iBiology

Bringing the World's Best Biology to You

Home » Careers » Professional Development

How to Pick a Graduate Advisor

00:00:06.24 Hi, I'm Ben Barres,
00:00:08.12 my topic for today is how to pick
00:00:10.29 a graduate advisor.
00:00:12.01 So, I'm a professor of neurobiology
00:00:14.14 at Stanford University,
00:00:16.02 where I've had a lab for about the last 20 years
00:00:19.01 and where I've been lucky enough
00:00:21.04 in that lab to be not only doing
00:00:22.23 research, but also mentoring
00:00:25.03 terrific young scientists,
00:00:27.20 these are usually PhD students
00:00:30.03 and postdoctoral fellows.
00:00:32.10 And so, what I'd like to talk about today
00:00:35.04 is the importance of picking a graduate advisor
00:00:38.01 who's not only a good scientist, but
00:00:41.08 who's also a great mentor.
00:00:43.21 Now, the bottom line of what
00:00:45.22 I want to tell you is
00:00:47.10 that you want to do two things.
00:00:48.25 You want to pick a graduate advisor
00:00:50.05 who is an excellent scientist,
00:00:52.00 who is also a great mentor.
00:00:54.05 So let me take those in turn.
00:00:55.17 First of all, how can you, as a
00:00:57.29 beginning graduate student,
00:00:59.28 find an advisor who's an excellent scientist?
00:01:02.02 After all, the whole point of
00:01:04.07 doing a PhD is to learn how
00:01:06.07 to recognize and do great science.
00:01:08.03 And you're just a first year graduate student.
00:01:10.17 So, how are you going to be able to select
00:01:12.06 an advisor who's a great scientist?
00:01:14.09 Well, there are several different methods
00:01:17.19 that you can use, I suggest them all.
00:01:20.00 And I've listed some of them here.
00:01:21.23 But, picking an excellent scientist
00:01:24.13 is not sufficient.
00:01:25.17 You need to also pick
00:01:27.16 an advisor who's a great mentor.
00:01:29.20 Now that's a little trickier
00:01:31.14 to figure out, and this is the step
00:01:34.11 where many young scientists
00:01:35.26 sometimes are not as sophisticated
00:01:38.01 or mature in selecting their
00:01:40.13 advisor, and I think that this is something
00:01:44.19 that you need to think a lot about
00:01:47.18 in making your choice.
00:01:49.28 So, how can you tell whether your advisor
00:01:53.01 or potential advisor is also a good mentor?
00:01:56.15 Well, here's a few tips you can consider
00:01:59.14 trying. Very importantly, there's something called
00:02:02.21 the trainees list. Each advisor
00:02:05.02 prepares a list periodically for
00:02:08.20 NIH, in particular, submitted with
00:02:10.20 training grants that your department may use,
00:02:12.26 like the graduate PhD program, to help
00:02:15.04 fund the training program.
00:02:17.04 Each advisor periodically prepares
00:02:20.10 the list of all the trainees,
00:02:21.28 all the PhD students and postdocs
00:02:23.12 that have ever been in their lab
00:02:25.06 and then also on that list,
00:02:27.25 is what that previous trainee
00:02:30.07 is doing today. Do they have a lab
00:02:32.01 at a university? Are they a successful scientist
00:02:34.23 at a good pharmaceutical company?
00:02:37.10 Are they working still in science
00:02:40.04 in other great jobs, like being journal editors,
00:02:42.19 or working at NIH in the review process and so forth.
00:02:47.06 Many great jobs that scientists
00:02:49.11 can decide to take. You want to make sure that you're choosing
00:02:51.24 a mentor who is not only a good scientist
00:02:55.06 but is training their students to be successful
00:02:57.10 in their careers.
00:02:58.11 And taking a look at the trainees list
00:03:00.21 is a really good way to take a look at
00:03:02.10 over the advisor's career,
00:03:05.00 what percentage of their students
00:03:07.09 have gone on to be successful in science
00:03:10.10 and actually get the kind of job
00:03:13.29 that you aspire to get someday.
00:03:15.13 Now, it may be a little awkward to ask
00:03:18.16 your prospective mentor for a copy of
00:03:20.24 their trainees list, although I've
00:03:22.16 had students ask me for my trainees list
00:03:24.00 and I'm always delighted when they show the maturity
00:03:26.13 to ask for something like that.
00:03:28.15 But, you could also simply go to your PhD
00:03:30.28 department's headquarters office, the main office,
00:03:35.10 and ask for a copy of their most recent
00:03:38.19 training grant, and you will find
00:03:40.03 in that training grant, a list of the trainees
00:03:42.10 list for all of the potential advisors
00:03:46.09 that you may be considering.
00:03:47.22 So I would strongly suggest taking a look
00:03:49.14 at those trainees lists.
00:03:50.17 Next, you can also talk to,
00:03:54.01 once again, to senior scientists
00:03:55.22 who you know, including your
00:03:57.28 PhD program director,
