Research Expectations

Expectations are a two-way street.

This document shares my expectations for current and prospective research students. By making these expectations explicit, prospective students can understand the kind of working environment they can expect, and current students know what’s expected of them during their research project.

There’s strong evidence that explicitly discussing expectations (from both parties) leads to better research outcomes, happier students and researchers, and a more effective and collaborative working environment. For these reasons I encourage all students to document their expectations of supervisors so that any differences (e.g., in working style, communication preferences, or expected outputs) can be identified and discussed early on. There are many helpful resources online that can guide you in articulating your expectations.

Meetings

• I recommend we meet weekly, at least. The frequency and length of meetings will vary for each student and will change throughout your research journey. It might be hourly meetings once a week, or brief daily check-ins—whatever works best for you. And it might change with time. At the start, you may want to meet more frequently. When you’re in a good productive groove, you might want to meet less frequently.
• Please schedule meetings in my calendar. Calendar invites help me keep track of commitments. If my scheduling constraints don’t work for you, please let me know why in the notes of the calendar invite—it shows me you’ve considered the scheduling!
• Calendar invites work better than emails for scheduling—they go directly into both our calendars.
• Pro-Tip™: In Google Calendar, click on Settings and navigate to Event settings. Set Default guest permissions to ‘Modify event’. This allows me to adjust the meeting time directly if needed, rather than having to decline and recreate events.
• I generally suggest 30-minute meetings unless you feel we need more time. Think about how much time you need and schedule accordingly. It’s perfectly fine if we finish early, and if we don’t cover everything, we’ll have a head start on next week’s agenda.
• Come prepared to meetings – it helps our time together be more productive. Bringing a notebook and plots (lots of them!) can be really helpful. I recommend a joint Google Document that tracks all meeting topics and discussion points throughout your project.
• Consider bringing an agenda to each meeting that includes: progress summary, decisions that need discussion, and questions you have.
• On plots:
  • Before making a plot, consider what you expect it will show: what the data might look like, how you’ll interpret it, and what the primary message is.
  • The best plots speak for themselves. Axes, labels, and legends help tell the story.
  • Try to interpret and explain the broader implications of the plots you share.
  • Have an opinion about your plots. Are things working as expected? Why or why not? What did you anticipate? If something seems off, what might explain that? What could you try next?

Communication

• My personal mobile phone number is in my email signature for emergencies only. Please reserve calls or text messages for genuine crises. For science questions, email or Slack work much better.Once a student was frustrated I didn’t respond to a Saturday afternoon text message about a plot. It wasn’t urgent or time-sensitive. There was no grant, job application, or deadline involved. They just wanted an answer right away.

  At that moment, I was four meters up on a wobbly ladder fixing weatherboards beside power lines, in summer heat. So I wasn’t really able to evaluate plots at that time.

But more importantly: text messages aren’t the right channel for science discussions, as they don’t allow for thoughtful, detailed responses.

• I work in focused blocks and turn off email and Slack when I’m deep in research or other tasks. This means I respond to emails in batches: usually morning or evening. You can typically expect a response within about a day for non-urgent matters.

• Every Friday I aim for #InboxZero. Sometimes I make it!

• Before emailing with a problem, consider whether you might solve it in the same timeframe. Here’s a technique that many find helpful:

  1. Draft an email that clearly and specifically describes the problem.
  2. Save it as a draft instead of sending.
  3. The process of writing often helps clarify your thoughts.
  4. Use that clarity to tackle the problem yourself.
  5. Delete the draft. Or better yet, keep an archive of emails you didn’t need to send—a record of problems you solved independently!

Professionalism

• Please be kind to people. When critiquing ideas, make sure you support and encourage the person who proposed them. I’m committed to creating a welcoming environment free from racism, sexism, bullying, harassment, or any related behavior. I’ll address concerning behavior directly the first time I observe it. If behavior seems systemic or reportable, I’ll take appropriate action, which may include stepping back as supervisor or filing reports as needed.

• Please respect others’ time. Try to find answers through Google or the literature before asking colleagues. If you can find the answer by searching online, it’s worth trying that first.See ‘How to make the most of your supervisor’s time’ below.

• Academia offers academic freedom and flexible working conditions. You’re welcome to work when you prefer, though having some regular overlap during business hours helps us collaborate effectively and helps you feel connected to the department community.

• Think of research as a professional endeavor. This is a workplace that we share with many colleagues.

