commitment to accept an offer. If nothing else, consider it a backup to your other possibilities which may come to fruit or not. But if you aren't in the game you can't win it. A the worst, it buys you time, which is a good thing.
It would be different, of course, if you had decided against any offer they might make. That seems unlikely here.

Alright, thanks. The thing is, at least one of the referees I could ask for my application, is involved in another offer. So, I cannot make the application formal.

This does not always have to be a problem. If you are honest about wanting to keep your options open, they may write you a letter anyways despite also wanting to hire you themselves.

My understanding is that there are people who 1) Know you well enough to provide a reference, and 2) Think highly enough of you to want to offer you a position.
These are great people to ask for references. Unless they would be so spiteful that you're considering to work for someone else besides them, in which case yes, they are terrible people to ask for references. But also terrible people to work for. So, either you trust them enough that you should feel free to ask them to be references for any position you want, or you don't trust them and should not take their offers nor ask them for references. You should never be in a place where you want to work with them but can't ask for a reference. You do not need to turn down their offer to apply to another: it is very reasonable for you to seek to compare possible offers before making a final decision.
It sounds like you have several possible offers, and don't know what you want. That's okay, but ultimately that's just something you have to figure out. There's no magic way without acting unethically to call dibs on a position and reserve it indefinitely. If you're uncertain and pursuing other options, be open and honest about that. Ask about timelines to learn how long you have to make a decision, and then make a decision within that window. Right now it sounds like you're stringing them along, and they are rightfully getting frustrated with that. If you won't take the position, they will want to pursue other people that will.
So, concrete steps:
Apply to PhD positions you are interested in. Apply fully, don't hold back information or documents to play a game.
Use as references the people who know your work best, have a high opinion of you, and who you trust.
Don't reserve slots for working with people you don't trust.
Once you have offers, decide to accept or not accept them, considering what other offers you have and other applications you have open.
Ideally, choose an offer to accept before rejecting other offers. If you need more time, ask for more time, be honest about the reasons. If a clock runs out before you're willing to decide, you may have to let it go if it doesn't suit you.

In this case, I don't even have an offer. Over time, they started to act like they were considering to hire me, though. I am convinced to tell them that I am evaluating other options, and ask for more time. But how would you justify the fact that I haven't sent the application yet? I wish not to upset them further

@carmelo If it's an opportunity that you want an offer from, then I'd recommend spending far less effort justifying why you haven't sent the application, and far more effort sending the application. I wouldn't bother justifying at all, just do it.

@carmelo I've also now read through your previous question that you linked... is it possible you are misunderstanding that applying for a position means you are committing to take it if accepted? I suppose it's possible things are different where you are, but in my world that is very far from the truth. You can apply to anything that you might possibly take - I wouldn't apply if you are definitely going to turn down an offer - but as long as there is an honest chance, it's okay to apply. You decide to accept or not later.

Let me clear another detail. I just asked the professor about possibilities. The possibility is there, but not so interesting I'll take it. I have not applied to a position, I just asked for details. They never mentioned offering it to me (but it's kind of implicit now). Now, I'm slightly inclined in the end not to take the position. I think it is worth explaining them the delay I had, not to burn bridges, if they matters. What do you think?

@carmelo I do not understand what you are saying about "possibilities". You only have to worry about whether you are inclined to take or not take the position if it is offered, which it hasn't yet. What purpose would explaining your delay serve? If you've decided you don't even want to apply, then you can just tell them "I'm sorry for the delay, I've chosen not to apply to this position" and that's that (though it will certainly reduce any chance you are given an offer to zero).

The offer is now advertised (it wasn't when I asked the professor about how to collaborate for a PhD). My rationale for explaining why I haven't finalized the application is to come out "clean", you never know that I'll have to do with them again. Assuming it is a good idea to do so, what would be a good way? "I am evaluating other options" is an explanation that will accomplish my goal of not upsetting them? If not, what's a possible alternative?

