Power and Doctoral Supervision Teams
Developing Team Building Skills in Collaborative Doctoral Research

Power and Doctoral Supervision Teams engages with the interplay of power generated through the way doctoral supervision teams are structured and how they operate in reality. The stories of experienced academic supervisors and late-stage doctoral students from a cross section of Education, Humanities and Social Sciences teach us what theory and how-to guide books cannot.

By using the narrative of stories to explain the models, the lived experience of interpersonal power dynamics shows the promises, pitfalls, joys and frustrations of the various team forms. The book alerts the reader to the great variety of practices and the potential and hazards within.

This book is an essential resource for doctoral research students to understand what works in team supervision; for academic supervisors who want to look at options outside of supervision or readjust their current strategies; and for academic administrators as they revise policies that apply to doctoral supervision.

Acknowledgements

Foreword: Authored by Liezel Frick

Introduction:Before a new journey begins, there is always the journey that went before.

Chapter 1: Concepts of Power and Agency

Chapter 2: One guide for the journey: De facto dyadic mode

Chapter 3: Some sections of the journey will need an additional expert guide: Segmented mode

Chapter 4: The leader, the Sherpa and the Traveller: Hierarchical collaborative mode

Chapter 5: Fellow travellers: Horizontal collaborative mode

Chapter 6: Shifting sands

Chapter 7: Four domains of power

Chapter 8: The fellow traveller’s playbook: Developing a pedagogy for collaborative team supervision

Chapter 9: Navigating the terrain: top tips for wary travellers

Margaret J. Robertson is an early career researcher with a specialisation in postgraduate research supervision. Her thesis investigated team supervision as it is practiced in Australian universities, and particularly in the ways that power is used within the supervisory relationships to enable or silence members of the team. Subsequent work has focused on developing ideas on how power in its various forms can be used to enhance or constrain team function and open opportunities for the rich development of new knowledge.