• Be professional in your interactions, keeping in mind that this is a shared workspace where everyone should feel comfortable.

Research practices

• Bringing a notebook and taking notes can be incredibly helpful.
• Find a note-taking system that works for you. Options include Google Slide decks for collecting plots, Evernote, Google Docs, or physical notebooks.
• Set up a robust data backup system.My backup system is comprehensive and automatic. All code lives on GitHub. Presentations are in Google Slides. My laptop backs up automatically over wifi to a RAID-5 network storage device. Weekly backups are copied to three remote locations. As David W. Hogg likes to say: “I should be able to throw your laptop in the Hudson river today and you should be working tomorrow without any loss of productivity.”
• I recommend using GitHub (or similar) for your code. You get unlimited private repositories with your educational account. Regular commits (every 10-15 minutes when actively coding) help protect your work.
• I prefer GitHub for writing papers rather than Overleaf or similar platforms, as it offers better version control and collaboration features.
• Jupyter notebooks are wonderful tools, but not always the right tool you need. If you encounter a weird bug in a Jupyter notebook, try restarting the kernel before we troubleshoot together—sometimes it’s a state error.
• If you’d like my help with a code or data analysis problem, creating a minimum reproducible example is really helpful. This process often helps you solve the problem yourself!
• Stay connected with the literature. Read astro-ph regularly—either through daily emails or a system that works for you. Skimming titles and abstracts, and reading relevant papers, keeps you current.
• On writing: I’m most helpful when reviewing polished drafts rather than early versions. Consider your n-th draft as your first draft to share. This way I can focus on substantive feedback rather than typos and basic edits.
• I encourage you to learn about writing craft. Creative writing books have excellent advice that applies to scientific writing too.
• Attending seminars is valuable for many reasons. An expert has traveled from their work and family to share their knowledge, and you’re invited to ask questions. You’ll build knowledge, learn new things, network, and feel more connected to the department community. It doesn’t matter whether the topic is related to your own, or not.
• I highly encourage interacting with seminar speakers. Join them for coffee or lunch. These interactions can be incredibly valuable for your development.
• Want to make a great impression? Read one of the speaker’s papers before they arrive, especially if it relates to their talk topic. This preparation leads to meaningful conversations.

If you disagree with any of these expectations, please let me know—this is a living document and your feedback helps improve it.

How to make the most of your supervisor’s time

What follows are not strict expectations but rather tips that many students have found helpful for effective collaboration with supervisors. You don’t have to “impress” anyone to have a successful career, though building positive working relationships with mentors, supervisors, and colleagues certainly helps. These people may become letter-writers, mentors, or advocates for you in the future.

• Do consistent, thoughtful work. Excellence comes from doing many things well over time.
• Try to solve minor problems independently first. Search Google, review the literature, develop a testing plan, and document your progress. Reach out to peers or junior post-docs. This builds your problem-solving skills.
• Maintain regular contact (e.g., weekly or bi-weekly). Consistent communication about progress and results helps maintain momentum.
• Bring plots to meetings. Make sure each plot has a purpose and message. Before creating a plot, think about what you expect to see. Have an opinion about what each plot shows. Consider what plots might be useful to make next.
• Communicate about scheduling. If you realize you might miss a meeting or deadline, let me know as soon as possible so we can adjust plans.
• Take notes. Bringing a notebook to meetings and using it helps consolidate understanding and ensures we can build on previous conversations.
• Share polished drafts. When you’re ready to share writing, spend time revising first. Consider your fifth or tenth draft as your first shareable version. Reading many papers helps you write better ones.

Research requires momentum and commitment, and different paths work for different people

I can tell when students are deeply engaged with their research, and I naturally invest more time and resources in students who are actively contributing to their projects.

It’s worth noting that most doctoral students don’t continue in academia long-term. Perhaps 1% of doctoral graduates will secure tenured positions at research institutions. That means academia is actually the alternative career path! Whatever makes you happiest is the right choice. I encourage you to share your 5-year and 10-year career goals with your supervisors and mentors. If you haven’t thought about career goals on these timescales, it’s worth starting. Being intentional about your career path—rather than letting it happen by chance—helps you make good decisions. Share your goals with your supervisors and mentors; we’re here to help guide and support you.

Contributions

The section on “How to make the most of your supervisor’s time” was inspired by Professor Lisa Kewley (ANU), Professor Matthew Colless (ANU), and Professor Darren Croton (Swinburne) based on an Astro3D workshop in 2019, held at the Australian National University.