Problems with PhD supervisor

[OpenToSuggestions]

Hey all.
This isn't my first thread on issues with my supervisor for my PhD. I am in the office 9-5 Mon-Fri, as agreed before I started it.
I am also a Sub Warden in an undergraduate hall and so have duties approximately 1/3 of the the time and when I am 'on duty' I have a mobile phone and keep an eye on the fire panel from 6pm-8am weekdays and 24 hours at weekends.

When I started my PhD my supervisor was a bit iffy about my being a Sub Warden. Once or twice in a year I have had a meeting and have left work early, but I have made up the hours and any training day courses (i.e. 3 days for first aid) I took out my own holiday allowance and today he was moaning about it.

Today my supervisor was telling me I need to leave the Sub Warden position soon as I should be focussing more on my PhD. Now I disagree. I am not the most social of people and spend a lot of time on my own, not out partying. I turned down a decent £25500 graduate job and there is no way my PhD stipend of £13000 per year would let me live the life I want, so I would have a part-time job on top. The Sub Warden position gives me free accomodation and so is worth a lot each month. Other people in my office have babies and/or young children and so can no longer stay much past 5pm. My supervisor is always late with his meetings and if he is coming over to the office at midday (he has two offices) then it will be more like 1.30pm and he will not have had lunch yet. Today he expected me to have another meeting with him at the end of the day. At 5.30pm he was in a meeting and had someone else to see (would be around 1 hour for this person) before me.

Am I well within my rights to tell him that I am doing the Sub Warden job and he needs to just accept it?
Am I being unreasonable?

 

[OpenToSuggestions]

My contract says I am not allowed to do more than (iirc) 10 hours per week work on top.
The thing is that this job is voluntary and requires around 6 hours per week I would say - Made up of meetings and calls out during the night when on duty. When on duty I would be in my flat and would be doing the same as I would anyway! A whole weekend on shift could get no call-outs at all.

As I am a first year PhD I do my 9-5 and would say I average 2 hours extra per week. I will put more work in when I have something of my own that I want to develop. I personally feel that if I choose to work in my own time that is my choice not his. When other PhD students have had children during their PhD I don't think he can say a lot about me needing to leave by 5:45 most days. Saying this job will interupt my progress is a bit of BS right now.

 

[OpenToSuggestions]

Perhaps they've had a negative experience with someone else.

He has had one Sub Warden PhD student before. They could have been amazing or completely useless but I have never met him so I don't really know!

I just feel what I do in my own time is my own business. I have a cooking lesson on a Monday evening that I go to most weeks and I do the Sub Warden job on top. I am not in any clubs and don't have many 'drinking' friends at University as I like to keep to myself.

Whilst my supervisor is being a pain on this issue, I refuse to break the number one rule of a PhD - Falling out with your supervisor.

 

[OpenToSuggestions]

Thanks for the posts so far .

I understand what you are saying D.P. but I have never known a PhD like yours! It sounds awful!

I think that my PhD will take up more and more of my time in the future, but as I am quite an anti-social person I spend a lot of time in my flat alone, to which I could be working. I feel being a Sub Warden really makes little difference. I am currently having a hard time mentally as the disability place on campus has put me forward to be tested for a form of Aspergers.

The issue here is not that after 5pm I think '**** it it is 5pm', it is more that my supervisor thinks it is OK to repeatedly fail to adhere to his own timekeeping. I will certainly start to do work out of office hows but what annoys me is that the supervisor seems to think that I am not allowed a life.

My supervisor seems to think my PhD is ahead of schedule, so either he is a fool (he isn't he is mostly a nice bloke and knows a lot about his subject) or I am genuinely doing OK.

Of course you are. Tell him to do one.

As I think I said in your last few threads on this, you badly need to grow a pair.

I have done, but he seems to bury it for a few months then dig it up again when he is in a bad mood.
I have recently split up with the girlfriend - Trust me, a bird takes much more of my time than the Sub Warden job ever has!
I am not saying a PhD doesn't require dedication and long hours, but I am allowed to choose how I spend my own time.

 

[OpenToSuggestions]

In the previous thread where someone was complaining about having to do work for the dept such as ordering equipment etc.. IIRC you described something like a 40 hour working week of doing work in your department while doing the PhD?
This would indicate that if you didn't have the workload from the dept you'd have at least 40 hours of free time in which you could quite easily fit in a part time job...

That person in the other thread was actually me .

Again, thanks for the time people have put into their replies . D.P. makes a PhD sound like 3-4 years of slavery!

 

[OpenToSuggestions]

I wouldn't have a black hole as I have the Sub Warden position, but the intention is to get a PhD not leave!

I am 9 months into my PhD and about to submit my first year report (it is supposed to be submitted 9 months in) and know my gap in knowledge but need a fair bit of guidance to find a solution! I am somewhat enjoying the PhD and will certainly up my hour-age in the near future. Over the summer I have nothing to do for the Sub Warden job, just free lodgings .