How Can I help? A less-is-more-approach to responsible, supportive and sustainable, doctoral supervision

“WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?” TOPIC AND QUESTIONS

Passing seminar room X at my department, several weeks in a row, I observed a group of doctoral students intensely focused on their screens, happily tapping away on their keyboards. A tray on wheels magically appeared outside their seminar room, morning and afternoon, loaded with an abundance of goodies and beverages. Having spent more than two decades as professional editor, translator and publisher of academic articles, journals and books, chasing authors and reviewers to send manuscripts and article reviews, and as teacher, guiding students to write, write, write, and encouraging colleagues to overcome their writing blocks, I was intrigued. What was going on here?

Peter¹, a third-year PhD-student, who appeared to be the informal leader, knew. It was a weekly writing day for doctoral students at the department:

This would appear to suggest that the doctoral students had reproduced the format of a department-organized event, to continue writing in a structured manner on their own.

Before moving on, let me add that the purpose of this article is to address a question most doctoral supervisors ask themselves at some point: How can I help? Here, more specifically, in relation to the assumption that thesis supervisors nowadays need to take more responsibility for doctoral students’ writing because of existing demands on PhD-students to publish or perish and finish on time (Brodin, 2020). What responsibility and/or help is needed and how much? In an attempt to probe, rather than give an exhaustive answer to, these questions, I did a small empirical study of the doctoral students’ writing group introduced above. Collecting student perspectives appeared crucial for gaining a better understanding of the complex issue of how to help doctoral students, and for instance, how to best balance hands-on guidance with student autonomy. Self-governing is important, the literature claims. But how and why does it work in practice? My findings have here been read against a backdrop of relevant research on writing and supervision practices in higher education, as well as my own reflections about sustainable academic work. I chose this perspective in order to share with other teachers my own insights into why non-invasive supervision might work and be considered a responsible scholarly practice. In my conclusion I offer some ways to conceive of and possibly implement an approach to supervision that here is called “less-is-more”. In doing so I hope to inspire thoughts about and modes of working with supporting doctoral students’ writing in a way that is sustainable for all involved, now and in future.

Why focus on writing? Writing is essential in any PhD-program, but even more so where Humanities are concerned where the final product is a manuscript or compilation of published articles. Research indicates that writing groups of various kinds have proven constructive and important not only to “facilitate doctoral degree progress” (Maher et al., 2013), but also to build academic and writer identity (Maher et al., 2008; Mattsson et al., 2020), and to battle negative emotions of writing (Cameron et al., 2009). In general, writing groups seem to enable PhD-students to “write more” (Lee & Boud, 2003).

Although agreeing in principle on the many possible benefits of writing groups, there are nevertheless many views on how such groups should be configured. For example, Roulston et al (2016) issue the caveat that there is no “one-size-fits all approach” to use across disciplines, “contexts and countries”. In the context introduced above, how was this writing group set up?

The writing group in question seemed to be what Eva Brodin speaks of as a “social space” (Brodin, 2020, p. 221) beneficial for writing. I could further define it by using Sarah Haas terminology: the locus of initiation was the “students’”, the level of facilitation possibly “semi-facilitated” or “non-facilitated” (this was at the beginning of the study yet unclear to me), and the mode of delivery “synchronous” (Haas, 2014, Kozar & Lum, 2015).

As indicated above, a lot is potentially to be gained by PhD-students from writing groups. But how did this particular one work? I wanted to know more: What motivated the students to participate (or not)? What were the actual outcomes of the writing group on an individual level? As a supervisor, I knew what I needed the students to get out of the group, but What did the doctoral students think and feel they got out of it? As indicated above, I wanted to know more about how, or in what capacity, we doctoral supervisors could support the students, their writing and their initiative.

