Letter of Support Concern

[cocomos]

I will try to keep this as short as possible. I am looking for some feedback regarding my current situation with my PI.

A couple years ago, I told my PI his analyses were wrong on a couple projects. I gave him alternative analyses and he eventually came to the conclusion that I was correct. Since then he has been increasingly passive aggressive towards me. My former PI in undergrad and other people tell me it's jealousy as the scientific and engineering communities agree with my methods over his. I have approached my PI in a formal manner asking him what is the matter. Being a charismatic man, he ensures me there is nothing wrong despite what other lab mates tell me. Yet, he continues to act unfairly towards me.

My worry is regarding the letter of recommendation for my MD/PhD application. In the past, he is known to be passive aggressive in his recommendations to people he does not like. He told me he would write a strong letter of support, but when considering his past history and his current view towards me I am in fear of him writing a harmful one.

A letter of support from my PI I feel is necessary for application to these programs. I have several letters from other research advisors (I have collaborated with many other labs at my institution) who are excited to write me a strong recommendation.

Assuming he writes a bad letter, would one emotionally nefarious letter destroy my chances? Will admissions committees wonder why all of my other letters are raves while one is intently bad? I prefer to keep my ethos intact and still waive any right to see the letter. Any recommendations on how to proceed? I have to approach this lightly as he has already done harmful things towards me, though I have only ever brought him and the lab success.

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[GalaxyKnot]

Sorry to ask this question but, if this was a couple years ago why are you still in his lab? If you were in his lab for a couple of years after the incident would that mean he has been treating you unfairly ever since then? I would imagine that it would blow over by now.

If you would you be able to gather enough letters of recommendations from the other PIs that you worked with then you might be fine. Given that you have been in his lab for a long time one would make the assumption that he knows you better than the other PIs that you may have intermittently worked with. It could possibly give his letter more weight. According to your side of the story, the relationship between you and your PI is on bad terms if your statement about him doing harmful things to you is true. However, I will have to take a step back to acknowledge that we are both strangers on the internet and I do not have the big picture in front of me. I hope it works out!

 

[cocomos]

Sorry to ask this question but, if this was a couple years ago why are you still in his lab? If you were in his lab for a couple of years after the incident would that mean he has been treating you unfairly ever since then? I would imagine that it would blow over by now.

If you would you be able to gather enough letters of recommendations from the other PIs that you worked with then you might be fine. Given that you have been in his lab for a long time one would make the assumption that he knows you better than the other PIs that you may have intermittently worked with. It could possibly give his letter more weight. According to your side of the story, the relationship between you and your PI is on bad terms if your statement about him doing harmful things to you is true. However, I will have to take a step back to acknowledge that we are both strangers on the internet and I do not have the big picture in front of me. I hope it works out!

Thanks for your reply and your perspective - it is truly helpful.

To answer your questions, I am still working with him as we are not allowed to switch PI's in the graduate program. Also, he is a charismatic man who is very good at convincing me otherwise when approaching him regarding his actions. Each time I think his ego truly blew over, yet both times I did that, soon after he goes back to doing the same things. It's been very rough for me. I've always been on the same side as him and the success we have brought to our field I'm not ready to back out on, especially when I found out he is trying to publish my work without crediting me.

For a long time I've treated his actions just as I would any other bully in the workplace and continued my work. I'm scared now as my future can be ruined by him.

 

[mdphd777]

Thanks for your reply and your perspective - it is truly helpful.

To answer your questions, I am still working with him as we are not allowed to switch PI's in the graduate program. Also, he is a charismatic man who is very good at convincing me otherwise when approaching him regarding his actions. Each time I think his ego truly blew over, yet both times I did that, soon after he goes back to doing the same things. It's been very rough for me. I've always been on the same side as him and the success we have brought to our field I'm not ready to back out on, especially when I found out he is trying to publish my work without crediting me.

For a long time I've treated his actions just as I would any other bully in the workplace and continued my work. I'm scared now as my future can be ruined by him.

Unfortunately as an undergrad you have no "credit" in general. He may or may not be a bully, but whether you can successfully "manage up" scenarios like this will be critical in your future career development. You job working in a lab is to make your boss like you, not to "get credit" for anything at your level. It's very possible a bad letter would "destroy your chance" of getting into the program of your choice, but there's no recourse, because the system is set up this way due to the competitive nature as such.

