Postdoctoral Supervisors’ Expectations of the Knowledge, Skills, and Attributes Required for and Developed During Postdoctoral Training

Postdoctoral fellows report experiencing misalignment between their expectations and their experiences in postdoctoral training. Little research explores their experiences with less still attempting to identify advisors’ expectations of postdoctoral fellows. This research aims to describe the knowledge, skills, and attributes (KSA) advisors/principal investigators expect when postdoctoral fellows begin and the expectations for developing postdoc KSA during the fellowship. Qualitative semi-structured interviews with postdoctoral advisors provide data about the hiring, starting, and development expectations advisors have for postdocs. Axial coding with KSA and abductive analysis identify advisors’ KSA expectations. Postdoctoral advisors describe hiring requirements and development expectations that do not clearly align. This misalignment starts postdocs and advisors in a new relationship with already misaligned expectations. Clarified language in hiring requirements and development expectations can help advisors and postdocs begin the fellowship with better-aligned expectations. The research reported here provides language to advisors and postdocs to assist and guide KSA expectations.