[analog31]

I had a decent experience in grad school, though it took a long time. I now live in an academic town, so I know a lot of professors, have worked with quite a few due to my day job, and so forth.

One thing I've noticed is that there is no systematic mechanism for supervising a professor and helping them develop as a manager. So the management skills of a professor are luck of the draw, and tend to be formed by their own PhD experience, and maybe things like coming from a business family, etc. To make it harder, managing grad students is weird because of the amount of independence that they're supposed to develop.

I haven't typically seen this manifest itself as abuse, but just ineptness. There have been times when the thought floating around in my head was: "You need to get some project management training." In contrast, when I became a manager in industry, my employer sent me for a bunch of training that was quite useful, and my own supervisor was observing my behavior as a manager. Also, industry in our better moments communicates norms about things like harassment and inclusion which, if you follow them, will serve you pretty well as a manager.

In fact I've told professors the following: "Your university probably has a career development program in the business school with courses such as basic supervision and project management. If not, check out your local trade school. You should sign up yourself and all of your students for one or two of those courses.