All the quotes included here were taken
word-for-word from the applications, either
from proposing mentees or the mentors themselves.
For obvious reasons they have been
depersonalized and are unattributed.
A mentor for life
“M, without any doubt, sees all his interactions with people as lifelong. He always keeps in touch with ex-students, postdocs and so on after they have moved on. Even if he is not directly helping them, he keeps himself aware of their activities and at times informs them of things he believes would be of interest or useful, to them. He genuinely treats his ex-students and postdocs as part of an extended family.”
Many ofthe proposing mentees started out as students of the mentors but later became well-supported colleagues. But a distinctive feature of a great mentor as opposed to agreat supervisor seemed to be a special focus on helping to build the mentee’s career. A natural consequence of the care and effort the mentors put into supporting the careers of their students/staff was that the majority of them became mentors for life: their advice continued to be valued, friendships grew and thelinks were maintained.
“For me there is a difference between a supervisor and a mentor. With the latter you find that you are not simply a student with a research project, but a student with a career in front that the mentor helps you start.”
Personal characteristics
Enthusiasm
“First and foremost, M is incredibly passionate about science. She eats, sleeps and breathes science. Her enthusiasm is absolutely infectious, and it creates a wonderful atmosphere in her laboratory.”
“It is the nature of supervision that you have to explain/teach some key concept time after time as each new student arrives. Each time I had to make it feel to the student postdoc that it was the first time I had ever explained the concept; each time I had to tell it with sparkle to help inspire them to seek to know more. At times it was hard to stay ‘inspirational’; but to fail would have meant to me that I should quit as a supervisor. You need to understand, as an old and wise
friend once said to me, ‘Remember, they stay the same age, you get older!’”
Passion, enthusiasm and positivity were words dominating the majority of the mentee reports. Whether these are traits we can cultivate or create is debatable. The lesson seems to be that it is very important to be as enthusiastic about your students’ research as you are about your own. If you are not, then the question becomes: is the student working on the correct project? If you are not passionate about their project, how can you properly support them? This should also be a lesson to administrators, who may sometimes allocate students to projects and supervisors for expediency rather than a genuine concern for the student or indeed the staff member.
Sensitivity
“When things go wrong, it is important to find out why things happened the way they did. There could be personal factors (sickness, relationship break-ups) that contribute to unhappy decisions or results. Although I may not be able to provide the solution to personal problems, I can provide a sympathetic ear as well as advice or direction to support services.”
This quote speaks for itself but there were a number of examples in which mentors were very sensitive to their charge’s circumstances and showed compassion and understanding. When a student or colleague exhibits unusual behaviour or lack of progress there will be a reason. Mentors need to listen, hear and support. Also, many mentors were sensitive to mentees’ needs that were not strictly professional, such as finding the right balance between work and family responsibilities; coping with cultural transitions after a move from a different part of the world; developing confidence in a culture that may not be welcoming; or opposing ethnic or gender bias
if it arises.
“M also knows that it is important to have a work–life balance. He’s made it easy for a postdoc with young children to return to the lab part time. It’s encouraging as a young scientist to see that there are lab heads who are supportive of people being able to spend time with their family but still have a chance to develop their careers.”
Appreciating individual differences
“Again it is important to cater for personal traits. Some of my student colleagues need to dot every i and cross every t as they design a set of critical experiments that we have all agreed are important. Others, with, I suspect, an equal success rate, need to jump in, risk making a mess of a few highly critical experiments but gain an instant understanding of either what not or what
to try. Allowing both approaches is sometimes difficult, but necessary.”
We are all different in how we work and in what motivates us. The mentees were clearly very appreciative of an ability to carefully craft development activities to enhance and extend personal strengths. Special effort is needed to try to understand all those in a team and deal with them differently. And however much you want that student/colleague to work on that project, sometimes you have to help them make decisions about their career directions.
“Not everybody wants to be a leading researcher and some have skills that make them better suited to other occupations. There is little point in encouraging young people to take on a career to which they may be unsuited or that they will find stressful or uninteresting. So I believe it is
necessary sometimes to encourage them into other directions.”
Respect
“She treats her colleagues, regardless of whether they are doing a PhD or if they are a fellow professor, with the same high regard. In doing so, M inspires confidence in her collaborators.”