I can guarantee you that this will happen OVER and OVER and OVER again in your scientific career, where attribution of proper credit is "unfair", or if you feel paranoid about your boss. If you don't have the grit to handle it at your stage, I suggest you exit and go into an "easier" career instead.

Two possible coping strategies:

1) I would take whatever people say at face value, because at your level, nobody really cares about what you do or where you end up. The likelihood of a famous scientist retaliating against an undergrad for something as garden variety in science as "credit" dispute is very low. Not sending in a letter would be odd. There's no reason to feel paranoid because your position in his lab is not significant enough for him to want to harm you.

There are notable exceptions to this: 1. if you have some kind of truly embarrassing knowledge, conduct violation, sexual harassment, etc. 2. if you made some huge discovery/invention that could have huge financial or scientific impact. In these cases, I would suggest you seek legal advisory. But I'm not getting the impression that this is what you are talking about. You just feel that he's treated you badly. He probably treats everyone badly. You would need to give him enough of an incentive to go out of his way to destroy you. The fact that you don't know about this suggests your "theory of mind" has some room for improvement.

2) There are more complicated managing up maneuvers, such as asking a third person as a mediator. Such a person is usually someone he trusts, and they can causally talk about you and the more honest opinion would then come back to you. Another option is to change strategies and actually attempt to make him TRUST you and share his genuine feelings. This may or may not work, and you'll have to take a risk. This may not seem "fair", and this person could be the biggest psychopath narcissist ever (and there are many who are big in science), but your ability to handle him and people like him, and even to manipulate him to your advantage, is a *critical* skill. This may be too much office politics than you can handle. In that case you can just ignore it.

Remember, as a working PI, you often have to convince not just one person, but committees of people on a regular basis that what you do is worthwhile. A lot of that has to do with making people happy. A large part of "grantsmanship" is about "emotional manipulation", which has other euphemisms like "leadership" and "trust development" and "consensus building". The fact of the matter is, a lot of people as dinguses. Sometimes in order to get things done you have to making people like you, even when you hate them for one reason or another. Sometimes, getting something done is more important than getting your due "credit". Credit is a commodity that you use to trade for other things that are potentially more important. It's rarely an end in and of itself. It's almost NEVER the only worthwhile goal in life. You live in a community and you have to think about how to appropriately make everyone else around you to be on your side. I know this sounds like blaming the victim, but unless you are 1) talented enough to starting a movement to change the system 2) skilled/intelligent enough that people would recognize your ability without consideration of these interpersonal factors, you need to learn to play the game.

I would also consider asking other trusted more senior mentors for advice.

 

[cocomos]

Unfortunately as an undergrad you have no "credit" in general. He may or may not be a bully, but whether you can successfully "manage up" scenarios like this will be critical in your future career development. You job working in a lab is to make your boss like you, not to "get credit" for anything at your level. It's very possible a bad letter would "destroy your chance" of getting into the program of your choice, but there's no recourse, because the system is set up this way due to the competitive nature as such.

I can guarantee you that this will happen OVER and OVER and OVER again in your scientific career, where attribution of proper credit is "unfair", or if you feel paranoid about your boss. If you don't have the grit to handle it at your stage, I suggest you exit and go into an "easier" career instead.

Two possible coping strategies:

1) I would take whatever people say at face value, because at your level, nobody really cares about what you do or where you end up. The likelihood of a famous scientist retaliating against an undergrad for something as garden variety in science as "credit" dispute is very low. Not sending in a letter would be odd. There's no reason to feel paranoid because your position in his lab is not significant enough for him to want to harm you.

There are notable exceptions to this: 1. if you have some kind of truly embarrassing knowledge, conduct violation, sexual harassment, etc. 2. if you made some huge discovery/invention that could have huge financial or scientific impact. In these cases, I would suggest you seek legal advisory. But I'm not getting the impression that this is what you are talking about. You just feel that he's treated you badly. He probably treats everyone badly. You would need to give him enough of an incentive to go out of his way to destroy you. The fact that you don't know about this suggests your "theory of mind" has some room for improvement.

2) There are more complicated managing up maneuvers, such as asking a third person as a mediator. Such a person is usually someone he trusts, and they can causally talk about you and the more honest opinion would then come back to you. Another option is to change strategies and actually attempt to make him TRUST you and share his genuine feelings. This may or may not work, and you'll have to take a risk. This may not seem "fair", and this person could be the biggest psychopath narcissist ever (and there are many who are big in science), but your ability to handle him and people like him, and even to manipulate him to your advantage, is a *critical* skill. This may be too much office politics than you can handle. In that case you can just ignore it.