The role of the PhD-supervisor has changed radically over time, from once-upon-a-time being the author of the doctoral student’s thesis (Sonesson & Lindberg-Sand, 2020), via something of a master turned role-model/coach, and, in the age of “publish or perish”, to somewhat of a “whip”, to put it crassly. When the forms for financing doctoral studies were changed in 1998, doctoral students were suddenly obligated to finish within four years (Sonesson & Lindberg-Sand, 2020), which increased the pressure on PhD-students to finish on time. In addition to this, there are a number of degree objectives (examensmål) expressed in terms of learning outcomes that have to be fulfilled. These are in turn to be broken down into specific tasks in individual study plans by supervisors and doctoral student together. Legislation thus firmly identifies contemporary doctoral studies as a program of education in which doctoral students are emphasized as learners, and supervisors as responsible (together with the faculty board and the head of department) for their development. In a text focusing on PhD-students’ writing, Brodin writes that judging by the literature in the field of writing help, there is “an asymmetry” which indicates that “responsibility for the development of writing normally rests with the doctoral student, in the form of self-help” (2020, p. 206). This should be considered together with the claim, mentioned above, that supervisors “must assume greater responsibility for supervision of doctoral student’s writing than was previously the case” (Brodin, 2020, p. 227), because the stakes are high and “the thesis text must be written here and now” (Brodin, 2020, p. 227). Research has indeed shown that supervision is crucial to a doctoral student’s success (Gatfield, 2005; Lee, 2008; Overall, Deane & Peterson, 2011), yet acknowledges that getting this right is a balancing act including correct measures of content, frequency, and quantity and knowing what is good quality supervision. A whole issue of the Swedish pedagogical journal Utbildning och Lärande (2016) is dedicated to figuring out what characterizes good pedagogical practice for a supervisor. My question in this study definitely heeds such inquiries and like Disa Bergnéhr (2013), I am of course curious which supervision practices promote learning in students. However, a brief very specific study like this one does not attempt or claim to define what constitutes the ultimate supervision practice, rather it wants to tease out whether the supervisor has a role to play in a writing-group initiated by students, so as to maximize their experience and take-homes in relation to the ultimate goal of finishing their thesis.

Then, what about the assumption that supervisors need assume greater responsibility for their doctoral students’ writing? Many tasks are laid at university teachers’ feet these days. A generally high level of stress can be perceived among university teachers in today’s academic landscape (Willart, 2019). Doctoral supervision may be one of our more cherished duties, but this is only a small part of what university teachers do. The pressure to handle new systems and digital pedagogies are mentioned as particularly stressful (Willart, 2019). Surprisingly, university teachers have a low rate of sick-leave. This would seem to be at odds with the many responsibilities university teachers are tasked with, for example, the aforementioned presumed demand on supervisors to take more responsibility for outcomes (Brodin et al., 2020), to also be reflexive and provide structure (Appel & Bergenheim, 2013; Bergnéhr, 2013), to implement administrative control (Carlsson et al., 2016) and provide “frequent” contact (e.g. Lovitts, 2001). The demands are many. Apart from asking how I can help the students in the writing group, I may also want to ask the question how the help desired (if any) resonates with sustainable work practices, sustainable supervision, as it were. I need to ask this question, if I presume we should also attain the goal of a sustainable work environment and life-long pedagogical practice for university supervisors.

METHOD AND INTERVIEW MATERIAL

I would have liked to study, in-depth, the motivations and meaning-making of the HD⁴ group, the “changes in” and “feelings about” the students’ writing practice similar to a Gothenburg research group’s study of a similar spontaneous grouping (Mattsson, Brandin & Hult, 2020). However, due to my limited time frame and the short format of this article, I narrowed the scope of my study and chose a “quick and dirty” (Q&D) method (Ehn & Löfgren, 2009; Handwerker, 2001), a rapid assessment procedure consisting of observations, corridor chats and short interviews-by-email.⁵

I sent a brief email with a short explanation of my rationale for the study and four questions with some clarifying sub-questions to eleven doctoral students at various stages of their doctoral studies, some of whom I had also spotted in the seminar room. The questions (in simplified and shortened form) were:

The PhD-students were very helpful and quick to reply; only one did not answer right away. However, this person got in touch with me later, which to me significantly shows that all students were eager to assist; they wanted to chime in and have their voices heard.

