Get back in my corner Advisor A!

Advisor A replied, which is a small miracle within itself. The gist of her response was that a) she doesn’t feel the need to keep me up-to-date on her relationship with Rival Uni whether or not the seminars are directly related to my research; b) As ex-Advisor B helps organise these special collaborative meetings, and she no longer is my co-advisor, she doesn’t want me there; c) Rival’s application was rejected because it was too similar to mine – which is precisely the problem I have been trying to have heard for the past 9 months.

What I took most offence at in Ad A’s email was her blatant untruths. Actually, maybe a better way of saying that is that many of the things she uses in her defence contradict things she has said to me in the past. I have no idea what is true or not true from her anymore.

Boss says the most important thing in an advisor is not that they are in your exact research field, or that they like you, rather it is that they are in your corner. They stand behind you, extol your virtues to visiting scholars, fight on you behalf for research space and resources, stand up for you in committee meetings, and generally try to make the experience as fulfilling as possible given the restraints on their own time and resources.

I feel that Ad A is going out of her way to make this more difficult for me, that if push comes to shove she has no qualms in shunting me to the side in favour of others. The fact that she would knowingly organise a seminar in my broad research area and better still, invite a specialist to speak on a topic that my first study is directly investigating, without informing me, is completely disheartening, and just shows how far out of my corner she really is.