Transcript of Podcast #24: How to Maintain an Effective Relationship with Your Advisor
In Attendance: Melisa Perut (she/they) & Hugo Sanchez Hernandez (he/him)
Melisa: Hello everyone, welcome to another podcast episode. Today we’re going to be talking about how to maintain an effective relationship with your advisor. I’m your host, Melisa Perut and today we have Hugo with us. Hugo welcome. Thank you so much for joining us today. Can you introduce yourself for us?
Hugo: Yeah, of course. Thank you so much for having me. So my name is Hugo Sanchez Hernandez, I use he/him/his pronouns. I am an incoming sixth year in the Psychological Science Ph.D. program here at UC Irvine. So yeah, thank you for having me.
Melisa: That’s right. Yeah, no, that’s exciting. Thank you for being here. And Hugo, where do you call home?
Hugo: I’ll would call home here in Gardena. That’s where my parents are. That’s where I grew up and that’s where my parents still live. So that’s, I think I’m always gonna call Gardena home.
Melisa: Nice. And are you a returning mentor?
Hugo: This is my first year as a mentor. Yeah.
Melisa: Oh, okay, cool. Were you a mentee before?
Hugo: I wasn’t but I heard a lot of great things about this like throughout the years and to be honest I really regretted not having joined earlier like I wish I had joined early I’m like you know going to my 6th year and I wish I had this experience before.
Melisa: No, but still it’s great to have you. So thank you so much for, you know, being here with us and also I want, I always like asking what do you like to do in Irvine in your free time?
Hugo: I’m a like a big movie buff so I think in my free time honestly if I, if it’s like a stressful day it’s 10 pm I’m like you know what let me go, go watch a movie at the local. There’s a local theater here at, at the University Towne Center, which is really right across the campus and they play all kinds of movies. So since I’m like, you know, I need to de-stress and just go out. So yeah, that I would say that’s like the main thing I do if I have time if I’m here in like the Irvine area.
Melisa: Nice. And they just renovated it like 2 years ago, I think. So it’s really fresh.
Hugo: Yeah. It really is and it’s like the seating is great like the audio quality too compared to a lot of other theaters, it’s fantastic and it’s also cheaper than a lot of theaters around here. So yeah, it’s honestly a great, it’s a great experience to just be there and just go across the street. If you’re like stressed from like the course. And I say that during my first year, I think I would do that pretty often. So I think it’s a great, it’s great to have it here for students.
Melisa: Yeah, that definitely and it’s just it’s it gives you a college town feel like when you can just walk across the campus and just go to the theater. I don’t know
Hugo: Yeah, no it’s awesome. I love it
Melisa: Yeah, nice. Okay, so we kind of like need to get away from some stuff.
Hugo: Mmhmm.
Melisa: Sometimes, I guess, that really ties into, you know, the stress of graduate school, but we’ve talked a lot about up until now in different episodes about you know, managing your time and, you know, taking care of your well-being and, you know, just navigating some of the aspects of graduate school, but one of the things is you have an advisor. That is kind of like your boss but not really in some ways. So it’s, it’s a very interesting dynamic. And for successful relationship. And at least in the US context, we hear a lot about boundaries. So can you tell us a little bit about what a boundary is and then maybe we can dive into more specifics of it.
Hugo: Yeah, of course. And I wanted to prefice, before I, you know, get into a little bit that, you know, everyone’s experience is like so different, especially here at UCI. You know, I think a lot of the times with advisors, everyone’s personality is different. And that’s one thing to really like look out for at the interview stage. You know, that’s really sometimes why you choose advisors is based on personality fit as well, in addition to like the research fit. As yeah so like everybody it can be so different so you know obviously the way that you communicate with people is different. So it could just could vary from advisor to advisor but with a boundary I think for myself it’s just realizing what threshold is when it comes to you know stress, when it comes to mental health, when it comes to you know, being able to work and do research without it really affecting, at least myself on like a really, and like a really negative personal way and sometimes, you know, grad school is gonna come with stress, you know, that’s it’s part of it. And so for me that boundaries just like knowing when, how much stress, I can you know, experience without it really affecting me and you know like mind body connection is super important and so you don’t want to stress to also, be affecting your physical health and so I think for me that’s like one example of like a boundary is like knowing how much is too much and like when do I need to like reign it back a little bit to make sure I don’t pass that threshold.