Remember, as a working PI, you often have to convince not just one person, but committees of people on a regular basis that what you do is worthwhile. A lot of that has to do with making people happy. A large part of "grantsmanship" is about "emotional manipulation", which has other euphemisms like "leadership" and "trust development" and "consensus building". The fact of the matter is, a lot of people as dinguses. Sometimes in order to get things done you have to making people like you, even when you hate them for one reason or another. Sometimes, getting something done is more important than getting your due "credit". Credit is a commodity that you use to trade for other things that are potentially more important. It's rarely an end in and of itself. It's almost NEVER the only worthwhile goal in life. You live in a community and you have to think about how to appropriately make everyone else around you to be on your side. I know this sounds like blaming the victim, but unless you are 1) talented enough to starting a movement to change the system 2) skilled/intelligent enough that people would recognize your ability without consideration of these interpersonal factors, you need to learn to play the game.

I would also consider asking other trusted more senior mentors for advice.

Thank you for your feedback. However, I must honestly say your response is negative and uneducated as you did not completely read my post carefully. Moreover, you do not understand the situation exactly and the assumptions you make have no basis of confirmation and even not relevant as my first posts would never suggest it.

Firstly, I am a graduate student, not an undergrad (that was implied in my first post). Everything I have done in his lab is my work. Most of the work we have done is verifying my theories experimentally. Unfortunately, he won't be able to publish without me as he does not understand my work. He has asked for several drafts, I have written them, and he sent one of the drafts I wrote to a former graduate student he had with my name deleted from the draft yet it is all my work. Since I am friends with the former student and he recognized it was my project he called me to let me know. My PI even once attempted to present my work only with utter failure (this was another time that sparked his jealousy). There was a time he valued my brilliance and wrote raving words in scholarship recommendations for me; it would seem he no longer does. I understand students hardly get shafted out of credit these days, but it still happens and it is happening to me.

Secondly, I have already mentioned that I treated the situation as you should to any workplace bully *stated above*. My fear is someone who is in a powerful position would abuse that power against me. He is known to do that in the past.

Thirdly, you assume that I have not made an attempt or am not able to "play the game". I only post here as a last resort because I know there are some admissions officers on these forums that may actually give a helpful response to my situation. I have sought help from the other professors I have worked and built rapport with at this institution. They all recognized my problem and acted in my favor. However, since this man is powerful he threatened their futures as well. For instance, he is on the tenure committee for two of the professors who support me and threatened they will not reach tenure.

Fourth, I have asked many other senior mentors, as mentioned in my first post. They suggested it is jealousy and for me to continue my work and let him be jealous. Yet, my PI attacks me even though I continue to bring him success. Even in the first post I made, I spoke as if we were a team still because that is what I want. It is okay for someone to be jealous but not to hurt them due to that jealousy.

Since you did not provide any unbiased and non-presumptive help, yet you are expected to be a mature individual as I see you are an attending physician, and because a known MD/PhD admissions officer, Fencer, agrees with your hasty generalizations and insults, I consider this matter closed and request no further advice. I am saddened by this because I was looking for sincere responses, even if it be criticizing and skeptical (like GalaxyKnot's response), and help on this matter as I feel helpless to his power. This may be a hasty assumption that I am making, but you two may be no different than my narcissistic PI.

I also want to say that if I was an undergrad, most of those things would be out of my control anyways so it is wrong to attack an undergrad who may not be socially or emotionally mature to handle matters as these. Just because people have a PhD or an MD for that matter does not make them immediately the most credible or trustworthy person. However, I do want to state that I believe in the system and I truly believe that MD admissions committees do their best to choose applicants who are understanding of all kinds of people in various situations from many different demographic/socioeconomic histories so that those honored with helping the lives of others are truly the most empathetic and logical there is.

 

[mdphd777]

Firstly, I am a graduate student, not an undergrad (that was implied in my first post). Everything I have done in his lab is my work. Most of the work we have done is verifying my theories experimentally.

Unfortunately, as either an undergrad or a grad student, your work in someone's lab is NEVER your work (only). The main credit almost always belongs to your boss. Your boss has the final say in authorship decisions. If this work ends up winning a Nobel prize, it's highly likely that you will not be a co-awardee. Sharing of credit typically does not occur until late PhD into postdoc. Fighting your boss w.r.t. authorship is considered in general very bad etiquette.

