Changes in doctoral education: Implications for supervisors in developing early career researchers

The purpose of this paper is to identify the implications of recent changes in doctoral education for supervisors who are developing early career researchers in terms of the need to develop their professionality.

This conceptual paper seeks to establish an historical benchmark in terms of the Von Humboldt model of doctoral education and the associated master‐apprentice model of supervision. It then sets out the key changes of the past three decades and summarises what is described as the post‐Humboldian doctorate. These changes are then related to the knowledge and skills needed for successful supervisory practice and to the professionality of research supervisors.

The paper demonstrates that the shift to the post‐Humboldtian doctorate has radically expanded the knowledge, understanding, and skills required by supervisors to successfully develop early career researchers and that these can be arrayed on a continuum represented by indicative characteristics of “restricted” to “extended” professionality as applied to supervisors.

The implications are that professional development programmes for supervisors developing early career researchers need to be reviewed in the light of how far they can support participants to make the full range of adjustments necessary to develop their own professionality as supervisors.

The paper is the first to apply the notion of professionality – and its “restricted”‐“extended” range – to the doctoral supervisory role.