Bentivegna, V. et al
Fourth year graduate student Virinder Singh was excited to find a new email from his supervisor in his inbox last Friday at 11:13 PM. Responding to a three-month-old request for feedback on a first draft, his supervisor had sent the following message:
K.
Sent from my iPhone
“I was having a drink when I checked my phone and noticed a new email,” Singh says. “I immediately rushed back into the office to start getting back to work. It was then that I realized that Prof McNally had forgotten to include the attachment.”
Singh’s supervisor, Dr. Alistair McNally is known for his open door policy: students can come to him anytime with questions. The door to his office is always open. He, however, is never there.
Dr. Jena Li, a postdoc in Dr. McNally’s group, seemed disgruntled: “Good for Virinder, I hope he’s able to finish that paper. I’ve been waiting more than a year for a reply to an email asking for a meeting. I’m not even sure Dr. McNally knows I exist!”
When asked for a statement, Dr. McNally replied “K.”