You have very little recourse in this scenario at this point. Authorship discussions, unless very clear from the outset, should occur prior to the paper being written. That said, it's not impossible to alter late in the game (pre-submission or even post-submission), but this invariably requires "campaigning". There are lots of very advanced maneuvers in authorship disputes (which are bread and butter, by the way), all of which invariably involve very complicated interpersonal strategies with people who are parallel or higher to your boss in seniority. You've communicated so far that you are smart and victimized and your boss is dumb and nasty. It may be the reality, and if it is, your options are limited.

Secondly, I have already mentioned that I treated the situation as you should to any workplace bully *stated above*. My fear is someone who is in a powerful position would abuse that power against me. He is known to do that in the past.

There is no uniform way with which one might be able to deal with "any" workplace bully. One might say interventions for workplace bullying requires "Precision Medicine." You can always fight him, but this will likely, though not inevitably, result in the end of your scientific career, at least in your current field. Things that are much worse than what you describe (i.e. frank sexual harassment, outright fraud and violation in salary agreements) happen all the time in academia...you can hire a lawyer. You can go to the dean. It often may not help. Many successful scientists have been psychologically damaged by the at times toxic environment. I'm just giving you what it is.

For instance, he is on the tenure committee for two of the professors who support me and threatened they will not reach tenure.

It's HIGHLY unlikely that he would try to retaliate you through acting adversely against someone on their tenure review. No need to be paranoid there.

Fourth, I have asked many other senior mentors, as mentioned in my first post. They suggested it is jealousy and for me to continue my work and let him be jealous. Yet, my PI attacks me even though I continue to bring him success. Even in the first post I made, I spoke as if we were a team still because that is what I want. It is okay for someone to be jealous but not to hurt them due to that jealousy.

This happens all the time. You have a bad boss. He may be jealous. You can either try to manipulate him to become less bad, leave, fight him (via lawyer or some other procedural mechanism), or do nothing and continue to be unhappy, or try to change your own mental state. You can do a combination of the above. I have NO DOUBT in my mind that there are a ton of dinguses, and your boss may be one of them, but this doesn't change the fact that you have to live and grow to deal with them. I'm not sure why you think of this reality as "biased" or "presumptuous".

 

[Go4Doc]

Sounds like a ****ty situation and I sympathize with you, I truly do. I hope it works out for the best. That being said, if you manage to get into an interview [never a guarantee], I'd be very careful to avoid throwing around language like "he's jealous of me", "I bring him success", and "my brilliance" if you're asked about this. Furthermore, some of the scenarios you offered up seem highly extreme (e.g., tenure) and sound paranoid. Even if you're completely correct on all accounts, this argument comes off as arrogant, paranoid, and egocentric, personality types that most med schools are trying to avoid nowadays. You also came off as fairly condescending by expressing your "disappointment" in an attending physician who took time out of his busy schedule to try and offer you some sincere advice. Could it have been a little gentler in phrasing? Yes, but this is an anonymous forum so you should expect brutal honesty. Also, you're applying to an MD/PhD program from graduate school so you're in the minority of students who post in this forum. Please try to understand how he might have come to that assumption.

Best of luck with the process.

 

[LLLC]

.

 

[mdphd777]

the situation cocomos is in is quite rare in the scientific field...

It's not that rare. And even if it is rare, I don't see how that affects the validity of my opinion, which is that your PI has the final say in authorship. Is it sometimes unethical and sometimes very unfair? Sure. What tools do you have affect the outcome? You can influence him. You can ask his peer or superior to influence him. You can complain to the dean. You can sue him. You can even get a gun and shoot him--workplace violence, which, sadly, happens with some alarming frequency with this kind of thing in science. I'm just telling you that the latter options almost never work, even when there's gross injustice. You can of course try these options and see where that takes you, but just be aware of the concomitant risks.

Your posts reek of a jaded scientist who was personally affected by unfair situations and is trying to project his world view onto other people. Maybe you worked in some s***ty institution where this is the norm, this is not and shouldn't be.

Now THAT's presumptuous. Unfortunately if you've worked in science as long as I have you will realize that the jaded scientist prototype is more common than you think. In fact, it's difficult to not be jaded no matter where you work. I don't think I am personally more jaded than the average working scientist. Obviously my opinion is just one opinion. Feel free to not listen to me or do what I tell you to do. Yes. This is a throwaway account, but that's a separate issue.