THE ANSWERS

A few weeks prior to sending the emails, I had roamed the corridors of the department, mentioning briefly to a few of the PhD-students that I might ask them some questions about the writing day. I had also learned from my colleagues that it was Peter who was the informal leader of the group. I approached him in person and talked to him about the study and he declared himself willing to help me with some basic information.

Peter explained the format of the writing days to me over email as follows:

He also explained his own motivations and take-homes to me:

CONCLUDING DISCUSSION – LESS IS MORE?

Judging by my “quick and dirty” study, the supervisor does not have much of a role to play when it comes to these doctoral students’ weekly writing day, at least not when the doctoral students get their say. But, approached a different way, of course they can.

If a department or a subject group does not have a writing day, supervisors can take the initiative to inspire one. By working together with the head of department, financial support can be provided for perks and nurturing. As exemplified by this writing group, the department supports the initiative by booking rooms and paying for the fika to get delivered to the room. I had picked up through corridor chats, “post-study”, that the free fika was indeed experienced as quite a luxury by several students, creating a feeling of being cared for.

The importance of this and other kinds of structural support has been pointed out by for example Bergnéhr (2013) and Brodin and Lindén (2020). This very specific material and concrete support from the employer, certainly generates several benefits and positive outcomes for the students, who feel attended to, which generates a sense of well-being. They are given a supported context in which they can cultivate a sense of belonging and forge new social and intellectual connections. My findings here are echoed in research that stresses writing groups as having many “significant socio-affective benefits” (Kozar & Lum, p. 40).

Supervisors can also inform new students that the writing day exists, and my study indicated that it was very beneficial for ‘old’ students who came back to the department after a number of years to finish their theses, to again become part of a community. This part of the experience seems to be the major take-home of the writing days: the fun, the sociality, and a building of a sort of “community of practice” (Wenger, 1998), the feeling of finding one’s place.

What else did this writing group do? While a teacher-led writing seminar might be focused on quality, the craft of writing or disciplinary writing, these student-led days are (at least at a quick glance) focused on quantity – getting something written – and, as indicated above, on the socialization process – developing identity. Brodin and Lindén (2020) emphasize that managing social and emotional aspects are important keys to a successful development of an academic identity. As supervisor, I need to remind myself that it is ok not to be needed. Sometimes this becomes the preferable and coveted goal. Becoming “independent” is both a stated intended learning outcome of PhD-programs, and integral to the doxa of humanities; graduating an independent intellectual being the ideal end goal (Brodin & Lindén, 2020 p. 136ff).

If I were to continue evaluating the initiative, it would be useful to ask all of the department’s doctoral students about their writing practices, as there are other aspects that are important to take into consideration. One possible idea might be adding an online-component, as the non-participants’ answers indicated a difficulty in physically attending. Following Kozar and Lum’s study (2015) such a group would do best if synchronous, that is, taking place in real-time, and non-facilitated, if the group was somewhat homogenous in terms of background and language (Lum, 2015, p. 48). Other factors like age and progress, for example were not touched upon in my very limited study, neither was cultural difference. It might have been beneficial to look at these. Research on gender differences in relation to supervision for example indicates that “the socialization of women to the academy differs from that of their male counterparts” (Engstrom, 1999) and women may need even more structural support, and the supervisor should probably always apply a “gender-conscious” supervision approach (Schnaas, 2011). An intersectional approach might also be of value, in hetero- as well as homogeneous research environments to promote “democratic pedagogies” (see e.g., Kandiko Howson, Kinchin & Gravett, 2022). It is worth mentioning in this context that HD is the home of several divisions and even more disciplines. The writing group is thus highly interdisciplinary. Bergen et al. (2020) list a number of ways to support writing groups, when they are interdisciplinary, two of which are “institutional support”, which I mentioned above, as well as helping to keep “vision and purpose”, which seem very fitting in the case studied here.