Melisa: Yeah, it’s just like your limits, right? Like. How much you can take kind of. And it’s very important to, I guess, communicate this to like the person that is kind of like your boss.
Hugo: Yeah.
Melisa: And I think it’s something that lot of students coming from different cultures. Even in this context as well, if you are a US based student, you know, working with this new kind of boss can be quite challenging. And it might be important to be able to communicate, you know boundaries or establishing boundaries. And I was wondering if you could provide some insights into effective strategies in setting clear boundaries from the beginning, right, when you start working so that you have a productive and respectful working relationship.
Hugo: Yeah, no, definitely. I think, you know, I was very fortunate. I think a lot of the grad students, even though I wasn’t part of this program, I was part of another program for incoming graduate students called Competitive Edge program here at UCI. And so I was a mentee for that program and a lot of my mentors, my peer mentors were really helpful in you know suggesting like you know you just gotta at the communication is key and so you gotta have those conversations with your advisor pretty early on. And so for myself, you know, I was able to meet with my advisor in the summer a little bit, a few weeks before the school year started. And can you have a chat as to like, just asking her directly, like what her expectations were in terms of communication between both of us. So for example, I think a lot of that chat was also about really getting to the root of you know so how often throughout the week are we gonna communicate, are we going to communicate on the weekends, are we gonna communicate, what certain hours are going to be okay for us to you know email each other or you know I know a lot of other students as well have, are, will text their advisor so like everybody’s relationship is very different. And so that conversation is that’s really the way that it went was as kinda letting each other know like oh I think my preference is this and really because they are your advisor, of course, it starts off with a kind of hearing what they’re saying. And so I think just the communication from the very beginning and setting a meeting to kind of chat about these things, I think it’s key from the very beginning that way it doesn’t feel like there’s been some time that has passed and then or like, oh shoot, like I didn’t have that conversation and now we’re stuck in this kind of, you know, space where we should have had the conversation months ago, but now we didn’t and now it’s kind of awkward. And so always starting off, you know, always being proactive and starting that off in the beginning. I think it’s super important.
Melisa: Yeah, absolutely. And you know, kind of, the tone that you set the relationship is what the expectations will be throughout the relationship, right? So if you are very responsive to all emails, every day, at middle of the night then That’s going to be the expectation moving forward. But if you’re able to say, oh yeah, you know, I have a very, you know, active life and I like finishing work at 6 and then I like work out that even saying this.
Hugo: Yeah.
Melisa: Sets, you know, sets a boundary saying like I don’t really work after like 5 or 6.
Hugo: Yeah.
Melisa: I’m like, that’s my time. And you know, a lot of students make the mistake of, you know, they want to really be there like for their advisors and like succeed and you know it’s it’s a lot of pressure. So there are a lot of students that. You know, overwork and, you know, try to be available all the time. But then that creates, creates like an unhealthy relationship that can eventually lead to burnout for the graduate student because you know, it’s stressful to, you know, you’re out and you get an email from your advisor that says, oh, send me this data set. And you’re kind of like, oh, I’m at the movies, you know, I do. Oh, I need to go back. So it’s kind of important for you to be able to, you know, just even in a simple conversation, like Hugo said at the beginning, I think it’s quite important.
