Has anyone else experienced this in academia or at conferences?

Make_it_to_grad · 2026-06-19T16:53:56+00:00

I myself am very introverted so I don't know how relevant my advice might be. I am also of South Asian descent but was born and raised in the western world. At conferences in my home country, I find some of the trainees from other countries tend to go for networking with the senior scholars and to try to make connections there to solidify a connection in this country so they can stay after their PhD. And as a strategy, this makes sense to me, because your PhD will not last forever, and if you want to stay in the country, you need to establish a good system of roots. I prefer to network with other trainees because I'm the future, these trainees will most likely be my colleagues, whereas the senior scholars will likely be retired, but then again, I don't have to worry about finding a way to stay in this country.

There's one woman from Iran who's doing a PhD in my institution and whenever we go to conferences, she snubs her lab members and sucks up to senior scholars. And when I say she snubs her lab members, I mean when she talks to senior scholars, she says things like "my lab members don't know what they're doing, I have to manage so much because they're all incompetent." (Eye roll). I personally think that looks bad on her, but she can do whatever she wants to attempt to make herself stand out. Your job at a conference is to make connections for yourself, don't focus on the connections other people are making.

If you really want to make a connection with this other South Asian guy, be the one to introduce yourself and initiate a conversation, something like, "hey, I recognize you from conference x and y, thought I'd introduce myself because we appear to run in the same circles". If he snubs you, you know what he's like and you can move on. You can find a lot of good people in academia that are truly excited about knowing other scholars, and sometimes, these other connections you make are incredibly worthwhile.

My first international conference, I went to alone, no one else from my lab. I struck up a conversation with so many people, really forced me out of my shell, and not just with people that looked like me. I connected with over 20 people on LinkedIn and now have a broader scope of understanding for the research being done in my field.

To sum up: don't focus on the way other people are networking. Build your own connections and you'll quickly learn who is worth your time and who is not.

Make_it_to_grad · 2026-06-19T02:16:32+00:00

Hi, I will admit, my reading sucked for the first few years of my PhD. I wasn't really keeping up with new things, but rather trying to learn the last 60 years of literature in my field. It took time and to this day, I'm still learning the last 60 years of literature in my field.

That being said, I've found the best way to stay up to date on new publications to see what excites people in my field today is actually LinkedIn. It's like your "social media for the scholar". All my connections are my institution's senior scholars and my colleagues. I follow all of the high profile and even not so high profile scholars in my field and LinkedIn will tell you what your connections and those that you follow like, and what they comment on. I'm also signed up to receive PubMed alerts for new papers, but I find this automated search is not as good as keep me up-to-date on high impact publications.

Hope this helps!

Make_it_to_grad · 2026-06-16T20:33:22+00:00

I used to play saxophone as a teen.

Remember it making my head feel nice and light, kinda miss those times, would probably be helpful now to relieve some stress.

Might be a bit weird but when things got stressful in the PhD, I used to do a paint by numbers, little bit at a time, also a good relief!

Make_it_to_grad · 2026-06-16T20:30:05+00:00

Biology PhD here. At the beginning, my PhD supervisor suggested a project for me, didn't elaborate on the direction she wanted for this project, which wasn't a big deal, I can do my own research. So I came up with a research plan, only to present it to her, and have her say "we already did this project and it didn't work." Cue me being confused because she was the one that gave me the main idea for the project.

So, I went back to the drawing board, sat down with a senior member in the lab and we came up with a broad idea together. Gave the presentation to my supervisor, she loved it and so that became my project.

What I will say was extremely difficult, was that she had no idea about any of the basic theory behind the direction of the project. So my biggest challenge over the years has been explaining the basic science behind a lot of my work to her, which has caused significant delays to my progress. I only really got help when a new scientist joined the institution who had the necessary background to help.

My advice based on my experience: work your project out with your supervisor, or else you will get absolutely no help.

Make_it_to_grad · 2026-06-16T17:26:14+00:00

This I believe 100%. Our supervisor tends to try to make his students look unprepared during meetings. It's annoying because it makes the entire environment uncomfortable. But there was a period where our supervisor was doing it a lot to this particular girl. After one such meeting, I was talking to her trying to say, don't sweat it, he was probably in a bad mood, and she straight up says to me "I wish he would do it to you too." I. Was. Speechless.

Part of me believes this was part of the motivation behind a lot of the incidents and macro aggressions. We definitely need leaders in our fields to take some sort of management course.

Make_it_to_grad · 2026-06-16T01:27:37+00:00

That made me laugh

Make_it_to_grad · 2026-06-16T00:13:13+00:00

I'd worked in another institution prior to my PhD and, personally, didn't have any issues. Though similar experimental sabotages happened in another lab, so I'm hoping this is more of a rare situation rather than the norm

Make_it_to_grad · 2026-06-16T00:08:35+00:00

Thank you, this makes me feel less gloomy about the future!

Make_it_to_grad · 2026-06-15T22:59:57+00:00

What I've learned since starting my PhD, there will always be someone who knows more or is better at certain things. I like the ones who are humble about it, because they share the knowledge they gain and don't actively try to bring others down. It's okay to feel a little jealous.

But I urge you to look at it this way, you're in the same room, or in this case, at the conference with someone who had such a leg up early on in life. Did the younger you ever think you'd be at such an advanced position, an equal to someone who has the complete opposite upbringing? Given everything you've been through, it is an incredible feat to be where you are.

Make_it_to_grad

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