And possibilities here means: projects to do a PhD on.

@carmelo I am still not understanding your goals here. "I am evaluating other options" does not make sense to me, because evaluating other options does not prevent you from submitting the application.

You are right, and that would not make sense to them either.
My goals with this professor is to avoid upsetting them and to keep the door open.
Justifying not sending the application is for the first goal. For instance, saying I had troubles with gathering references is quite accurate (if I ask a letter to another Prof. X who made a good but not so good offer to me, I have to decline the offer of Prof. X).
For the second goal, I could ask for a deadline to take more time to make my decision. Or I might as well say I will not continue further  (I'll unlikely confirm any offer as I said).

@carmelo If you want to keep the door open, the first and most important thing to do is finish submitting your entire application. Sure, it's fine to apologize and say it took you some time to arrange references, but I think it's not a big deal, it's a problem best solved by just completing the application. I don't see why you need to ask for more time to make a decision, you haven't been asked to make any decision yet.

Thanks for the many clarifications :)

I don't think I've ever seen an ad for an individual slot in  PhD program.

Why not just be honest??  You haven't been guaranteed admission to the program that seems like it really wants to have you.  Given that, it would simply be irresponsible for you to put all your eggs in that one basket, and the responsible behavior would be for you to apply to more programs.
I don't really understand all of the satellite issues surrounding your decision, because you're not explaining them particularly well, but it sounds like you would need members of this group to serve as recommenders if you apply for more programs.  That's delicate, but it would certainly be unfortunate if you created a situation in which you can only apply to the one program you're not sure if you want to go to because of it.
All in all, I recommend honesty with the group asking you to complete your application package.  That way, if everything breaks down, at the very least you haven't burned any bridges because the people you were dealing with feel like they've been lied to.

I need a certain number of references for entering the programme. One of the professors I could ask the reference to, is one from which  I have another offer pending. I hope it is clearer. Thanks for the answer by the way.

I like this answer. Honesty is always the best policy. And @carmelo, you can also explain to the referee that you are considering other options. It's not an unreasonable thing to say.

You don't say where all of this takes place. PhD funding works very differently in different countries, which will have a huge impact on all of this.
That said, some general comments:

If you feel like someone already pressures you before you've even started, it may not be a great place for you.

However, if you want to long, the place may not be available anymore. Depends on how the funding works. See above. So there's could be a legitimate reason why they ask you again and again. If you're OK to lose the opportunity (which I think you are), just tell them honestly.

Maybe in contrast to what others said, I would always recommend honesty. Even if you don't end up going there, these people may judge you in the future (you may have a long academic career ahead of you). Not good to look dishonest and unreliable before you even start. Just say what you want honestly.

You seem to have very good supervisors locally. Trust them more than random people on the Internet. They will know your situation much better.


text:
PhD offer: what to do after a long reflection pause?
I have been offered a PhD position (to which I did not apply, it was from a professor who knows me). I am not entirely sure about accepting, but for various reasons I don't want to give a negative answer already.
It's been few weeks since the chat we had. It is expected that I give some kind of response to the professor. Some possibilities:

"I am still thinking about it": shows a lack of interest
not doing anything: unpolite and shows a lack of interest
asking more time to think: possibly shows a lack of interest

What would you suggest?

First, it is OK to be undecided.
I'd suggest that you say, in person, that you are flattered by the offer, but need to explore what other options you have and that you haven't yet had a chance to do that. That is also OK and doesn't show lack of interest. You can also spend a bit of time in conversation exploring the research topics you might explore with them. That shows interest and you might just come up with something that interests you.
But, I also suggest developing a plan to search out the options so that you have something to compare this offer with.

Is it very important the "in person"? I can only do emails or ask for teams meetings as of now...