Hugo: Yeah, and I think it’s sometimes, you know, even though you get advice from other people, you sometimes have to learn like the hard way like I know in my first year I was very, even though I made that have the conversation with my advisor and so the expectation wasn’t there for me to you know, be emailing her on the weekends. I think one thing I appreciated, is that my advisor was clear about I don’t text students from the beginning and so that boundary was clear and you know for me it was like okay that’s, that’s, it kind of aligns with what I would want. I wouldn’t want to receive a text from my advisor. On the weekend however I, that is a lot of students that I’ve talked to experience with their advisors. And when I asked him about it, they say that was also, communication that they had about that they were okay with receiving that communication. So again, it’s whatever that you are comfortable with and I think that is that example that you brought up is the perfect one like you know I remember that first year I would be maybe out on a Friday night and it’s not that my advisor was asking for things but I myself wanted to kind of like go above and beyond and I think that’s a lot of student first year students mindsets, if I go above and beyond, I want to prove myself. And so I will checking email at like 10 pm, 11 pm. And that kind of hindering my social experiences with like my friends and things and that was something later on that I realized I have to nurture too. You have to nurture your relationships in your life and, and so I kinda learned the hard way not to do things like that, but again, it was definitely a learning experience.
Melisa: Yeah, and you know, some students might also have other like commitments that are you know you can’t really do anything else in that in that time and you can just you can just communicate that if you have to pick up somebody from the hospital like you take somebody to the hospital regularly and that is your time. You can just say, hey, I’m not available during these times. It might be 2 or 3 pm, during the week but that’s what you have to communicate. You might also have, you know, family commitments, picking up a family member from school or, you know, a child from school. So you can just say like hey I pick up my child so you can be transparent about it and even saying this sets a boundary, right? Then that you’re not going to be available at that time and the expectations are clear. And all of this ties into communication, right?
Hugo: Yeah.
Melisa: And communication is key. And I was wondering if you could share, like how frequently should students communicate with their advisors, schedule meetings. So that they can maintain their regular progress and, you know, share updates and how should they structure these interactions.
Hugo: No, that’s a great, that was part of, I think my first meeting with my advisor was kinda laying the foundation for how often we should meet, you know, I think. She always suggests like, do you wanna meet once a month, once a week, every 2 weeks? And I think as a first year I was like maybe I wouldn’t need it, but like let’s meet every week just to make sure that we are on the same page about things. And so I think a lot of the things I like throughout the week that would come up where I was like oh, I want my advisors opinion on the suggestion. My first instinct would be, okay, let’s, let me email, let me email her and then I will be like, wait, I have a weekly meeting and because it’s a weekly meeting, you don’t feel like, oh, I have to wait such a long time. So I would just add that to my agenda. So I think, things that pop up throughout the week, like small little questions, even for your advisor, like it would be really helpful to just have an agenda, have a Google document with the agenda, weekly agenda that I would use with our meetings with my advisor and just add things there that I will need to chat with her about. So it would be kind of structured. So like at the beginning of our meeting and this still happens to this day, it would be also what’s on your agenda, what’s on your agenda like maybe there’s things that align with both of our agendas. And I think so just having that conversation again from that very beginning about you know, how often should you meet and some times when the advisor does leave it up to you I’ll recommend, yeah, just why not make it like a weekly? Just to set that, expectation from the beginning because sometimes your advisors do take another role. There are some years where they are more busy, less busy. And so if the norm for them for you is to meet every week. Then it’s then that’s like almost like the expectation like slash the norm. Versus if they became like used to maybe meeting once a month or every 2 weeks. It might be a little bit harder to then want to meet every week. So I think my suggestion would just be to meet every week, even if the meeting isn’t long, I think we have a tendency to feel like oh, we might not need to meet and then things come up and might as well have that meeting on the agenda. And if it’s a short meeting, I think your advisor would be like, oh, perfect, it was a short meeting like I can go on to, you know, have some free time. So I think that again, that was that was the expectation and like you said like the communication, that is the key and from the very beginning and making that transparent, I think was super helpful.
