go with the supervisor that you respect and that you know or at least feel strongly will support you through thick and thin. One of the best advices I got is that the student supervisor relationship is what makes you even if you are complete retard, if your supervisor is respected in the field and likes you, even with 0 publications you can land a job in Harvard or any other ivy leagues (if they know some profs there). I have seen that with my own eyes. Forget completion of the thesis, it will happen, what is more important is publications, the more you have the more likely you are to getting a decent post doc. So basically the more publications you have even if you don't complete in 3 years you are more likely to land a job than if you have 0 publications and finished within 3 years. Nowadays with so many high profile labs a lot of academics are expecting that you publish before you get a phd. Its all about the supervisor-student relationship that gets you places that should be the most important aspect at this stage. Remember 3-4yrs is a long time not to get on with your supervisor and this can end in 0 publications, and loss of income as academics are quite childish and vindictive.

SOD the phd go for the clinical scientist much better. do Phd later if you have to for further career prospects

have you noticed any traits of psychosis with your main supervisor? Females tend to make everything personal. it sucks ( i am saying this through personal experience)

Hey damned,

I have the same exact situation and I have had many "big talks" with supervisor and also went further but only made things worse and deteriorated the situation. I think sometimes in research world its really about who you are and not the results that you produce. So have you got any 1st author publications? What stage of phd are you in? are you the opposite sex to all the other students and supervisor? are you different genetic make up to your supervisor i.e. is your ethnicity different? If yes to any of these then these could be the reason. I found that academics can be very vindictive and childish even though they may be highly regarded in the field. Many issues that they are pressured for from above tend to make them like that. If the supervisor is really unable to communicate properly then there is no point trying. can you get second supervisor involved?

Main thing is that the more you try and get a resolution from the committee members of your graduate school/department etc, this is then going to result in the supervisor feeling bad. One thing you must remember is that no matter what the uni will always take the academic's side and so will most of the other academics in your department. Anyone that says in the academic circle that they are there for your support generally is talking shit. I found that in most uni's basically a PhD student is a worthless piece of crap and are disposable and therefore it means that saying nothing will take you a long way. I learnt the hard way. honestly there is no point just get everything in writing and do what they say unless you are going to get into shit. forget about career prospects at this stage as the more you worry about that the less you are likely to move forward in your project. The less conflict you have with your boss the more likely it is that you are going to get a reference and don't expect a beautiful one but one that will at least just get you a job. once you have gained one position then you don't need to worry about the rest. if you are under 30 then this should not be a problem as you can change fields and make it later

PM me

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Well with mine, it was the supervisor that was desperate for staff. He/she was exteremly desperate for staff since their group was reducing in size quite dramatically and I was the (un)lucky monkey that had to eat the wrath of supervisor fustrations. Alot of the time since funding is scarce and supervisors can be placed in a desperate situations, they can take people on against their will and this is only a disaster especially if the supervisor is unreasonalble. Avoid at all cost if you can better to have no PhD than a failed one, thats waht happened to me.