Such things are much better done face to face. Nuance can be everything and it is lost in emails. But you use the tools you have.


text:
Asking reference to Y without letting colleague X know
Faculty member X offered me a PhD position, spontaneously. I have also been interviewing for a job. The company asks me now for a reference, and I clearly cannot provide X. I want to provide faculty member Y, which knows X and is in her same department.
How do I ask for a reference to Y, without having X know?
My idea was: Dear Y, [...] I was thinking of continuing with a project supervised by X, or to stay in industry. Since you know me well from course  Z, seminar W and project K, I would be glad if you could act as a reference for an industrial position. In case this helps, I attach some detail about company, position and my CV [...].
I hope this is a good draft, and if not, I am looking for ways to improve it. Assuming it is a good idea to approach Y in the first place!

The assumption in the answer of @JosephDoggie is correct: I still consider the offer of X, and will likely take the job, if I am offered it.

Does Y know your situation? I.e. do they know that you have some kind of relationship with X?

'I clearly cannot provide X.' Why not..? If this person is willing to act professionally and in your best interests, they can write you a good recommendation. What could sound better than 'I am currently trying to hire this person'?

This is a multi-faceted answer.
It appears from the question that taking the job you are interviewing for and "the offered PhD position are mutually exclusive.  I'm further assuming that you want to retain the PhD position if you don't get the job interview but will abandon it if you do.  If you are certain that you won't want the PhD position under any circumstances, you could just tell X about the interview, and ask them to be your reference.
This is a somewhat common situation.  It's ok to do that but try to keep as honest as possible with all parties.  My own advisor told us that we would likely face a situation like this, and it's ok to do what is best for us.
I would just ask Y without telling them not to tell X, that gets too complicated.  Of course, be polite in asking.  I think your suggested outline is OK, I personally would leave the X out of it, as well as the associated-with-X position.
Some of this would be culturally dependent, I come from the US perspective.
Best wishes.

I agree that writing 'don't tell X' is not something I should do. I was hoping that, by only mentioning X, he understands not to let the news arrive to X. Why would you leave X out?

And about your assumptions, they are all correct.

It just makes it worse for Y to mention X in my opinion.


text:
Including false attempts in resarch statement
I am Masters student in Mathematics.Currently I am studying modular forms.I am interested in integer partitions, Modular forms. I am working and thinking about problems which are arising during my studies.Besides this I am trying to understand connections of these problems to another field of Maths and physics. Actually I am preparing application for fellowship grant , there is requirement of Research statement.So How can I write down research statement having no strong result? Should false attempts during thinking about problems be included in resarch statement?

This had a downvote but I think there is a good question here about whether it is appropriate to include false starts/incorrect attempts at a problem on one's research statement. If you edit the question a bit and give the question title a more direct question then you might get good answers/discussion.

It is probably fine to indicate that you have already studied the problems/questions that you are exploring and that you have "narrowed the field" by rejecting certain unfruitful approaches. If you already have "strong results" then the research is behind you, not ahead. Focus more on the importance of the questions you are exploring than the failed attempts to answer them. In mathematics, some problems are inherently difficult. Some are even impossible, but things can be learned and math can advance even for those problems.
It is especially valuable, if true, to point out that some of the attempts to answer the main question have also raised new questions that are fruitful for exploration.

+1 for If you already have "strong results" then the research is behind you, not ahead. Indeed, this is especially true for mathematics, where research statements tend to be more a description of one's interests and one's studies related to that interest (such as independent study courses for credit, summer projects, honors thesis, etc.), all while trying to form a connection between this interest and that of some of the research carried out by members of the department to which one is applying. However, this is coming from a U.S. viewpoint . . .


text:
How detailed should I be in informal enquiries to advertised PhD positions?
To cold email professors asking if they would take me as a PhD student I usually craft ad-hoc and on point emails, expressing my competences and my interest in one of their articles, with reference to something very specific I have appreciated therein.
This is usually successful.
I am now very interested in an advertised position, and informal enquiries are welcome, prior to formal applications: I wish to know what level of skills is required in a certain topic, how would the supervision work and so on.
Is it acceptable to write an email saying roughly "I am very interested and I would like to gather more details on content and supervision. Would you be available for an online meeting? I attach my CV for your information."?
Or this is too generic? Note that a cover letter is still required in the end.