Melisa: Yeah, and some advisors will already have their own way of communicating with students. So there might, they might have labs so they might meet with like multiple students at the same time, you know, weekly meetings. So then you get adjusted to that or some professors are very hands off, you know, they don’t really meet regularly and then they just say like if you want to meet them we can meet which is something that you can absolutely request. But if they also are busy or if they’re on sabbatical or it’s something then you also adjust to their time. So it’s, you can, you know, requests to meet with them based off of how you want to proceed, but be flexible to changing conditions. Your advisors conditions, also your conditions too, you might have taken your qualifying exam and you might not want to meet with anybody for a while and just take some time off or over the summer you might, you know, do some field work so you might not need to meet as much. So be open to the fact that it might change over time but also being aware of what kind of needs you have. And you know communicating that as Hugo said like you have to tell them hey I would like to meet weekly. I have cases where students schedule with an advisor just for a short period of time, if they’re working on a very short piece of work or they have a big deadline. They scheduled with an advisor and say like, hey, can we meet for the next 2 months every week? And you know, just until I get this done, so there’s accountability. And like I can share some progress with you. That is also very helpful. So just be like be open to changing interactions, but also being structured in a way that helps you as, as Hugo said, and that’s very important.
Hugo: Yeah, and I think, and like you mentioned, it’s, I think, really what you would need, like because if you’re more hands off or hands on and also kind of sometimes depends on the project like for a lot of the grad programs, you know, we have like, a, you know, that we have to accomplish. And so it might depend a lot of that. Like if you’re, you know, getting a study up and running, collecting data, you might need more weekly like guidance versus all that, say you have secondary data and you’re going to run these analyses, clean this data but you’re kind of familiar with some of those processes already. So you might be more hands off and that maybe your preference. So really is like for me, even though a lot of those things it’s like just to be safe, let’s be more hands on during the first year. So that was my preference. But of course everybody does vary so again yeah just really be attuned to your own needs and be fair to yourself as to like what you want to get out of out of those meetings and how often they happen.
Melisa: Yeah, and that also depends on the workload and how much workload you’re taking on. So between, you know, balancing coursework, your research commitments, and also taking care of yourselves. It’s very important and Hugo do you think you can tell us a little bit how students can navigate this balance in terms of their relationship with their advisor. What kind of strategies can they, you know employ to avoid taking on too many tasks and become like overwhelmed with the workload.
Hugo: Yeah, it’s like the classic like first year mistake, right? It’s like trying to take on so many projects and I again, I preface by saying like I know everybody’s, everybody’s advisor so different and I was very lucky to have an advisor that was stopping me from doing this because I wanted to do this like let me take on this project and this project. This study is cool, that you’re running like let me be a part of it and she was good to be like focus on your coursework for the first year like let’s talk about this on your second year and, Aand that, you know, later on, like, and you, I was so appreciative of that, like looking back on it because it would have been so stressful. And so. I think we again we all come with like wanted to go above and beyond and really the first year I think and the most consistent advice that of course from all advisors is That really should be the focus should be the course work because a lot of our coursework is front loaded and we have to accomplish that in the first views of our program. And then we can focus more on research when things like dissertation happen, like thesis happen. You know, like our comprehensive exams happen and so I think the first year should be focused on coursework and that should be the priority. And so if you wanna take on a one project or maybe two projects depending on like the maybe like the workload, I think that’s okay. But also not all we’re doing with the amount of classes is another thing because I’ve seen a lot of students want to like, you know, finish other classes in the first year. But again, that also can become super stressful because a lot of these courses, especially if you’re coming straight from an undergraduate program. Or you haven’t taken a graduate course before, it’s so different, it’s, it’s, you are required to do so much writing you to be so involved in the class and so it might be super difficult to. I think my advice would be like whatever you have in mind for like, oh, the project you want to take on. Take on one less than that, at least one less than that. Just like do less than that expectation that you have for yourself. And your advisor will be super understanding because that’s the other thing it’s you don’t want to over commit because you don’t if anything you want to surprise your advisor with what you were able to accomplish based on what you committed yourself to. So it’s. One thing I always do with my advisor is Oh, thank you for responding with your feedback, I will get by to you, Monday and let’s say it’s Thursday and I was able to get back to them on Friday then it’s like okay that’s awesome but I think one thing that can happen is you know, okay, I’ll give it back to you in one day or tomorrow or and then you unfortunately don’t finish it by that time. So by not taking on these projects, you can also excel in all of them, you know, if you’re overstretching yourself throughout all the projects or just it might be hard to really excel and do your best each of them. Versus if you’re taking on less, taking on less courses, less research projects, you can excel and go above and beyond on those specific projects and I think that is more impressive to advisors. Because I feel like a lot of the times we think that they want us to take on all these things, but at the same time, a lot of them are understanding and of course, some unfortunately that’s not always the case. Sometimes there are expectations from advisors that don’t really align with what we think we can take on the first year. And so I think that’s where the communication from the beginning, that meeting that you have with them. And I’ve seen parents being really good at this and it’s almost, you know, I used to think like, why do parents seem to have better balance between all of their commitments than like students who don’t, aren’t parents and don’t have all these kind of and it’s because they’re very clear. It’s like, lke you mentioned, like I have to pick up my kid at this time. I have to take them to the doctor. I have to do this and this for them. It’s, It’s almost like having that priority like I have a live outside of this. Helps you then succeed and almost feel better mentally when you’re actually working in the grad program. So yeah, first it seems like how did that work but then it’s because of the communication, the transparency. So I think again, that was just, goes back to that.
