Supervision – annotated bibliography

Denicolo, P., Duke, D., & Reeves, J. (2019). Supervising to Inspire Doctoral Researchers. Success in Academia. SAGE Publications. (Through a wide range of multidisciplinary case studies, the book offers valuable guidance on how to support doctoral students, and be empowered in the process, from selecting of candidates to the final assessment stage).

Esterman, A. (2020). Supervising doctoral students: A practical guide for supervisors and potential PhD and doctoral candidates. Independently published, Adelaide. (A short easy-to-read guide for supervisors within the health, natural, and technical sciences. The book distills Estermans’ 20 years of experience successfully supervising doctoral students through to completion).

*Hutchinson, S., Lawrence, H., & Filipović-Carter, D. (2016). Enhancing the Doctoral Experience: A Guide for Supervisors and their International Students. Routledge. (It combines research, theoretical frameworks, practical models, and the authors’ personal experience. This synthesis of scholarly theory and pragmatic sampling has produced an excellent book that works as the perfect and practical ground for students and supervisors to have conversations about their expectations).

Lee, A. (2020). Successful research supervision. Advising students doing research. 2^nd Ed., Routledge. (A comprehensive book on various pedagogical approaches to supervising. It offers a research-based practical framework for academics to examine and develop their effectiveness as supervisors).

*Taylor, S., & Kiley, M. (2024). A Handbook for Doctoral Supervisors. Second Edition. New York: Routledge (A very practice-orientated book on the whole supervision process from start to finish. It is based on the latest research, and the new third edition is fully updated and includes extended material. The first author is from the natural sciences and the last author from the humanities, which makes it relevant reading for supervisors from all scientific fields).

Wisker, G. (2012). The good supervisor: supervising postgraduate and undergraduate research for doctoral theses and dissertations. 2^nd Ed. Palgrave Macmillan. (A comprehensive book about PhD Supervision from first stages to completion. Written by one of the top researchers in the field).

*Guide on Supervision (An article by Wichmann-Hansen published in Dansk Universitetspædagogisk Tidsskrift in 2021. It is a research-based hands-on guide for supervisors of bachelor projects, master’s theses, and PhDs. It summarizes the main advice presented at the course).

Postgraduate Environments  A resource page from 2017 that includes advice on all parts of a PhD study process from enrolment to the PhD defence. It focuses on how to integrate students into the research environment. The web page is aimed at students as well as supervisors. It is a collaboration between 12 European Universities.

*Supervision – Graduate and Postdoctoral Support A very strong resource from McGill University. It is aimed at PhD supervisors, and it includes a number of concrete evidence-based advice. It also includes a tab aimed at the PhD students. Enjoy your reading.

*Supervising PhDs An excellent UK blog post full of concrete tips for doctoral supervisors written by leading researchers in the field as well as supervisors.

Western Guides on Graduate Supervision. Here you find recommendable and easy-to-read brochures with good advice for PhD supervisors. One of the brochures is specifically about supervision across cultures: Western Guide to Mentoring Graduate Students Across Cultures. I warmly recommend you to read that one! The brochures are developed by The Teaching Support Centre at the University of Western Ontario.

*Tress Academic (An excellent German-based online site about how PhD candidates can increase efficiency and quality in their academic work, projects, and communication! Includes resources about how to write papers, present at conferences, complete a PhD, or get a job in academia. It also includes resources for supervisors!).

*PhD on Track (A national web resource for PhD candidates and early career researchers in Norway. The website aims to enable beginning researchers from all academic fields to easily access information on 1) the research process, 2) communicating results, and 3) open science.).

Thesis by Publication (A collection of resources to support doctoral students who are considering or completing a thesis by publication, or who are otherwise looking to publish during candidature. It also includes resources for supervisors on how to supervise theses by publication).

The brilliant mind blog: This site accompanies scientists in their daily work by providing methods and inspiration to improve their writing skills, boost their productivity and manage self-doubts and frustrations. The site is run by Gayannée Kedia, University of Graz, Austria.

The Researcher Development website and the Postgraduate Researcher Career Planning Guide are open-access resources and are covering key topics from working with supervisors to digital research communication and thesis writing. The websites are located at University of Exeter, UK.

DocEnhance. This platform offers online transferable courses for doctoral education on 1) Data Stewardship, 2) Career management & entrepreneurship, 3) Supervision. Each course is developed with three modules and can be used for self-learning or as a collective resource, easily adaptable to existing curriculum.

PhDComics (Mostly for fun… 😊).