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Inquiring about PhD position
My uni advisor offered me, some months after my graduation, a PhD position in his group. I do not know any detail about such position.
Right now I am more inclined going in different topics, and I am actually evaluating other proposals, academic and not. Still, since an intersection with my current interests is somewhat possible, I would like to know what their project might involve, but with the serious possibility that I will reject the proposal.
I was thinking of writing something along the lines of "thanks for the message, I am thinking about other proposals in a different direction. Could you please give more details".
Do you think this is appropriate? Would you set up the reply in a different way? Thanks!

Do you have the possibility to have a face-to-face meeting?

@Buffy No, I would have to ask for it

Then why not ask for a face-to-face meeting ?

@Nobody No particular reason, I was thinking about it when I was saying "give me more details". Would you still add the part about new interests in other topics?

Since they are your advisor, you should know them quite well. Your own judgement is better than strangers on the Internet. I would ask them the details face to face if I were you. If it's not what you really want, then politely say you are not interested. You must learn how to say no when you need to say it.

You go ahead and ask for more details from your advisor. It's a reasonable request. What you seem to want is to explore other options while leaving this door open. You don't know the details of your advisor's offer, and presumably, you don't know the details of the other options either. So right now you don't even know your options, as you are in the information-gathering stage.
Some people have the mistaken perception that in negotiations, all parties give their "best and last offer" (in real estate jargon) up front, so that you can just enter all the options on a spreadsheet and make a decision. But that's not how anything goes. Most negotiations, like the one you are about to undergo, develop in stages: people send 'feelers' around to see what's available and who's interested (this seems to be your stage now), then if things sound good, all parties ask for more information. You then ask your advisor about the stipend, how much TAing is involved, which project you'll work on and who will have ownership (e.g. will it be your own project or will you be a postoc's helper?), etc. Your prospective advisor will ask about your interests, your time commitment, your requirements for pay and TAing, etc. Presumably you both have other options, that is, you have other positions to consider, and your prospective advisor has other candidates. You keep dancing until an agreement is made.

I suggest, pretty strongly, that you request a face-to-face meeting to "discuss your future".
Assuming that you have established trust with the person, as seems to be the case, ask them for the details you seek, but also bring up other possibilities and ask for their advice.
An ethical advisor would give advice to your benefit, not their own.
And even if you take another offer, such meetings are useful in maintaining long term contact that can benefit you in the future. But such things are much harder by email where a misplaced word can cause misunderstandings. Make it personal, not impersonal.


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PhD in X needed for academic career in X
I am based in Europe, and I am about to start my PhD. Europe refers to the set of countries I may want to work in: Germany, Switzerland, France, Austria.

Is it formally necessary that I earn it in field X if I want to have an academic career in field X?

By academic career I mean taking up a professorship, or in any case, a research position in some university.
Assuming that my research falls significantly under field Y as well, what disadvantages may happen in trying to have an academic career in Y?
What about X = mechanical engineering (focus computational mechanics) and Y = mathematics (focus numerical methods) ?

This question isn't answerable, it's too general. The answer is field-specific.

@user438383 Updated

Still not answerable and too general @hahn76

@Starship-OnStrike Can you please indicate what clarifications should I address?

What job are you talking about for one? Certain jobs wont care about your schooling, pust your performance whilst others tend to be the opposite (and theres of course some in the middle) @hahn76

Hopefully it is more answerable now. I cannot be more precise as for the country. @Starship-OnStrike

We still need to know what profession @hahn76

"By academic career I mean taking up a professorship, or in any case, a research position in some university." @Starship-OnStrike. I mean to be a university researcher, possibly professor, in on of the two mentioned fields. I don't know how to further detail from here.

