Five Types of Dissertation Advisors

and how I would guide you through working with them

Via Getty Images

[A quick note before we begin: I originally titled this “Five Types of Dissertation Chairs” and heard from multiple folks that they thought it was about literal furniture and not the Chair of a Dissertation Committee! I updated the title on Substack to clarify this, but folks who read the letter in their email inboxes the time it was sent will still see the original title.]

I’ve seen several types of advisors and chairs in my work as a Productivity Coach for folks finishing their dissertations. For the sake of today’s letter, I’ll use the word “chair” to mean the person who is the head of your dissertation committee.

Before I dive in, I want to pause and say that some of my friends and clients have lovely, supportive, encouraging chairs and committees (I myself had a great dissertation chair!).

I want to also note that I’ve witnessed many professors advising dissertations alongside a very long list of responsibilities—with junior faculty especially expected to take on additional service and mentoring labor, squeezing their time and energy thin. It’s usually not a moral failing that my clients end up in a less-than-ideal advising situation.

That said, I’ve noticed some patterns in dissertation chairs over the last few years of coaching clients to finish their dissertations. Here is a little summary of what some of them look like and how coaching has served as a helpful complement to a dissertation chair’s support (…or lack thereof).

The Weekly Update

This advisor wants you to send them new writing every week to show your progress and get their feedback. While this can feel motivating for some people—and helpful when you need their feedback on a draft—it can also prompt anxiety if you don’t feel “ready” to share your writing. Because a lot of the labor that goes into writing a dissertation doesn’t amount to a word count (reading, brainstorming, mind mapping) it can feel stressful to generate a weekly write-up just for the sake of proving that you’re making progress. When I support clients who have Weekly Update chairs, we might:

• Develop a memo template they can fill out to share with their advisor to show their progress, ask questions, and get support

• Have the client talk out their ideas during a coaching call, which I will then type up into notes that the client can rework into a draft

• Generate a method to gamify writing a set amount of words in a short amount of time

The Write It Like I Wrote It

This advisor expects you to follow the same process they used to write their dissertation—even if that was 40 years ago, they used a completely different methodology, and they had summer funding you don’t have access to. A Write it Like I Wrote It advisor can be helpful when they share models of “good writing” or when they can explain how their approach relates to your research. But it can also feel stressful if you want to use a different approach or style that they don’t value or understand. When I support clients who have Write It Like I Wrote It chairs, we might:

• Identify a list of questions to ask their chair so they can get clarity on what precisely their chair expects from a quality dissertation chapter

• Model how to reverse outline a piece of writing (like their chair’s dissertation!) in order to sketch out a new outline for their chapters

• Identify any gaps the client may need to explore in order to complete their dissertation chapters using a new methodology or approach per their advisor’s guidance

The MIA

These advisors are busy people. I want to give MIA chairs the benefit of the doubt—they have their own schedules and responsibilities, which might include doing field work halfway across the globe, going on sabbatical, or (just like all of us) navigating the challenge of balancing work with life—but sometimes they may put advising dissertations at the bottom of their to-do lists, which isn’t great for their advisees. Regardless of the reason why it happens, it can feel frustrating when your advisor goes MIA and takes forever to get back to you with answers to your time-sensitive questions or with feedback on your writing. When I coach clients with MIA chairs, we might:

• Develop a to-do list for their dissertation and categorize it by what they can do on their own and what they need their advisor’s feedback to work on

• Determine which of the action items on their task lists should be done first and which should strategically be put on the back burner to return to at a later date

• In the rare case that an advisor truly isn’t fulfilling their role as a dissertation chair, we might brainstorm emails to their advisor and/or committee and/or Dean to request support in developing timelines you and your advisor must follow

The Send It When It’s All Done

This advisor prefers to give feedback on your finished chapter instead of providing feedback during the drafting process. While it can be nice to have full reign of drafting up your chapters if you feel confident about your momentum and have other methods for receiving feedback (like a writing group), it also can cause pile-ups and increased stress when you do finally get feedback. When I coach clients with Send It When It’s All Done chairs, we might:

• Break their task list down into bite-sized tasks so they feel more confident completing short sections of writing, which can really build up

• Discuss methods to gamify their approach to writing so they can increase their word count during writing sessions

• Develop a list of activities that the client can shift to focus on while they’re waiting to receive feedback on their draft (like reading, research, bibliography, etc.)

The Hands Off

This advisor wants you to have agency in developing your ideas and creating drafts on your own schedule, so they’re relatively hands off in terms of setting deadlines and scheduling meetings. While they trust your judgment and cheer you on, you might struggle to keep up momentum without an external deadline or feedback on your writing. When I coach clients who have Hands Off chairs, we might:

• Develop short-term deadlines for different sections of their task list, which I support them in meeting via check-in emails between coaching calls

• Identify what “good enough” should look like for their chapter drafts as a way to determine when it’s time to send the draft to their advisor

• Explore ways to increase focus during work sessions, including opening or closing routines for their workdays, time boxing, batchotasking (batched monotasking sessions), co-working, etc.

Human beings are complex, and your own dissertation chair may fit into more than one or none of the above archetypes. When you’re working on a long-term, complex, and high-stakes project like a dissertation, it’s important that you have someone in your corner to help you break your larger project down into manageable tasks, strategize which tasks to work on first, and set deadlines to help keep up momentum. My clients reach out to book with me because they’re looking for extra support from someone who specializes in making projects actionable and achievable, while providing external accountability and motivation to make ongoing progress.

My books are open for three Success & Accountability Coaching Clients to start packages in September. I’m especially looking to support people who are working on their Master’s thesis or Doctoral dissertation, writing book proposals, journal articles, or books, or who are planning out their semester as professors—including chairing dissertations!

If this sounds right up your alley, I invite you to book your free 30-minute Discovery Call to explore what Success & Accountability Coaching might do for you. Feel free to leave any questions here in the comments as well, or email me directly at Kate@KateHenry.com.

Take care and talk soon,

Dr. Kate