It is sadly true that laboratories exist where the PhD students are seen as extra pairs of hands rather than genuine collaborators. Although the supervisors may well be successful and grants be funded courtesy of those extra hands, they will never have the satisfaction of working in the stimulating environments and will never truly be respected themselves.
Unselfishness
“His magnanimity in sharing his own ideas and delight in seeing others succeed has also been an inspiration, not just for myself but for a whole generation of younger scientists.”
“Most importantly, M has no intellectual jealousy. She was always happy to see others succeed,
pushing them forward into the limelight while standing back in the shadows herself.”
There are leaders of some big and important groups who are more concerned with using group members to promote their own scientific standing. Letting your students/colleagues take your ideas and run with them, and being free and willing for them to take credit is not always easy but is always appreciated. What do you lose by allowing them to be lead authors even if the idea was yours?
“His lack of defensiveness was very important to me. On several occasions I’ve published papers that were critical of some aspect of his work — and he helped me to articulate the issues and supported me in getting them published.”
“I believe that it is too easy for mentors to create grand (manipulative) plans for their younger colleagues. I believe it is important for mentors to suppress the desire to paint the grand picture, instead it is imperative that they learn to understand their colleagues and how to assist them to fulfil their dreams.”
“It was not uncommon to hear that she had lobbied for an opportunity for a postdoc to speak at a conference rather than doing so herself because she recognized the value of becoming known, especially given our distance from North America and Europe.”
Support for other than one’s own
“M is just as diligent in fostering careers of people who he thinks can advance science as he is at fostering his own students. This action is consistent with a motive that goes beyond mere ego and represents service to the advancement of science.”
The impact of a good mentor goes far beyond his or her own boundaries. Within the applications were many examples of support outside the mentor’s group. Indeed a number of the mentee support documents were from those who had never actually been in the mentor’s laboratory but whose lives had nevertheless been touched.
Teaching and communication
“M’s enthusiasm was infectious for many undergraduate students, and I have no doubt in saying that her delivery of the subject matter was instrumental in fuelling my interest in X as a subject.”
The tension between research and teaching remains at all universities. Success in both is not mutually exclusive and it was striking, but not surprising, that many of the exemplary mentors were exemplary teachers. Many of the mentees who themselves have gone on to very successful careers and have international reputations in science would not have gone down that pathway if they had not been exposed to their future mentor as a teacher. Those who work in university administration need to remember the benefit of exposing undergraduate students to top scientists to increase the number of graduate students. Up-and-coming young scientists should
put effort into their teaching in order to inspire and interest their future mentees. Good mentors encourage their students to teach as soon as they start their PhD, not only to supplement
their income but, more importantly, to develop skills that will benefit them in the long term.
Also, many of the great mentors were great communicators, not only of science itself but also of enthusiasm for it to diverse audiences such as schools or local societies. This is not a universal talent and can even be damaging to all concerned if done badly. The good mentors appreciated that such activities can be very valuable training for the communicatorand encouraged their students and younger colleagues to develop these skills.
“I first encountered M as a year-11 high school student in a small country town. The Royal Australian Chemical Institute had commissioned M to travel to regional Victoria and put on a ‘chemistry show’. I remember the explosions, the foam tower spilling its contents over the stage, and M pretending that he hadn’t noticed the chemical mayhem around him. And I remember that it was about this time that I became interested in chemistry.”
“Students need experience talking about their research in many different forums. Conference attendance is crucial so that they have the opportunity to discuss with other researchers and to develop new ideas. But it is equally important that students have the opportunity to discuss their work in lay terms, whether it is being presented to parents, teachers, or to doctors and nurses as S has done.”
Tips for mentors
There is no magic formula; these are simply examples of what the mentees thought worked for them.
1. Availability: the open door
2. Inspiration, optimism
3. Balancing direction and self-direction
4. The art of questioning and listening
5. Being widely read and widely receptive
6. The initial project
7. Life after science
8. Celebration
9. Building communities
-Of scientists
-Of people
10. Skill development
-Criticism
-Writing
-Oral presentation
11. Networking
-Use their contacts and promote their students/young staff
-Send overseas
-Advice on career decisions
Conclusion
“Having a good mentor early in one’s career can mean the difference between success and failure in any career.”
“Those who are good mentors get incalculably more out of it than they put into it.”
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