00:03:59.07 about the training track record
00:04:02.12 of the advisors that you are considering.
00:04:04.16 If you're considering several different labs,
00:04:06.20 you might speak to senior scientists
00:04:08.22 and say, well, how does the
00:04:10.11 training track record compare
00:04:12.10 for each of those labs?
00:04:13.23 And then again, listen to what they're telling you.
00:04:16.01 You can actually even
00:04:20.22 Pubmed their trainees, and you can
00:04:22.12 figure out who their trainees are by
00:04:23.27 and large by looking at who have
00:04:26.00 been the first authors on papers
00:04:28.19 over the 10-20 years in their lab.
00:04:30.21 Then you can actually Pubmed those
00:04:32.18 authors and see now if they're
00:04:35.01 previous trainees have their own laboratories.
00:04:37.10 Are they actually doing great science
00:04:40.05 in their own laboratories?
00:04:41.20 So, by Pubmedding the previous trainees,
00:04:43.26 you can find out whether they're going on
00:04:46.08 track to be successful scientists.
00:04:48.19 And then most importantly, something that I
00:04:51.14 strongly advise you to always do
00:04:53.04 when you're considering joining a
00:04:55.14 lab of a particular scientist,
00:04:57.26 is to speak with some of their current
00:05:00.13 and past trainees. And then you
00:05:02.27 can ask these trainees what do they think
00:05:05.29 about that lab, is that a good lab?
00:05:08.04 Is good mentorship, in particular,
00:05:10.13 is good mentorship happening in that lab?
00:05:12.01 And here are some of the questions
00:05:13.17 on the next slide, that you can be asking them.
00:05:15.22 These are the sorts of things
00:05:18.23 that good mentors do and you
00:05:21.19 can ask their previous trainees
00:05:23.25 and assess, for example, as you do your rotation
00:05:26.13 in those perspective labs,
00:05:28.13 whether the mentor is going
00:05:30.08 to be doing these sorts of things.
00:05:32.01 And many, many things a good mentor
00:05:34.11 needs to do to help you,
00:05:36.07 keep in mind that when you do your PhD thesis
00:05:38.06 or your postdoc in a lab, this is essentially
00:05:41.09 a period of apprenticeship, where you're
00:05:43.00 going to be working very closely with
00:05:44.15 a senior scientist to learn how to
00:05:48.23 do research successfully yourself.
00:05:50.22 So there are many things that they're going to need
00:05:52.19 to teach you and therefore,
00:05:54.20 they're going to also need
00:05:56.27 to be able to spend a lot of time
00:05:58.05 with you. Well, one thing that a good mentor
00:06:02.03 does is help you to form good and tractable
00:06:05.04 questions. This may actually be the most
00:06:07.17 important that a good mentor does.
00:06:09.00 Because it's very hard as a young scientist --
00:06:11.13 after all, you're only going to have a few years,
00:06:13.25 to do your PhD. You need to have
00:06:17.07 a tractable starting point and
00:06:20.08 it takes a period of training before you learn to
00:06:22.25 recognize for yourself what's a good question
00:06:25.13 that's actually tractable in a several year
00:06:28.23 period of your PhD thesis.
00:06:30.25 Having picked a good question
00:06:34.22 to work on for your thesis,
00:06:36.12 next, you're going to need to talk to your mentor
00:06:38.25 about how to design good experiments.
00:06:40.19 What sort of experiments you should do.
00:06:42.06 You'll come up with some ideas yourself
00:06:44.10 but you'll need someone to toss them around with
00:06:45.24 and sort of suss out whether those are good ideas
00:06:49.08 or whether those experiments might be tweaked a little bit
00:06:52.08 to be even better.
00:06:53.16 A good mentor helps you to do that.
00:06:55.09 The best mentors also help you
00:06:57.16 to become increasingly independent.
00:06:59.11 over time. They may start by giving you some guidance
00:07:02.10 but as you build in confidence
00:07:04.13 independence, and knowledge, you'll be able
00:07:06.09 to increasingly come up with your own questions,
00:07:08.23 design your own experiments,
00:07:10.13 and so forth. And a great mentor will let you
00:07:13.04 do that. And very importantly
00:07:15.13 a great mentor does not micromanage
00:07:18.11 you, and by that I mean
00:07:20.11 a great mentor resists the ever present
00:07:23.19 temptation to tell you exactly
00:07:26.04 what experiments they think you should do.
00:07:28.08 Because, if you're always being told
00:07:30.04 what to do, number one, it won't
00:07:31.15 be as much fun, and number two,
00:07:34.04 you learn to develop your own instincts
00:07:36.14 about what is a good experiment.
00:07:38.28 And I could say here, that one of the most
00:07:41.29 fun things that I've found in running a lab
00:07:44.12 is talking to students and hearing
00:07:49.01 their ideas and seeing the sorts of interesting