Melisa: Absolutely, we have a lot to learn from parents, graduate students, they are amazing.
Hugo: Honestly, yeah.
Melisa: Yeah, they’re amazing. Yeah, they’re all wonderful people as well. But, one thing that kind of, Hugo, when you were talking about it was, you know, feeling overwhelmed because you are the person that knows all of your workload. Your advisor doesn’t know what your courses require of you, how many research papers you’re supposed to write, or how many projects you’re supposed to do, or what kind of commitment your other workloads requires of you. So it might be the case where your advisor is giving you more tasks and you are the person that knows how much time it each might take or how much time you actually really have if you have three papers to write at the end of the quarter or three projects that you’re working on. You, you all are the only person that knows that you might not be able to take on more. And then that’s when you might also need to communicate that to your advisor, and say like, Hey, you know, I’m kind of swamped this quarter or oh I have a lot of you know course related work this quarter but I’m happy to work on this next quarter or over the summer or you know when you know next year so you can also you know suggest other times that you will be available as well and plan according to that. Because oftentimes you don’t, students don’t want to miss an opportunity or feel like they’re missing out on an opportunity, especially when it’s an international student who can only work for the university while they’re here. And that kind of really creates this overwork, you know, overwhelming workload mentality and you know, it’s it’s it can be difficult. So I think it’s very important for you to be aware of your boundaries and like how much you can work. I mean, we all think that we can work seven days a week. But you can do that only so much. You can do it a couple weeks maybe and then you need a break.
Hugo: Yeah, I love what you said too, which is like being transparent with them about like, oh, I have these courses and maybe like letting them know I want my first year to be focused on courses, but I love this project that you mentioned and I would love to be part of this this or like after the first year. Letting them know rather than just saying like, oh, I don’t wanna do research the first year and just leaving it at that because you want them to know that oh you are motivated and committed and wanting to do this later. It’s not that you don’t want to do it. It’s just that right now you understand that you know, you have all these other things. So I love that wording because I think mentioning that would let them know that, Okay, they do wanna work on this. And so That’s already on their mind. So yeah, that’s I think that’s a great advice.
Melisa: Exactly. And sometimes, you know, when you’re trying to communicate things, I think it’s It’s one of the hardest things to do, but there might be disagreements with your advisor. You know, it could be a simple disagreement. They can, you know, with, Hugo he said, you know, oh, I, I’m happy to take on this project and their advisor said no, you know, focus on your coursework, you know, but then there might be more challenging disagreements or obstacles that you’re facing with your advisor. So can you tell us a little bit about how to address, you know, disagreements and you know in a constructive way without really damaging the relationship or you know stressing yourself too much and how to you know find a solution when you’re at that point.
