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CHAPTER 3

Becoming a Researcher

3.1 DEVELOPING A RELATIONSHIP WITH YOUR RESEARCH MENTOR

Research groups can be set up in a variety of different ways and range in size from 1 to 100+. You may be working one-on-one with your research mentor or you may be working in more of a group setting where you meet with your research mentor along with others working on the same or related projects. In larger research groups you may find that there are researchers at a variety of different levels. This might include undergraduate students, graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, engineers, scientists, and faculty members. In some cases, your most immediate research mentor may be someone at a level just above your own. For instance, you may be an undergraduate researcher working most directly with a graduate student mentor.

Ultimately the responsibility for the research group, its direction, and the projects being pursued are determined by the lead faculty member or lead scientist/engineer, sometimes called the principal investigator or PI. This individual is also your research mentor (maybe you will think of this person as your Mentor with a capital M), but your interactions with this individual may be less frequent and may be in a group setting rather than one-on-one. You should not discount the others in the research group as they may provide you with invaluable information, advice, and mentoring that could prove to be important to your success.

Student Perspective

“I had some previous research experience at [a] National Lab. … I had a mentor and a co-mentor that were constantly guiding me. I would meet with them several times per week to discuss how progress was going and ask [any] questions that I had. [My] two mentors also had offices right down the hall from mine and had an open-door policy so I could stop in and ask anything if I got stuck. This was so helpful to the ease and speed of my workflow. I could work on my project and when I ran into a problem, I would try to solve it on my own first, but if I couldn’t figure it out, I could easily consult one of my mentors for help. Sometimes if they couldn’t figure out the problem, they would point me in the direction of other researchers around the lab. This was a neat experience to draw on the expertise of researchers from different groups. I got to meet new people and learn about what they were working on while also getting a new perspective on the problem I was originally trying to solve. Prior to coming to grad school, I had guessed that my advisor would be play a similar role as my mentors at [the National Lab]. This semester has taught me otherwise. I didn’t take into consideration the seemingly countless other obligations that grad school advisors have such as teaching, doing their own research, being active members of academic organizations which causes their time to be limited. Therefore, I do not have the same two-to-one relationship as I had at [the National Lab] which makes my work more independent. I think this is a good, and necessary step for me to take in my research career. This has made my problem solving skills much better and also has made me get to know the areas of expertise of the other students and staff members in my group. I’m learning who can possibly help me depending on the issue that I have run in to.”

The Guides at Your Side

I would be hard pressed to count the number of mentoring relationships I have had over my career. Certainly somewhere in the multiples of hundreds, if I consider both those where I have been the mentor and those where I have been the mentee. These relationships have ranged from a few weeks to decades and have varying levels of involvement, but the common theme is a goal to help the other learn, evolve and be successful at what they are trying to accomplish. The more everyone understands the goals and motivations at the heart of a mentoring relationship, the more successful the results will be. This relies on communication and working to develop a rapport that will ultimately lead to a productive outcome.

Regardless of the size of the group and who specifically is your research mentor(s), you will need to take an active role in getting the mentoring you need to be successful with your research. Initially, you will be learning the basics of the project and the techniques you will be using, but even at this early stage you need to take ownership of your progress. Let your mentor know what you do know, and what you need help in learning, so that s/he can help you identify the resources that can assist you. As you gain more experience you are likely to be given more independence, both in terms of working more independently on specific tasks but also in carrying forward with the next steps before your next check-in with your mentor.

In the business world the term is called “managing up”—making the management of you as an employee easy for your boss—you can use these same ideas in a mentoring relationship by “mentoring up.” In an article titled “Making the most of mentors: A guide for mentees,” the authors¹ suggest that you take responsibility for the mentoring relationship by “guiding and facilitating the mentor’s efforts.” When working with a mentor, you have to figure out what you need from that person in terms of time, energy, and influence, and help that person to help you. Your goal is to ask for the help you need in a way that is easy for that person to give it to you. You may need other things from them—like letters of recommendation for a scholarship/fellowship for instance—and you need to make them aware of these needs as well as make it easy for them to meet your needs. Tell them about your goals, and where you want to go with you career. Tell them what would help you if you know and, if you don’t, ask them what might help you to achieve your goals.

With your research mentor, determine how regularly will you meet—this may be more frequent at first and at critical points in the research or your degree process, so you may need to revisit and renegotiate the frequency of your interactions. If your mentor does not have regular meetings with you, take responsibility for requesting and scheduling these. Go beyond simply following through with the tasks that have been assigned to you and think ahead to what should come next, set goals that you can discuss, generate ideas for overcoming the research obstacles you have run into, and be responsive to the feedback you receive from your mentor. Most importantly, when you have an opportunity to interact with your research mentor, you should strive to be prepared.

• Have a clear plan, at least for the next step of your research.

• Be prepared to discuss what you have accomplished recently and what you plan to do next.

• Have questions to ask based on your research progress and/or your reading of the literature related to your project.

• Listen to your research mentor’s responses, and write them down (either immediately or just after the interaction).

• Act on your plan and the suggestions made to you by your research mentor between now and your next interaction.

Student Perspective

“It was good to realize that the student is in some way expected and encouraged to dictate the schedule and flow of meetings. This made me more confident to meet with my professor and decide what an appropriate pace for my research is.