00:07:51.06 experiments that they come up with.
00:07:53.28 Now, a great mentor very importantly
00:07:56.17 does not expect you to always be in the lab
00:07:58.26 slaving away every minute
00:08:00.18 over test tubes and so forth, doing
00:08:02.19 experiments. But understands that you need
00:08:05.08 to do some other activities that will often
00:08:07.19 enhance your training as a young scientist.
00:08:10.06 You need some teaching experience,
00:08:12.00 perhaps TA'ing in courses,
00:08:13.29 perhaps you'll take some summer courses
00:08:15.24 at Cold Springs Harbor or Woods Hole
00:08:17.13 or other places like that,
00:08:19.15 where you could learn more about science
00:08:21.00 in a different setting or in a different way
00:08:23.02 than you might be learning in your own lab.
00:08:24.29 And definitely, you need to be allowed
00:08:27.13 to attend conferences and present your work
00:08:29.11 and interact with other scientists.
00:08:31.22 And so, good mentors make sure
00:08:34.04 students have the time and the ability
00:08:36.08 to do those things.
00:08:37.23 Another thing that good mentors do
00:08:41.00 is that they create a very happy and interactive
00:08:43.01 and diverse lab environment.
00:08:45.08 And I mean diverse in all ways,
00:08:47.00 diverse in terms of gender
00:08:48.13 and race, but also knowledge and background
00:08:50.24 of the different people entering the lab.
00:08:53.06 And also creates a happy environment
00:08:55.11 where people are not directly competing with
00:08:57.03 each other, but rather, are teaching each other
00:08:59.06 and helping each other to be successful.
00:09:02.21 Another thing that good mentors do
00:09:05.19 that takes a lot of time is, they need
00:09:06.28 to spend you, teaching you
00:09:08.18 how to give a good talk,
00:09:10.04 how to write good papers,
00:09:11.24 how to prepare competitive grant applications,
00:09:14.08 review papers, and all the things
00:09:16.07 that you're going to need to do someday
00:09:18.06 when you're running a lab yourself.
00:09:20.24 And even after you finish
00:09:22.12 your PhD thesis in their lab,
00:09:24.14 a good mentor is going to support you
00:09:25.29 for the rest of your career
00:09:27.28 and help you to get opportunities as a young scientist,
00:09:30.11 to give talks at seminars,
00:09:32.11 to get grants. And all of these things
00:09:34.26 are things that a good mentor will do,
00:09:37.16 but it takes their time and it takes some
00:09:40.13 generosity on the mentor's part.
00:09:42.13 A good mentor really gives until it hurts.
00:09:45.28 And so, I think that this is a personality characteristic,
00:09:49.28 not all people are created equal in this regard.
00:09:52.00 There are very different styles of mentorship.
00:09:54.18 You want to look for a mentor
00:09:56.19 who is going to do all of these different things
00:09:59.10 to help you along your training as a PhD student.
00:10:05.03 Okay now, there are some things
00:10:07.01 I want to urge you to never to do.
00:10:08.21 And I've listed here three very common
00:10:10.28 mistakes that many first year graduate students
00:10:13.13 make in choosing a lab.
00:10:15.10 Don't make these mistakes!
00:10:16.16 Most important is number one,
00:10:18.29 I have found that universally,
00:10:21.09 and I was certainly no exception,
00:10:23.15 universally, students have this idea
00:10:26.20 when they enter graduate school about
00:10:28.23 some very specific research topic
00:10:32.01 that interests them and they cast
00:10:34.06 about looking for a lab
00:10:35.17 that works on this one little thing
00:10:37.08 that they want to work on.
00:10:39.21 Now, this is always a mistake.
00:10:41.26 Because that is not the way you should be
00:10:44.14 picking a lab. In any university
00:10:47.17 that you go to, there are going to be many great
00:10:49.08 mentors, but they may not all work on the one little thing
00:10:51.24 that you want to work on.
00:10:53.29 If you pick a good lab, if you
00:10:55.25 pick wisely, and you're mentored well,
00:10:58.01 you will get all of the skills and
00:11:01.04 abilities that you'll need so that someday when you
00:11:02.29 run your own lab, you'll be able to work on any topic
00:11:06.03 that happens to interest you.
00:11:07.23 Now, another mistake that I
00:11:10.25 would like to caution you about is
00:11:12.07 to never pick a lab just because
00:11:14.06 the PI is a Howard Hughes Investigator,
00:11:17.15 or is a Nobel prize winner,
00:11:19.28 or a National Academy of Science member.
00:11:21.28 All of these things are great indicators
00:11:24.13 that the lab or advisor you're considering is probably
00:11:27.22 a great scientist, but remember, being a great scientist
00:11:30.19 is not enough. You also want to make sure
