Table of Contents

• Table of Contents
• Communications
  • English as the language of science
  • Timeliness and Candor
  • Meetings
  • Collaborations
• Working from home
• Professional conduct
• Vacation policy
• Leaving the group

Communications

English as the language of science

English is the language of international science and the language that is expected in all office conversations. You may use other languages for social interactions, but not for scientific discussions. It is to your benefit to practice conversing in English, whatever your comfort level is.

Timeliness and Candor

The two basic principles of communications is timeliness and candor.

Timeliness refers to how early that you communicate potential issues to your advisor, lab mates and collaborators. Here, it is always better to err on the side of being too early than too late. This is key to managing expectations. For instance, if you are having personal problems that would result in loss of productivity, your advisor would prefer a quick email so that he can make the necessary adjustments to cut you some slack as well as guide you to potential solutions. I assure you that it is much better to disclose such things early. There is no need to disclose deep personal details if you are not comfortable doing so.

Candor means that you should always be honest in your communications and feedback. Being polite works in social interactions but it does nothing for scientific rigor. I subscribe to radical honesty - everyone, including your advisor, lab mates, collaborators, etc., would very much prefer you say exactly what you think of the ideas, directions and quality of the work as soon as possible (related to timeliness).

Meetings

Meetings are a necessary component of effective communications. That said, badly run meetings that go on forever should be avoided at all costs. In the MAVRL, we believe in a high meeting tempo - very regular short meetings, as opposed to infrequently held long ones. Again, this is related to timeliness.

As a group member, you can expect, barring special circumstances (e.g., travel, exams, etc.), to have an opportunity to meet with your advisor at least once a week. Here is a general overview of how meetings are done in our group:

• Subgroup meetings are held once a week. They are as short as they need to be. You are not expected to have updates every subgroup meeting, but this is probably the most important forum to get regular feedback on your research from your advisor and fellow lab mates.
• Group meetings are held once a week. Their purpose are three-fold: (i) to discuss group-wide issues (e.g., computing, infrastructure, morale, etc.); (ii) to practice your presentation skills to a wider audience that might not be intimately familiar with the details of your research, and (iii) to seek feedback on your research and cross-pollinate ideas.
• Collaborator meetings that involve your advisor should be held either biweekly or monthly depending on project tempo. For subgroups that relates to a specific project, these will substitute for the subgroup meeting for that given week. Nevertheless, you should make it a habit to have regular off-line communications with your collaborators, e.g., a simple exchange of email once a week to exchange brief updates on what each of you is doing and what you can do to help each other (data exchange, etc.).
• 1-on-1 meetings to discuss your overall progress will be held every quarter. You can also request ad-hoc meetings as needed if there are things you need to discuss urgently (see timeliness in the preceding section).

Collaborations

The goal of collaboration is simple: to achieve research that is greater than the sum of the individual contributors. If this goal cannot be achieved, the collaboration is worthless. A successful collaboration requires three key ingredients:

1. A common problem of interest to all parties
2. Complementary expertise
3. Regular communications (see Collaborator Meetings in the preceding section).

We do not collaborate if we are not interested in a problem, if we do not have the right expertise to contribute to its solution, or if we do not require any expertise not available in our group. If we decide to collaborate, we do it right - find the best collaborators and communicate effectively.

Note that a collaboration that is just a simple sum of the individual components is not considered an effective one. For example, if an experimental group asks us for a calculation and all you do is to just perform the requested calculation without deeper thought, that is a non-value-added collaboration. Our group has no interest in being simply a computational drone for another group - your advisor does not care even if that collaboration is one that potentially generates a high impact factor paper. We care about doing great science and generating original ideas. Take the effort to understand the research problem and provide the most insightful solution possible (within reasonable resource constraints). The best type of collaboration is when the collaborator and us provides each other with insights that generate new directions for exploration.

Working from home

Important Note: The current WFH policies have been suspended for now due to the Covid 19 crisis. Here are the guidelines until further notice:

• Unless otherwise stated, all group and subgroup meetings will be held via Zoom.
• Scheduling regular discussions among yourselves via Zoom is encouraged. Ad hoc discussions will take place via Slack as always.
• Nevertheless, if there are meetings requiring in-person presence (e.g., meeting with funders, collaborators, etc.), you should still turn up. But please take all necessary precautions (e.g., masks, social distancing, etc.). This will be very rare (if ever).

Though we are a computational group, and I understand the desire to work from home from time to time, please note that you are expected to be in office during typical office hours most of the time. A major part of research is being present for discussions with your adviser and group members, which may take place on an ad-hoc basis.

Professional conduct

Doing a PhD is not just about research, but also about becoming a professional. That means professional standards of conduct applies. This means punctuality, properly managing the expectations of your adviser and colleagues, and delivering on your promises. If in doubt, consider what is acceptable in an future office environment with colleagues and bosses.

Vacation policy

• All graduate students have officially two weeks of vacation per year, excluding US public holidays. However, our group is extremely flexible with regards to this and outcomes are given a higher priority.
• The first thing you need to do is the submit a request for vacation (even if it is for a day) to your adviser. Do not make any travel arrangements before approval has been given.
• You are not expected to work while on vacation.
• However, if you will be away for an extended period (e.g., for visa applications, etc.) exceeding reasonable vacation limits, you are expected to work while you are away. Under those circumstances, no excuses are accepted for work not being done. Examples of unacceptable excuses are a poor internet connection, jet lag, personal/social commitments, etc. The professional gets the job done, regardless of circumstances.
• Upon vacation approval, you should enter the period that you are away in the MAVRL group calendar. This is so that the group can arrange to handle some of your responsibilities if needed.

Leaving the group

• An exit interview will be conducted when you leave the group. You will have the opportunity to share your private thoughts on your experience in the group as well as providing suggestions for further improvement.
• The Morale Manager will set up a farewell dinner or social event. This should be set up close to the actual date of departure.
• Please note that we cannot authorize the removal of MAVRL-purchased equipment, including laptops. This is not because of the cost of the laptops, but rather it is an accounting requirement imposed by UCSD (think of your laptop as the equivalent of an XRD machine for an experimental lab). As for data, there are no problems bringing all data you have generated with you, e.g., by copying the data to a personal hard drive, subject to the understanding that Shyue Ping expects unfinished work to be completed even after you leave the group and that no data that is generated during the time within the group is published without his expressed permission. As for accounts, we are happy to continue to provide access to computing resources, Dropbox, etc. for a period of up to one year after you leave if it is required for the completion of unfinished work. This can be arranged on a case-by-case basis. All Resource Managers (DB, Data, Computing, Software, etc.) are responsible for ensuring the user lists in their respective resources are up to date.
• The Web Manager should update the group web page to move the person to the alumni section.