Hugo: I think, and the chat, that’s always, for every advisor so different, this is just so different. And I think one thing I noticed for myself was that there was something that I was, oh, I, maybe. There might be some disagreement there and I what I at least realized for myself is I think I can communicate my, my thoughts better through writing. And so let me write down this conflict that is kind of occurring instead of wanting to like let me jump on it and like let them know like this how I’m feeling. I had to like learn to like okay let me think about it a little bit and make sure that I’m, I go about it the right way because I think going about in a way that’s gonna make them a little bit defensive is when then things start you know escalating in a negative way. And so that had been like a learning process again throughout like my first few years. Was oh my god I wanna like let’s say like an email came through and I’m like oh no that doesn’t all know that doesn’t work like let me respond really quickly I’d be okay let me like take a pause, how about I draft the email for myself and I mentioned it, you know, because I know a lot of people can also
express themselves better. Like with some thought beforehand through writing, I know some people prefer like the one on one. I personally, I feel like I can do that better through writing and like I feel like it helps me understand better like what I want to get out of that conversation. And so maybe drafting an email. And then making sure that the email I think email etiquette is super important that’s another thing that’s just like, I think emails with advisors is you have to be super careful and like once you know how, what their communication is, you want to make sure that it aligns with them. But email etiquette because that’s one of the things that can go on unsaid let’s say that your working with somebody and like the email etiquette isn’t the greatest, you’re gonna remember that and it’s gonna leave some, like in sort of like a maybe like a fear or negative feeling the more that you communicate with them. So I think for me was like draft me, you know, making sure that the email looked, like it was fine in terms of like there’s no negativity here. It’s just like kinda let’s address this challenge. And being super personable too, like being, And so I think that’s the way that I learned myself that I communicate better. And so then I would like send the email and then let’s meet to kind of llike go through this. A little bit and I think that was my experience, but I, but I don’t think I’ve had a, and again, I’m very lucky I don’t have had a challenge where like it was something that was like a really negative thing where it had to be addressed like quickly. And I know that has happened to a lot of my peers. You know, based on like their experiences with like their own advisors. And so, again, it’s gonna might just depend a lot on how they communicate and then that also kind of goes into you know, cultural nuances and like the way that we communicate and express things with each other. So it might just be a matter of like knowing your advisor at that point. And knowing how they communicate and from there really the solution might be just based on that and tailoring it to that. And unfortunately, I wish there was like a way to like this is like the solution and the general solution that everybody could use because it really it just depends how much on the person. And that’s the unfortunate thing and you know that we’re humans and all of us have a come with our own experiences, feelings and everything and that’s just the way things are unfortunately but. But yeah, that’s kinda how I would solve some of those challenges. We’ll be just drafting that up beforehand and making sure that everything look good before sending it out.
Melisa: Yeah. It’s the hardest thing is also, some students find that emails can be really scary, right? Like you don’t really know the tone of the email. So having a colleague, a friend’s, you know, read that email.
Hugo: Uh huh yeah
Melisa: Especially when you draft your response, have them read the response as well. I know in situations where I received an email and I freaked out and I thought, oh no, they’re so mad at me and then I guess I was so stressed when I read the email that I really didn’t get to tone. And then a colleague of mine, I asked them to read it and say, and I said, oh, this is a really bad email. And this was not just like because these emails can come through from anybody, not just your advisor, but like from the professor that you’re teaching for or that you’re doing research for so it could be anybody that you have like this challenge and just have somebody read the email. And like you give their feedback and they will tell you this is not a bad email. And then tell you that you wrote like a very freaked out response and maybe you should change it a little bit. So that’s also very helpful like to have somebody that you can’t count on to like, calm the situation down for you because sometimes you know it’s just it’s over email and you don’t really understand what’s going on. But I have also read many emails to like my colleagues have written to professors. You know, it maybe they were TAing for them and you know something went wrong like one of the students said something and something went wrong. And you know, even in those moments, it’s very important to be respectful and, you know, saying like, hey, this and this happens and I really appreciate it or, you know, I apologize and you can say all those things but Just maybe take a couple of minutes. You don’t need to respond right away. Just like Hugo said, just write your response. Take a step back and then come back.