So, how can I help? When I do not teach or supervise, I am a researcher of popular and digital everyday culture, and when I started the study that this article is based on, I picked a buzz-phrase from a TV-series, a medical drama from NBC called New Amsterdam (Schulner, 2018) that had made an impression on me as my title: “How can I help?”. In this series, a newly appointed Hospital Director poses this question to his staff, as his main supervising and management technique, to solve problems, create drastic change and provide help that really makes a difference, regardless of the costs.

My case study showed that no drastic changes were needed. Instead, I found that sometimes less is more – as long as we know why. To do less requires espousing reflexivity, a quality which indeed is advocated as crucial in several articles discussing good supervisory practice (Appel & Bergenheim, 2005; Bergnéhr, 2013; Lönn Svensson, 2007.

Needless to say, reflexivity is only one component of many on the road supervising a student towards graduating and getting their PhD. As Carlsson et al write, supervision is a complicated “interactional pattern … shaped and re-shaped, interwoven in a process within a framework of historical and social contexts¨ (2016, p. 21). They also write that too much structure might stifle the creative process. In their case they bring up the individual study plan (ISP) as an object of contention that may symbolize a logic of control that might affect relations of trust and knowledge formation (Carlsson et al., 2016). This I believe is applicable in this context as well. Bergnéhr (2013) points out that there may also be a risk involved in giving the doctoral student too much support. Referencing Overall, Deane and Peterson (2011), she suggests that the students who get a lot of support might risk lower levels of self-confidence and independence compared to those who have received somewhat less support (Bergnéhr, 2013, my transl. p. 175). These attitudes reflect a preference for what I will call a ‘less-is-more approach’.

In my case study, I found that reflexive awareness became a key as help was ‘rejected’. That included the awareness that I could potentially offer great and long-term support merely by showing up as a representative of institutional support. In the process, knowing the ramifications of this support, and allowing one’s doctoral students to know in other supervision situations that this support is in place, it is possible to be (or at least strive to be) a conscious carrier of vision, trust and purpose, for the doctoral student’s journey as a whole. That trust is important for well-being in general is a well-researched topic (see e.g., Helliwell & Wang, 2011) and research on supervision shows the same: building trust is essential to students’ well-being as well as enhancing their performance (Al Makhamreh & Kutsyuruba, 2021).

So, yes, I can help, as supervisor, even in the cases where my help is not requested. I can inspire and support as observer and builder, as space-holder in the shadows, as it were. I can occupy the significant role of one being aware that this is all in order and heading in the right direction of independence and developing an academic identity, a community of reading and writing practice. These words of PS3, a first-year student, attest to this, and are quite reassuring as far as this conclusion goes: “most of us know exactly what we need to get done, we just need the space to actually do it”.

The ‘less-is-more approach’ aimed at helping students become self-sufficient by minimal intervention, is of course only valid and helpful if it is intentional, if there is awareness of exactly what it is, what it does, and what the purpose is. One case study does not necessarily provide proof that this is always the case. In the end, it is natural to assume that each student-supervisor relationship requires different degrees of support, but in this specific case, of the writing group, less was preferred. Every supervisor would have to assess each case on its own merits, learning in the process, what works best. But to return to the previous assumption about increased demands for supervisors to take on greater responsibility for the doctoral candidates’ writing and outcome these days, and a generally high stress-level among academics, which needs to be managed, a conscious less-is-more approach might be beneficial and educational also for university teachers.

AKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to express my deepest appreciation and gratitude to the doctoral students who gave of their time and whose insights and contributions made this article possible. You are amazing, thank you!