Jocko Underground: When Someone is Gate-Keeping and Preventing your Success.
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- This is the Jocko Underground Podcast, number 165, sitting here with Echo Charles, preparing to answer questions from the troopers of planet Earth. - Sure, planet Earth. So, we ready? - Yeah, we're ready. We're gonna present some courses of actions, some thoughts, and then we'll move forward. - Yeah, see how we can move forward. Good, okay, first question. Hi, Jocko Echo. I write to you to ask for advice on behalf of my girlfriend. She's one of the most squared away and hardworking people I know. Wakes up early, works out, goes to the lab, works all day,

She's in the last phase of her PhD program where her advisor, the person who runs the whole lab, is making life difficult. For starters, he's rarely in the lab. From what I can tell, he keeps students in the dark about their future. For example, he hasn't reviewed the papers that my girlfriend submitted over a year ago.

There is minimal communication. He'll meet with students occasionally where he yells at them for not achieving the results he expected. All of that would be tolerable except for he keeps pushing back her graduation every single semester. Everyone who has recently graduated from the lab has left on bad terms with this advisor. What can she do in this situation? Should she just keep at it and hope for the best? She's even ready to jump ship to another PhD program.

but that will undo a lot of effort she has put in. Thanks for everything.

Well, I'll start off by saying I don't really know a lot about PhD programs and how they work other than hearing stories from people that I know that are doctors of some kind. And you know, there's different kinds of, but they do mention labs. So I'm imagining it's not like a PhD in literature or something like that. This sounds like some kind of a science based, right? At a minimum going to a lab. So, but I don't know much about those programs. I didn't get any degree past my just regular degree in English.

which wasn't science anyway so you're talking an area that i don't have a lot of expertise and i certainly don't know the specifics of the program that she's involved in so i'm just going to look at this from sort of a leadership and a human interaction perspective and i think what i would do if i were her is i would kind of start to document what is happening and i would gather documentation that has already taken place right and i would start to document things that are going on

Sending emails. Hey checking in, you know doc, you know, I'm assuming the person that's running the lab is doctor checking in doctor Doctor advisor, you know, you know, what's up with this? Can I expect a grade back and then I would just start to maintain what kind of communication you're getting and if you're not getting communication That's by the way, that's a form of communication if you're getting blown off as I make communications Whether I receive things are not back. I would start to to

Not demand, but I would request very specific things be put in writing. You know, I'd be saying like, hey, you know, doctor, advisor, I would like to know about this. I've got this thing working. I'd like to know what I can expect here. I would start to ask for very specific requirements that then I can hang on to and I can be able to, where I'm going with this, be able to present some kind of a case, right? I would probably gather other information from other students as well.

Like you sure you have friends that are there. Maybe you have some friends that graduated. Let's get some documentation from them. And then I would put together like a nice request, an outline of a plan that this advisor approves that to a commitment for how you're going to finish this program and then hopefully get traction.

But if you don't get traction, I would set a meeting with the advisor and I would say, listen, you know, here's where we've been for the last three months, four months, five months. Cause she, she must have some emails. So you, maybe it's the last nine months. Here's what I've been through. Here's where I'm at. And unless you can help me resolve this, I'm actually going to go and talk to, you know, the professor, not the advisor, but like the professor or the department head or something like that and get this resolved because I

This is unacceptable. It's unacceptable for this. Be cordial and be professional. But this is wrong. You know, this is just wrong. So that's what I would do. I would gather evidence. I would build a case. I would eventually request like an outline of what I need to do to get this done.

in writing, and then if I'm not getting the response that I need, I would present the case first to the advisor and say, hey, 'cause I don't wanna blind someone, so I don't wanna blindside someone. I would present and say, hey, listen, Echo, here's where I'm at. I've been nine months of correspondence from you. You sent me too many emails back. I've sent you 37 emails. The only thing you sent me back, one email says yes, the other email says check back with me later. And I did and you never responded.

So that is nine months of me putting forth my maximum effort. And this is what I've gotten back from you. I need to graduate from this program. I need to carry on with my life. If you cannot give me a simple, clear, concise answer on how I can make that happen, I am going to take this information to the professor that is running the course. And I'm going to get this resolved. Now, listen, I'm being a little bit more aggressive than I would be in this conversation, but that's ultimately what you have to do, in my opinion. Yeah, it's...

how documenting Yes. is becomes so much more persuasive, I guess, for lack of a better term, where, you know, especially when you have the dates and the times, you know, like, you ever seen those depositions or whatever? I'm thinking of a movie right now, The Social Network. You ever watch that on The Social Network? So it's about Facebook and stuff, the lawsuits and stuff like that. But, like, they'll go, like, through the little court or, sorry, the lawyer, you know, I think it's the deposition maybe.

And they'll go like, oh, Wednesday, this, you said this, you said this, you said it kind of like when you're in the moment, it's kind of like it's easy to ignore the email and be like, well, no, like I didn't ignore all your emails. But it's like when you have it literally written there, it paints this like way more clear of a picture, you know, because you're.

from it. You know, you can just kind of see it as a whole. But yeah, it takes a lot more work to do that. But I think in this situation or these types of situations, this is your PhD you're talking about. So it's like worth it. The only other thing to consider here

I don't know what the, like I said, I don't know anything about the specifics of this program. If that advisor is some like highly politically connected person and you screw them over, they're gonna freaking backlash and it's gonna be, you might have to just sit there and suck it up. Other people graduated. Sometimes it's like, cool, I'm gonna grin and bear it for the next however. You know, like occasionally, man, occasionally you just gotta play the game. You gotta play the game sometimes. People underestimate that idea. Yeah.

But the amount of friction that you can cause by not playing the game and you think it's the right, you think it's the right thing to do and it might be the right thing to do.

But I'd wait till you graduate and then put the dude on report. You know what I'm saying? You want to do the right thing? Cool. Graduate and then go to the professor that's in charge and say, Hey, just so you know, here's 94 emails that I sent in a three month period. And I got one response and it was checked with me later. And I didn't ever heard it back from them again. So you got to figure out and you got to weigh the risk versus reward.

Like, oh, it's going to take you an extra four months to graduate, but there's no drama and we'll get it done and you can carry on with your life. Cool. You present this person. All of a sudden they have a way of going, oh, you want to program? Cool. And they grade your paper and they fail you on your PC. I'm saying you can set yourself up for a bad scenario. So I don't want that to happen. So that is a little excerpt of what we are doing on the Jocko underground podcast. So if you want to continue to listen,

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