00:11:33.05 that the lab is a lab with great mentoring.
00:11:36.27 And then lastly, and especially
00:11:39.00 I address this target to women,
00:11:40.16 never pick a lab because of the gender
00:11:43.02 of your advisor. I know that many
00:11:45.06 women in science are looking for mentors
00:11:47.11 as role models, and of course, this is very important
00:11:50.11 but that is not a sufficient reason to pick
00:11:53.17 a lab to do your PhD thesis.
00:11:56.26 First, make a list of labs where you
00:11:59.27 think the advisor is a great scientist
00:12:02.03 and a great mentor,
00:12:04.03 and if on that list, is a woman
00:12:06.23 and you have the desire to work in the lab of a woman,
00:12:09.05 by all means, then choose that lab.
00:12:11.23 But first, they must be a good advisor
00:12:13.18 and a good mentor. And most importantly,
00:12:17.14 maybe this is the most important thing I'm going to say
00:12:19.15 today, I think that doing science should
00:12:22.06 always, always feel like fun.
00:12:25.02 You should select a mentor who
00:12:28.03 has a sense of fun about science,
00:12:30.22 who's passionate about doing science,
00:12:32.09 passion about science radiates
00:12:34.11 from them when they talk to you about science.
00:12:36.27 One thing that always gets in the way
00:12:39.26 of having fun is if you have a mentor
00:12:41.26 who's telling you how many hours to work.
00:12:44.21 I've heard many stories where mentors are telling students
00:12:46.07 you should work 60 hours a week or something
00:12:49.12 like that. I have never in 20 years
00:12:52.01 ever told a student how many hours
00:12:54.15 to work. If somebody told me that, that would completely
00:12:57.07 take the fun out of it. I think
00:12:58.26 that all you can do as a mentor
00:13:00.10 is take good students into your lab,
00:13:02.17 give them opportunity, guide them gently,
00:13:05.28 and then the rest should come from them
00:13:09.16 and it should be a feeling of having fun.
00:13:13.13 Very importantly, doing great science
00:13:18.09 at any stage in your career should never
00:13:20.26 exclude having a life.
00:13:22.17 I have many students and postdocs in my lab
00:13:24.16 over the last 20 years, they've all
00:13:27.00 had active lives, many are married or have boyfriends or girlfriends,
00:13:30.15 have had babies while in my lab,
00:13:33.07 either PhD students or postdocs,
00:13:34.24 I've had multiple babies.
00:13:36.16 All these things are part of life
00:13:39.16 and there's nothing about doing science
00:13:42.00 that excludes having a great
00:13:44.03 life. If you're in a lab where the mentor
00:13:46.24 does not appreciate that, you are in
00:13:48.14 the wrong lab.
00:13:49.17 Most importantly, being in the right lab
00:13:53.10 should feel -- every day -- like being in summer camp.
00:13:56.07 When you wake up in the morning
00:13:57.24 you should feel like you can hardly wait to get out of bed
00:14:01.14 and go to lab. If you're in the right lab
00:14:03.18 it's going to feel like that.
00:14:05.19 Well okay, I've told you a lot of things
00:14:08.09 today about how to pick a good graduate
00:14:10.25 advisor. I've told you that you need to find
00:14:12.15 an advisor who's not only a great
00:14:13.26 scientist, but who's also a great
00:14:15.13 mentor. And you may be worried
00:14:18.11 that by the time you do all that,
00:14:20.14 that there may only be one person
00:14:22.03 in the entire university who fits that description.
00:14:23.12 Nothing could be further from the truth.
00:14:26.11 There are many great scientists who
00:14:28.14 are also great mentors
00:14:30.00 at every single major university in this country.
00:14:33.11 And every school has many great mentors,
00:14:37.17 your job, if you want to be a successful scientist,
00:14:41.05 is to pick one of them.
00:14:42.09 Thank you very much.

This Talk
Speaker: Ben Barres
Audience:
  • Student
  • Researcher
Recorded: June 2014
More Talks in Tips for Science Trainees
All Talks in Tips for Science Trainees
Share

Talk Overview

Ben Barres gives advice on how to pick a graduate advisor. He strongly suggests picking an advisor who is not only a good scientist, but also a good mentor. In this talk, he describes a mentor’s qualities and attributes, and gives suggestions on how to identify an advisor who will be a good mentor.

Speaker Bio

Ben Barres

Ben Barres

Dr. Ben Barres is a professor at the Neuroscience department at Stanford School of Medicine. Barres earned his BA in biology from MIT, and completed a medical degree at Dartmouth Medical School. He continued his medical training as a neuroscience resident at Cornell University, completed his PhD in Neuroscience at Harvard Medical School, and joined… Continue Reading

More Talks in Professional Development

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.