technicians and papers - (Jun/02/2010 )

it does depend a lot on the PI...i worked as a tech for over two years in a lab where i was the only employee - my PI directed me, and i did all the work, in addition to trouble-shooting and interpreting some of the data. however, she wouldn't let me help draft the manuscript no matter how many times i offered to at least write the methods section, and wouldn't teach me how to do the statistics, yet she made me first author! and also included a long list of co-authors who had absolutely nothing to do with the paper. at the time i didn't realize how fortunate i was that, as a lowly tech, i was included at all, let alone given first authorship. it's my opinion that techs should be included if, as others have mentioned, they do more than just follow a protocol given them, and i think more PIs are moving in that direction - but the norm is still to not include techs

Good day!

I hope you feel better now. Personally I think that tech name should be included in the paper too. Be it author, or in the acknowledgement section. I am sure that given your experience, optimising experiments, you must have read through a lot of literatures in order to be able to do these. I myself is a tech too. When my PI publish paper my name was included in the paper too. The thing is, I think it is personal if your name is not on the paper, if your PI likes you, your name is on it. If he doesn't then probably thats why it is not. At least they should put you on the acknowledgement section. When I first started working there, the moment they told me about their project, I told them I want my name to be on it. The next time if you are still in research, the moment they discuss it with you, tell them straight away, you want your name to be there. When I said that my PI told me they will "try" if it is not possible they will put it under acknowledgement.

I do not believe in those that said you are given a protocol and follow through thats why your name do not deserve to be on the paper. Do you know when I first started my project, I was given 2 protocols, of both they were wrong protocols given by my PI. So tell me about it, whats the big deal that you are given a protocol, so? In the end, a tech does most of the work, consolidating data, working overtime, reading journals, ensuring data accuracy, optimising experiments and so on. Is just a name on a paper, to them this is easy, to you, it can help your future career.

So what you are a tech now? If you have money and interest and a long term plan, you can do your degree, post grad and so on. The whole idea is you are not just a tech who do what they are told just for the money. I am sure you care about the whole project.

Recognition on the paper and the findings you have comes together. If either one is out, the other as well. If a tech slack on the job and the PI decide to remove the tech name from the journal, so thats understandable. But you work hard on the project, they have to put your name. Thats the way I know it works. Even it is not the author doesn't matter, at least it should be in the acknowledgement. You should talk about this before they start the project.

Talk to your boss, and take your (hopefully meticulous) lab book with you to document your case. If your PI agreed to include you, but the post-doc threw you out, you may talk to the PI about inclusion. Your boss' authority supersedes that of the post-doc.

edited to add: Maybe you should calmly point out to your boss that many more people are listing "publications in a refereed journal" among their requirements for hiring new techs. Another angle: If something were to happen to him, say a debilitating stroke or fatal heart attack, who would give you a reference for your next position? The publication would be his recommendation for posterity. If he feels your work is not quality enough to support publicly, perhaps he has a recommendation on how to improve it?

hay
I did'nt have much time lately to follow this venting-part of the forum..sorry. My boss was also kind of a victim of the post-doc. Forcing the post-doc to put me on his paper would have ended in serious trouble here...so for the rest and peace i just left it that way. (causing lots of inner stress: but what doesn't kill you )
But it's a pleasure to hear that techs are appreciated..i just got bad luck i stumbled on an selfish post-doc.

Good luck with all your experiments and sometimes give your tech a hug: he/she 'll appreciate it (especially when experiments are giving a hard time)

at the faculty i worked, the situation was :

technicians are asked to choose between :
taking a monthly salary until the project is done vs writing their names as authors on the paper ...

what are your inputs on this ???

i can see, that the project may extend far than expected ... but its up to the technician...

i know some who prefer authority, for future plans ...
others who prefer taking money ... not thinking of higher education, satisfied with their positions, and had their families and this adds more income ...

and Casandra : reading the ethical considerations you kindly shared, is it really the case always ... ???
i know Doctors who ask for authority just because they lend you a device of their own !!!

nightingale on Mon Nov 29 22:27:01 2010 said:

LOL

But it brings me to an idea or general view on the names in papers: you just cant be sure that they are for "real"..

I mean: offcourse some names are known and will always be meaningfull... but face it: some names are on papers just for any reason you can think of...

I knew of a person who had his name on 2 papers because he wrote a thesis (when studying, graduation thesis) from wich a little bit of info was used.. however the info that was used was nothing more then the info gotten from an experiment from a prof. that the student had to do
(student just did the practical thing, nothing more..)

So is this ok or not?

And what about a person I know who has his name on 5 papers simply because he read the papers and corrected for writing errors or maybe big general errors every teacher in that field would know...

(keep in mind that this person is not a "researcher" , he is mainly a teacher and has no research of his own..)

I can keep giving examples like this..

The point being:
rules are there to follow , to make it clear when and who just be on a paper...
But as we all know: are rules followed by everyone at any time?

pito on Tue Nov 30 16:36:01 2010 said:

nope, and that's the irony of why we have rules....because we can't do self-policing and we don't trust each other's integrity and sense of fairness and some people (esp those with the power) will not do the right thing unless there's a threat of punishment/sanctions...this is a very depressing topic......

it IS really depressing ...
i always thought of the world of scientists as an ideal one in terms of manners ...

There should be one rule -- authorship on a paper is determined by the amount of work/data/ideas/financing contributed to the ultimate manuscript. Titles, hierarchal position within the lab, and secondary considerations (such as so-and-so "needs" a paper) should have no standing.

HomeBrew on Wed Dec 1 12:41:02 2010 said:

I guess most people would agree but who interprets, manipulates and enforces this rule? What a very idealistic way of looking at it, HB....