How to deal with trouble Boss - (Feb/12/2008 )
Can some body tell me how to deal with boss who created troubles. It means boss is delberating doing the things which are unfair and wants to give maximum credits to some one of else.
I would do the following:
- go and speak to your boss about it in a calm and rational way, he/she might not be aware that they are upsetting you. give them the chance to explain their actions. maybe there are ways that you can improve also??
- if you still think that they are being unreasonable, go and speak to somebody above them, say your department manager or head of discipline (you don't say if you are a student or not but if you are- then you should have somebody you can talk to about this kind of issue at the university).
- if things don't get better after the first 2, I would seriously consider quitting and moving elsewhere- life is too short to waste time in an unhappy environment and if what you say is true, you won't get the credit for your hard work there anyway so whats to lose??
Everything is about communication. I've got a hard time with my boss, not because he's fundamentally bad, but because we're fundamentally different persons, with different ways of making science. It's very hard for some bosses to admit they've commited a mistake. Sometimes they will just get stubborn "just because" and "who's the boss?". Well being stubborn happens to students as well, but they are in no position to negotiate.
There is a lot of fine advice about communication in work and in the lab around, plus lots of self-help about communication. It doesn't mean YOU're necessarily at fault. But you won't be giving these articles to your boss, eh?
It's time for you to act wisely. I feel for you.
I agree with Lauralee, except for step 2. Unless there's a specific, serious issue like race/gender discrimination, sexual harassment, or if you're not getting proper credit on publications, going to the department head won't solve the problem and will probably make things worse.
Try to communicate with your PI. Tell the PI what he/she's doing, why it bothers you, and most importantly how it affects your work (since most PIs care more about your product than your feelings). If things don't change, leave.
Sometimes the benefits you may receive from being in a certain person's lab or being trained at a certain institute will outweigh being miserable for a few years. Unfortunately, a lot of problem PIs know this. Ultimately you'll have to decide if the nonsense you're enduring will be worth the eventual payoff.
I should probably admit that I'm in the third condition (benefits of staying outweigh the bull I have to deal with).
I agree with Cassio.
If you go to the department head, you may produce tension between you and your boss. Your boss may not like being told off by the department head.
A PI told me that his student complained to the Department Head about something... and instead of solving the problem...it created tension in the lab...
If I were you, I just focus on my work to publish a paper by myself. The boss will respect you at that time!
uh huh. right.
Yes, focus on work is well and good. Whether that leads to your boss respecting you, or even allowing the paper to be published under your name, or publishing without adding on his 'favorites' for minor little contributions, or just generally holding up your progress regardless of how hard you work.....that's something else.
Yeah from the beginng i just focued on my work and fininshed my works successfully and result is he put all my imporant data to his own student which is home student and my name was there but not as a leading author, and i know the results are not the thing you got at once, but its a high level of mental illness if you are thinking to deprive some student of his own achievement. How can some body think about it and from where one can develop such a thinking.
I can believe that with such a strategy one can't run the system very long.
uh huh. right.
Yes, focus on work is well and good. Whether that leads to your boss respecting you, or even allowing the paper to be published under your name, or publishing without adding on his 'favorites' for minor little contributions, or just generally holding up your progress regardless of how hard you work.....that's something else.
I think that in some instances it has to do with the fact that you're a student. Yes, it's nice if you get a really good paper out and all, but in the end it won't really affect your career all that much. Papers that you put out as a post doc will have a bigger impact in the long run. If the boss is in a position where he would like to help out a postdoc so that they can get their next job, then he might switch authorship around to do so. This sort of happened to me as an undergrad. I did all of experiments for a project and wrote most of a paper for it. But when it came time to actually publish it, my mentor had a post doc rewrite part of it and then gave her first authorship. It really sucked, but in the long run I knew that I wasn't going into that field and it probably helped the post doc, and for me, even having a paper as an undergrad was an accomplishment in itself.
Now this obviously isn't the same situation as yours because he's giving authorship to another student who is at the same level, but it is one justification for why a boss might do such a thing. You should also remember that this person is going to be your primary reference when you go out to get your first real job. If you create a bad environment by trying to go over his head, then you might end up doing yourself more harm than good. If you really want to insure that you get full credit on your next paper, then you might want to stake a claim early on. Tell your boss that you really want to be first author on the next paper, and ask him what you need to do to get it done. Doing so might give him a subtle hint that you're upset while at the same time it shows him that you're really dedicated - something that he will probably remember and will tell your next perspective employer.