Okay I think thats enough detail then thanks @hahn76

While a PhD in Italian literature is likely a barrier to employment in an engineering faculty, much of STEM is highly interrelated and the specifics of what you studied and how it applies to what is happening in some department is the most relevant question.

What is wrong with Austria and Belgium :D ?

@EarlGrey - well, for Belgium at least, mayonnaise on fries for one...

Well right, added Austria, Belgium is too far away from where I live ;)

Glad you got a useful answer. I can't imagine this post being useful for anyone else in the future, so I'm going to close it out for now.

Europe is not a country.
In some European countries, the PhD in topic X (say engineering) preclude you from being professor in department of Y (say mathematics). Some countries have granular divisions of topics, and some topics fit (are allowed to apply towards) a certain faculty, some another faculty.
However, what you ask is a bit non-sense.
You can simply be Xy, a PhD in Mechanical Engineering, with a focus on numerical methods applied to computational mechanics. With that knowledge you will have plenty of opportunities, in the academia and outside, in any country as long as you learn the local language (and even without knowing the language you can find something).

+1 for "Europe is not a country", Iceland, the UK, and Greece are all in Europe


text:
Submitting paper to lower tier journal instead of doing major revision at higher tier journal
I am about to submit a paper from my master's thesis, my ex supervisor is my co-author.
They are letting me choose between two journals: one is a top journal, one is a good journal.
I'd like to submit to the top journal, and if the reviewers ask for major extensions I'd rather not do them, withdraw the submission and try with the lower impact journal (of course, I won't submit to a different journal if they spot a flaw).
I wouldn't want to spend much more energy on the paper, I moved away from academia and I prefer to focus elsewhere. If put gracefully, is this something "ok" to say to an ex-supervisor?
After all, they are fine with the other journal to start with.

I really like the comment of @R1NaNo. They say that the difference between the two journals, both respectable, is the required novelty, not the thoroughness of the reviewing process and the magnitude of the asked revisions.
My choices then are not submitting, or trying the top journal.

I think if you don't want to spend much energy, I would just go with the "lower tier" or "lower impact" journal first.  This route saves more energy, and then you don't need to be embarrassed by balking at the revisions.  Of course, if that journal wants revisions, you would have to decide what to do!

The difference between higher impact journals and respectable lower impact journals is the factor of novelty. If your work has flaws and needs further work, it will be picked up by any good reviewers and enforced by any good editor. So your logic is flawed. If you feel your work has novelty/impact then go high, if not then go to an appropriate topical journal. If you feel the work is incomplete and questionable, I guess there is always MDPI, Hindawi, and a laundry list of questionable venues that will push through incomplete work for an APC.

Just to mention that some journals nowadays call everything beyond typo corrections a "major revision". The major revision we just received on one of the papers I'm a co-author on amounts to a few days of work at most. We are currently cautiously celebrating paper acceptance as that seems to be the most likely thing to happen.

@R1NaNo Thanks for the comment, this perspective makes me think that my choices are higher ranked journal or not submitting. I encourage you to make your comment an answer, btw.

@penelope you consider a few days of work minor? I'm surprised - that seems major to me.

@Allure before we read the feedback, we were afraid that "major revision" would mean at least a couple of weeks of work, probably not running new experiments but maybe producing new data visualisations.To the point where we'd almost decided to not get started on the revision yet as we all currently have a busy schedule, and get started on it mid-August when people are back from leave. Considering that the proposed revisions can be done with light rephrasing and making some schematic figures (not data visualisations), we decided to just go for it and hopefully resubmit by the end of next week

@R1NaNo "The difference between higher impact journals and respectable lower impact journals is the factor of novelty." I think that is an over-simplification. There are other possible differences too. Quality, thoroughness, sophistication, difficulty. Also, unfortunately, higher impact journals sometimes accept or reject based on factors like whether it is a trendy topic and whether statistical significance was achieved.

R1NaNo's comment only applies to certain fields, and even there it's an over-simplification. Be careful @Lilla.