Hugo: Come back to, yeah, I think that’s a great example. Because your experiences also colors the way that you. And that the way that you see things and that’s, you know, I think I’ve been in the situation where I think a friend like a pushed me. They’re being this in this way and that way and look at this how we can respond. And it’s sometimes would be awkward, especially if it’s a close friend. It’s like. To be honest, like I don’t actually think they meant it that way or like I don’t think it’s that negative like are you sure you want to send this email out? And I think for example I had I got an email from a peer yesterday, a peer that you know I work closely with and you know I was I took took it negatively but then I was like you know what let me come back to it because I know this has happened before then I was like wait it’s not at all like I’m glad I took the time to kind of reflect on it and be able to like respond accordingly. So yeah, it’s like it can be so tough. The email communication.
Melisa: Yeah, and you might not know like especially when you’re teaching for a professor you might not like get to communicate with them as much you know you don’t see them as much and it’s mostly over email. And it’s good to like speak to colleagues that have experiences with those professors. And just like say like, Hey, I received this email, what do you think the tone is or, you know, hey, can you take a look at this, you know, email, what did they mean? And oftentimes you’ll find like those colleagues will have a lot of experiences with those professors and will be able to say, oh yeah, don’t worry about it or oh yeah, oh they like it in this way or they do this in this certain way so just fix it this way and then you’ll be fine. So you’ll like you have a lot of allies at UCI, you’ll find and they are a great resource to navigating like these challenging. You know, circumstances. And also like cultural differences also play into this, right? How we communicate, how we collaborate. You know, the cultures that we come from really have a lot of nuances. And I was wondering Hugo if you could tell us a little bit about the expectations of, you know, US advising, US graduate school in terms of these boundaries and how should you know students that are not too familiar with this culture kind of expect and do. You know, even we can, you can give us an idea of how do we even address advisors? Do we call them doctor, professor or first name? Like How do we like navigate all of this?
Hugo: Yeah, and I think, I guess I’ll start from, like the end of that, which is they get the doctor versus their first same basis and you know, I came in and it seems like based on my advisor, you know, oh, call me by my first name. And then it was like a little bit later where it was like, well, a lot of students might not be comfortable with that you know, they might come from a different culture. Even though their advisors saying, oh, call me by my first name, like they might not themselves be comfortable. And I think making that, just being respectful and letting your advisor know that you know, based on your own experience, like, oh, I’d rather, can I call you that, this instead? I think that of course I think the opposite wouldn’t be true where like they’re saying call me doctor and you’re like, can I call you by your first name? I think that would be a different because you have to go based on their preference. But if they’re telling you to be more casual and you wanna address them by doctor, that’s okay too and and of course, like culturally I think a lot of the norms are here in the US, around like individuality and like a self-expression and independence sometimes doesn’t align with a lot of the cultural cultures that like different people come from. Whether sometimes they come from more interdependent cultures and the norms are very different. And so a lot of the times there are norms associated with like self expression where it might not align with the way that you yourself want to express yourself and that kind of goes back tomaybe kind of like the email thing where you want to, yeah, you’re way of communication is so different. And I think that’s another thing, that I think sometimes there are norms here related to and norms of pressure related to you know, really like asserting yourself and really like putting yourself out there and really like sharing like things that you’ve done well and like everything and so I think that can be a little bit for like students to depending on where they come from. And just kinda like keeping those nuances in mind because that sometimes is unfortunately the norm here of the university here in the United States but hopefully with the you know, not just UCI but many universities are becoming more culturally diverse I think hopefully those norms can be changing a little bit or at least there’s another understanding that things can be very different. And I think a lot of that advisors sometimes are aware of these things, but sometimes, unfortunately, they still aren’t. And going to the mindset to like kind of your communication with your advisor is going to tell you a lot about them as well, like their viewpoints, the world views and based on those conversations you will be able to get an understanding of like what to themselves might be more aware of, more tolerant, tolerant of and more sensitive of because everybody’s sensitivity might also vary quite a bit. And so, yeah, just all of that to say that the, with the norms can be sometimes misaligned with a lot of our students. And that can lead oftentimes constantly because there’s expectations on like how you should be communicating. What do you yourself aren’t comfortable communicating and the doctor thing is an example of it. You know, just being respectful and your communication with your advisor about these things, is super important. And I think again, like the key is always like going at it and from a place where you’d think about like what’s gonna be a way I approach it to them without them being on the defensive because once somebody is kind of feeling that way then again it can lead down a path to negativity so like just find and unfortunately that requires a lot of monitoring on the student side, right? That’s like us having to monitor ourselves, having to manage it the way we’re communicating with them to make sure that we don’t come across this way or that way. Because those power dynamics are real and unfortunately that is sometimes the experience of a lot of students at UCI but again just coming into it and like being aware that like sensitivity again, could hear from person to person and just being being almost ready for that unfortunately, is sometimes the reality of of the university experience here in the United States.
