Managing your dissertation supervisor

You are more reliant on other people that you might imagine. You will need the time and guidance of your supervisor, and frequently you will require people to supply information. Understanding other peoples' needs is crucial to getting the best out of them - and your supervisor will need managing if you are to get what you need from them.

In managing your supervisor in this way, you are in essence managing the process of your dissertation.

Time allowance: It is a little known fact among students that staff are human too! This means that some are more organized than others, some have better memories than others and because the world is an unequal place some are busier than others! A good starting point to good supervisor management is to find out how much time you should have available to you. Universities typically give staff a time allowance for dissertation supervision. You should make sure that you get this time. You have every right to expect the time that staff are allocated for your supervision. You should not expect more than this - if staff give you more of their time out of goodwill then that's great, but if they do it's particularly important that you use it well. If they are giving more time to you then they may well have to do their other work in their own time. So, establish your rights to staff time right at the beginning - if this is not in your course documentation then ask your supervisor or unit/course leader.

Making appointments: It can be very frustrating if you are unable to get hold of your supervisor. In turn, it can be very frustrating for staff when students expect to see them without notice. Staff can be difficult to get hold of for any number of reasons. They many have a lot of teaching or be involved in work that keeps them out of the office for large periods of time. This is why you need to make appointments and stick to them. Ask your supervisor the best way to make contact/appointments with them.

Supervisory style: Being individuals, staff may well have very different approaches to supervision. This is not a problem - it can be one of the good things about doing a dissertation, provided your way of working is a good fit to your supervisor's way of working. Some staff will take the approach that it's your project, so it's your role to approach them if you need/want to. Others are more directive and will expect you to make regular appointments to discuss progress. They may contact you if you do not contact them! Think which way would be best for you and discuss this at your first meeting. Usually, you can find a way of working with your supervisor that will suit you both.

Getting the best out of meetings: It is your project, so you need to take your ideas to your supervisor for advice and discussion. Never expect the supervisor to come up with all the ideas or answers. Their role is one of support - they should guide you, but not do the work for you. It is important, therefore that every meeting you make has an objective.

What are the objectives of your meeting? For example, you might make an appointment to discuss developing the area of investigation and your research question. Don't go to your supervisor saying that you want to do a dissertation on, say 'retailing', and then expect them to come up with a project to work on. You need to be more specific. Have some ideas of your own e.g. are you investigating in-store consumer behaviour in grocery retailing? Or perhaps you are investigating consumer perceptions of own label? You may have several possible areas of investigation and your meeting objective is to evaluate and discuss the relative merits of each.

In addition to an objective, each meeting should have an outcome (answered questions perhaps) and/or action points (things for you to do next). At the end of each meeting, establish what you should have achieved by the next meeting. You and your supervisor should set the action points together, and you should always do your best to have achieved them (or at least made progress on them) by the next meeting. A log of meetings is attached at the end of this chapter to help you make good progress.