Committee members not seeing eye to eye

[robot_hamster]

My school has a committee system and it seems like the members of my committee don't see eye to eye. I understand that they are from different areas (I need a well rounded representation for my thesis topic), but they were practically at each others' throats during a meeting. Is this normal?

[fuzzylogician]

I really hope the to your question is 'no,' although each of us here can tell you about our committee and not much else. My committee members, at least, are nothing like yours - they certainly don't fight with each other during meetings, and they are all at least not harming my process, although I work more closely with some of them than others. I also work closely with people who are not on my committee. But the important question beyond normalcy is, what can you do about your situation.

- how often do you meet with your committee as a whole? is it better when you meet with them individually? how much can their behavior in meetings affect your research?

- beyond fighting, are your committee members making contradictory requests or comments? do some comments just not make sense? is your committee making it impossible for you to progress, or are they kind of wasting a bit of your time but not hindering your progress? If you can still proceed with your research uninterrupted despite the uncomfortable meetings, maybe it's not worth fighting over. The important thing is whether or not you feel that your research is being hurt by this situation.

- does your committee have a chair who can direct the meetings towards a more productive discussion? can your advisor help get the committee back on track? is there a DGS or some other designated person who could help? maybe it would help if you came to meetings with a printed agenda of things you would like to discuss, instead of letting your committee hijack the discussion.

- can you replace unhelpful committee members with helpful ones? can you add people you want on your committee and then tactfully get the ones you don't like off it because it's getting too large? it can still have the breadth you need, just with people who get along with each other. (this could backfire if you can't get people off, so be careful. The more opinions you get, the more work you'll have to do to please everyone).

[robot_hamster]

To try to answer you, I am worried that they might hinder my research. At least when it comes to what I want to do. They each have their own ideas about how to go about things. My adviser is more with me on this and understands exactly what I want to do. The others get defensive and say "you can't do it like that", but I think it is because they don't fully understand what it is I want to do. We try explaining it, but then the conversation somehow gets derailed. Before you know it, my ideas don't even sound like my ideas anymore because one "suggestion" leads to another and everything starts to take on a new shape.

I assume I can switch out committee members if I really need to. But maybe coming more prepared would help. I don't know.

[StrangeLight]

i don't have a PhD committee yet but i've seen plenty of colleagues have a similar problem to your own. usually when you put these committees together, one of the biggest concerns is how well they get along and agree with each other, not how well they fit your research. sad but true. i've known students with very explosive, combative committees and most simply have to tailor their answers carefully to appease as many people as possible. it becomes an art form.

i'd recommend always ultimately agreeing with your primary advisor. learn to respond to their answers in ways that won't set anyone's alarm bells ringing. be diplomatic. when they suggest something that is totally unworkable for you, tell them you'll take it under consideration and would be happy to talk to them about it in greater detail when you've had more time to work through the idea yourself. often the secondary committee members will never take you up on the offer anyway.

unfortunately, it sounds like your committee will be less helpful to your work and more like something you have to manage and navigate through. it's definitely less than ideal but also definitely not unheard of. if there's one committee member in particular that is the source of these problems and it's not your primary advisor, consider taking them off the committee.

[robot_hamster]

I understand what you're saying about trying to appease as many people as possible. It is going to be difficult. I understand that they want to make suggestions on how to make the research more "worthwhile", but I also think they don't understand what it is I am trying to do since they are from different areas. I wrote everything down and I tried to explain it in terms they would understand. However, I guess the idea is so foreign to them that all I got from them was suggestions that really took things away from what I wanted to do. Seriously, it was like they were trying to compare apples to oranges.

[Eigen]

Honestly, this sounds like it's something your Chair (Advisor) should be taking care of. They are the ones who should be leading the committee, solving disputes, etc. That's why you have a chair!

Sadly, though, I've heard plenty of cases of students having problems with their committees due to interdepartmental politics... Talk to your advisor, come up with a game plan, and stick to it. See if they think you need to change out committee members.

[robot_hamster]

I'm going to have a discussion with them for sure. I was just wondering if this was normal/common and it sounds like it is (at the very least) not unusual. Thanks!

Edited June 9, 2011 by robot_hamster