supervisor woes

30 Apr 2007
Supervisor woes.... Current mood: busy

My supervisor has a disconcertingly selective memory. Quite often he'll look at something I've done and say 'why have you done that?' - to which the answer is generally 'because you told me to'. Alternatively he'll ask why I haven't done something, even though the request for me to do it never actually made it out of his head. At those moments I'm never quite sure to what extent I should insist on my version of events... What;s the etiquette here when dealing with a superior?! It;s made worse by the fact that his scattiness is highly selective - when I had a boss who was truly vague I knew what I could get away with, and could tactfully say 'my memory of the situation is this' because she knew she wasn't a details person.

Had a slightly different version of this just now, I met him in the corridor, he asked about a piece of work, and I apologised that it was taking me longer than I'd expected. His reply was that it was fine for me to show him half finished work, and to discuss ideas with him. What a nice helpful supervisor I hear you saying... Well yes, except that I tried exactly that with this same piece of work a couple of weeks ago. I emailed him a rough draft and booked a meeting a few days later to discuss it - not only had he not read the draft (and still hasn't), he used the whole meeting to discuss a different piece of work, only giving me a solitary piece of advise about the original work - "make sure it's focused". Well, yes, thanks, the focus was really what i was hoping to discuss..