Beware that your proposed course of action can backfire.
That lower tier journal that you submit to instead of addressing the reviewers' concerns may very well invite the very same reviewers as the original higher tier journals.
These reviewers may have spent a possibly considerable time reviewing your original submission. After all, as Bryan Krause writes, a Major Revision means that the editor, and presumably the reviewers, believes your paper can be published in the higher tier journal after some work on your side. So pointing out what exactly needs to be done may indeed have cost your reviewers quite some time.
If a reviewer sees your submission to a different journal without changes corresponding to their review, they will not be pleased. I have been in the reviewer's situation in cases like these, and I strongly felt that the authors were wasting my time. This is not the reaction you want to provoke.

Has happed to me.  I review a paper.  In my review I point out errors.  Later, I receive the same paper, submitted to another journal, with errors not corrected.

@GEdgar: how did you react?

I've also been there, and I just sent my original review to the other journal.

@StephanKolassa I haven't had that, but I would clearly state that to the authors and the new editor. I guess a good editor would know what to do.

I had something similar happen: I reviewed a paper for Scientific Reports (which is supposed to publish basically anything as long as it's correct), and I pointed out errors, then in lightning speed saw the paper published in a journal with a lower impact factor without the errors corrected (even very basic spelling errors). You can imagine what that made me think of the authors.

In my experiences, the filter at top journals is mostly the editor's desk reject followed by a strong initial negative response from reviewers.
If you get to review and a major revision decision, your paper at that point likely has a higher chance of being accepted at that journal as any other (putting aside journals that just accept everything because their peer review is a sham).
Almost every initial submission that goes through quality peer review is going to come back with some revisions necessary. If you're not willing to do those revisions, you're not really willing to go through the legitimate peer review process.
I'd recommend discussing with your advisor the task of revisions before submitting and perhaps ask if they would be willing to do those tasks for you, given your current situation outside academia. If you feel like this is not something you're willing to do at all, you can even go beyond an ask and just set a boundary that you won't be doing it or setting a strict time limit. In either case, as you're giving up some of your responsibilities on the paper, it would make sense to let your co-author/former supervisor have the primary decision on where the paper goes.

Thanks for your answer. I guess then that I can clarify my limits to my supervisor, as I already know that I am going to be the one who's messing around with the re-writing process. The limits are: rewriting, restructuring and in case, fixing flaws (unless my results are fundamentally flawed). But not doing additional research for the moment.

What a "major revision" is will depend on your specific field. In my fields (forecasting and psychology), it very rarely amounts to doing additional research. Rather, it's precisely the rewriting and restructuring you mention, possibly some new data analyses. Ask your reviewer what kind of revision work you could expect.

@Lilla See Stephan's comment, and also I would add that if a major revision suggests additional research that you have reasons not to do, you can always come back with a response that says exactly that, and the editor will have to decide what to do. If the work is otherwise in good shape and the additional requested work is not entirely necessary to make the paper meaningful it may still be accepted once other changes are made.

@BryanKrause I want to be a bit careful with my supervisor. Is "I don't have time/resources to do the requested additional research" considered to be a "valid" reason?

@Lilla For your supervisor or for the reviewers?

@BryanKrause Mainly for the supervisor: then I would need to decide what to tell them upfront. I'm also curious about the reviewers if you have any perspective on that.

@Lilla I mean, it is your reason, isn't it? That doesn't mean your supervisor needs to agree, they don't have any power over you once you've graduated and left academia. You can of course choose to invest your own time to keep up a good relationship etc, but if you don't need or value any of that then you can't be forced. For the reviewers, it depends entirely on the state of the work with and without additions. Sometimes reviewers make suggestions that they think are simple but actually require far more work.

@BryanKrause I value keeping a good relationship with my ex advisor, I was wondering if speaking my mind in a graceful way is incompatible. So, I hope that saying that I don't have time for more research isn't going to upset them.