Melisa: Yeah, but I mean Hugo’s point about communicating with your advisor really sets the tone of you know what they expect and how you should you know communicate with them and professors, yes sometimes they’re not aware of, you know, how different cultures, you know, interact and how they like might communicate, but you’ll also find that there are a lot of professors that have diverse students that really like know some of these contexts. And you know, some of them will say like, hey, you can call me by my first name, but some will say, call me whatever makes you feel comfortable. And like that’s just a way of, you know, showing that they kind of are okay with your cultural like norms a little bit. So just be open to, you know, different interactions with different professors and being kind of aware of what’s going on but always feel free to reach out to you know your GIC mentors or your colleagues to ask like, hey, how does this work? Or like, Hey, I’ve been calling my professor this is just a simple example that we’ve been working on, but I’ve been calling my professor doctor and I would like to switch to first name. And even that that has, you know, a way of asking, hey, can I call you by your first name now? So and we’ve all been through these and it’s all of this is interpersonal relationships as well. It’s always going to be trial and error relationships as well but we’re here to always support and, you know, help you work through all of this. And I also want to, you know, preface by saying, you know, it’s your personal relationships in your own life and your work relationships are going to be different. You know, so it’s important to be professional while you’re maintaining these relationships. Sometimes you’ll see that some relationships are very friendly and that can work for some people, but in some cultural context, it’s much more important to be professional and stay professional and that works in this culture. You can always say professional and you can always maintain that balance if that works better for you.
Hugo: Yeah, I think it would be harder if it was the other way around, which is you know, so used to like, so casual and then here, it’s like my God, everything is my doctor and like super. So I think it’s easier to have that converse because like who like your advisor you know and like here UCI I think part of what makes UCI great is that they do compared to a lot of other schools and other UCs like people here are very open minded about things like that and they’re very willing to have these conversations. I mean, there’s so many things across campus dedicated to having these conversations. And here it’s just a matter of having the conversation that your advisor, okay, like that makes sense like you know that’s that’s like the way that you wanna communicate with me and that’s really okay. And so, yeah, I think that’s a good example of how that kind of works here.
Melisa: Exactly. Well, thank you so much, Hugo. I think we had a great conversation and as always, if you have any questions about how to navigate a relationship, how to, you know, write an email and communicate with your advisor or need a second pair of eyes that could read the tone of an email. You can always feel free to reach out to Hugo and myself so we can help you work through that.
Hugo: Yes. Yeah, thank you so much for having me. I really enjoyed my time.
Melisa: No, absolutely. It was great to have you Hugo and you know you had some great insights and it’s great to hear that you know you have a wonderful relationship with your advisor but you were also able to communicate what works for you. And that’s important for all of us. And it’s always going to be a work in progress, you know, some things can change. So be open to change and you know communicating the changes in your life. You might be very flexible at the beginning, but you might have a child while you’re in graduate school and then you might not be able to be asked flexible and you know available and just communicate that. It’s very important.
Hugo: Yeah, thank you so much. And yeah, hopefully, you know, the, everyone just has a good experience and hopefully someone can find something useful from this conversation.
Melisa: Absolutely, no. Thank you so much Hugo. Take care everyone. We will see you in another episode.
Hugo: Thank you