@Lilla I don't know them, so I can't predict. Academics can be used to the norm of working on past projects in new positions that is common within academia but mostly unheard of elsewhere. You can raise it as a discussion about how much you are willing to contribute, but ultimately if you're not willing to do more than some amount of work that's simply your position. I think it's better to have the conversation than to try to avoid it passive aggressively by suggesting to submit to a journal that you don't think cares enough to require necessary improvements.

There's an elephant in the room: you don't know what the reviewers' comments are. Major revision reviews can range from "clarify this step in your derivation, I don't get it" to "this needs more experiments to be convincing". Obviously the first review takes much less time to address than the second. If you ask me, you're likely to regret not revising the manuscript if you get the first review, while with the second you might reasonably say you no longer have time.
That said, if you do get the second review, the manuscript might still be published eventually (since your ex-supervisor might be able to engage another student to do the necessary experiments).
Therefore, I think you're asking the wrong question. You don't know what the reviewers' comments are, hence now is not the time to worry about how to address them. Submit the manuscript to the best journal that might accept the paper, and decide what to do when the comments come. If your ex-supervisor thinks you have a chance at the top journal, then submit there.

I would approach this from a different perspective. For master thesis results, it's often more strategic to submit to a good, but not top-tier journal.
Top-tier journals typically require a more comprehensive introduction and writing style that appeals to a broader readership. While master students often have strong technical knowledge in a specific area, acquiring the broader expertise needed for these journals can take much longer.
Thus, preparing a manuscript for a top-tier journal demands more efforts on the text, which is time-consuming (even with the help of your supervisor). In contrast, submitting to a reputable, but not top-tier journal will allow you to focus more on the technical aspects of your presentation.

I wouldn't want to spend much more energy on the paper, I moved away from academia and I prefer to focus elsewhere. If put gracefully, is this something "ok" to say to an ex-supervisor? After all, they are fine with the other journal to start with.

You are doing a favour to your ex-supervisor. Since this is a master thesis, the publication is very (very) likely to never matter in your life (yes, never say never but, let's face it, a master thesis is a basis and nobody is going to dig).
So this is a combination of interpersonal relations and strategic relationships (= how much will you get of it (the egoist version), how much you like them and want to help (the altruist part), how much time you can dedicate to that)
There is a possible alternative: let them write the paper (and possibly rearrange the order of authors, this really depends on the case) and deal with the submission.


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Can a rejected paper with no resubmission allowed be resubmitted to the same journal after changing content and heading of the paper?
I got rejection from IEEE WCL with no resubmission allowed. Thereafter, I improved the paper significantly with addition of more analysis spending 8+ months on the paper. Can/Should I submit my paper to IEEE WCL with different headings? Do such journals have repositories to recognize that a rejected paper has been resubmitted?
This question is a bit different from Should I resubmit a rejected paper to the same journal? because IEEE WCL specifically uses the terms "Reject (resubmission allowed/not-allowed).

Someone at the journal will make a judgement as to whether it is in fact an improved version of the same paper, or if enough has changed that it's a different paper.
This is a judgement that can only be made by someone in your field who understands your work.  We cannot judge this, and the judgement cannot be made using some automatic rules.
If you think it can reasonably be considered a different paper and do submit to the same journal, you should be up front with them and tell them in the submission letter that your new paper incorporates the work from the old paper, which was rejected without giving you an opportunity to resubmit.  Then the editors can decide for themselves whether to consider the paper or not.
If you don't think it is really a different paper, you should not waste your time or that of the editors.
What you definitely should NOT do is submit without mentioning the old paper.  The journal might consider this an unethical attempt to resubmit a rejected paper and ban you.  In this case, you might not be allowed to submit anything to the journal (or possibly any IEEE journal) for a period of several years.
For my research, there are always at least one or two other journals which are roughly equivalent to any given journal (if for no reason other than that each journal's editors have somewhere to submit their work) so there is really no reason to try resubmitting.  I realize this may be different in other areas.