“People should know there is always someone who listens to them” - Interview with the Persons of Trust at D-BSSE

I am talking today to the four Persons of Trust at the D-BSSE: Selen Manioglu, Olivier Belli, Roland Diggelmann and Maaike Welling. They are members of the Scientific Staff Association VMB. I would like you to briefly introduce yourself, and please also tell us how and why you became a ‘person of trust’, and besides your personal motivation, what does this role entail?

Olivier: I am a 3rd year PhD student in the Platt group. I joined this Person of Trust (PoT) group in the very beginning of this initiative. I had joined the department when the 2018 AVETH survey was published, indicating that the PhD students at D-BSSE were the most unhappy about their working conditions across ETH Zurich. This was an interesting time to start and at the VMB we decided to better structure the existing informal counselling team and to also integrate it in the larger framework of the AVETH (Association of Scientific Staff at ETH) team, which is available to everyone across ETH Zurich. So, it was very interesting to build up this team from the ground, and to participate in the process of creating a better work environment and culture at D-BSSE.

Selen: I also joined the VMB right after the announcement of the 2018 survey results. At that time, VMB was gaining more momentum, trying to be more active on resolving supervision-related problems and working towards a better community spirit at D-BSSE. They were recruiting people for different positions, and PoT was one of them. So, I became a VMB member as a PoT, and later I worked in different positions within the VMB as well. But I thought: the role of the PoT is closely concerned with the conflicts and the problems that my colleagues could encounter. Therefore, it has a more direct involvement with the process of resolving these conflicts. And that’s why I became a PoT!

Maaike: I am a Postdoc in the Khammash lab. I have been at the D-BSSE for a few years now. Like Selen, I have been involved in the VMB for quite some time, so I have seen what happened prior to this 2018 survey and what happened after. One of the reasons why I became a PoT is that I realised that some people come and talk to me already. Also, previous experience from my own PhD which was at a different institution is useful for providing some perspective or help to people who come and talk to us. One of the biggest motivation for me is to let people know that they are not alone: they should know there are always people who listen to them.

Roland: I joined the PoT group about a year ago, right after my PhD defence. I did my PhD in the department, so I have been here for quite a long time. This is one of the reasons I figured I would be a good PoT because I know a lot of people in different labs and have a large network. I have seen a lot of very good things happening here, but I have also seen several problems arising throughout these years. So, my motivation was to bring my own experience into this team.

Who should get in touch with you, in which situation, and why?

Selen: Our counselling team is actually a part of the VMB, and the VMB is the association which represents the PhDs, Postdocs and Senior Scientists at D-BSSE. Clearly, anybody who belongs to one of these groups can get in touch with us. Also, two years ago we extended our scope to the Master students at D-BSSE, so they are also invited to approach us. For which situation: this is quite broad, and we would like to emphasise that situations can be quite different. You can get in touch with us if you have doubts about some regulations, or you have some supervision conflicts, something that is related to work ethics that you have some questions about. In general, we encourage people to approach us also for minor issues, not only for some serious harassment issue, which is also in our scope of function. We think it is better not to wait for issues to escalate. Come to us even if you have a simple question, things that are not clear in your mind, you can get in touch with us. Also, consulting to the PoT is one of the earliest levels on the escalation chain for the conflict resolution. And, we are PhDs and Postdocs who were once master students, so this makes us relate to the different types of conflicts or problems more easily than other levels of the escalation chain. That is another reason why students should approach us if they would like to.

How do people contact you? And: what happens AFTER people contacted you?

Olivier: Our favourite interaction is via the proton-mail. We have a mail address which is separate from the ETH mail servers. You can shoot us an email there, and all four of us have access to it. For sensitive issues we encourage you not to use your work email, you can simply create an anonymous email address for this particular situation if you want to stay anonymous, we completely respect that. Your anonymity is our highest priority across the whole process if that is your choice. After contacting us, the first step would be to have a meeting together: you can choose to meet with all of us or only with one of us. Obviously, we are not professional councillors, so if we feel it is necessary, we can also guide you to more appropriate services here at ETH Zurich. Our main role in general, is to transform specific issues into propositions that we submit to the leadership. I feel like this is what we have been the most successful at so far: to be a force of proposition for the leadership in order to solve existing issues and to make sure they do not happen again thanks to new regulations. Once again: We will maintain anonymity at each stage of the process. One last thing I wanted to touch on is that many times people contact us not because they want help but they want us to be aware of a specific issue; they tell us not to take any step right now but to be aware of a specific issue, so we keep our eyes open if this happens again in the future. It is always very useful for us to keep track of what is going on at the department in order to act early.

We have seen in the poll that there are quite a few different types of worries troubling members at the department. Especially during the pandemic years, with what types of issues were the VMB Persons of Trust dealing mostly; and what was the advice you gave?

Maaike: During 2020 but also the years before, most people contacted us because they had some type of problem with their PI; this could be a personal problem specific for that person but it could also be something that concerns several people in that research group. What we try to do is to break up the particular issue into pieces and see if there are underlying core problems. Then we will discuss with the person that contacted us if we can formulate concrete ideas that could change the current situation to a better one. If the situation allows it, proposing these ideas to the person you have problems with would hopefully result in a better working relationship and atmosphere. Related to the corona-situation: yes, we have been contacted by people who have been suffering due to the current restrictions. Because we wanted to get some insight into how people are dealing with the current situation we conducted a survey last month which we sent around to all PhD students and Postdocs at the department. With this survey, we wanted to get a better idea on how the work situation could be improved; and we want to discuss potential improvements with the leadership. We are still analysing the results.

As we are still dealing with #longCovid: What are the tricks and tips you can give all of us?

Roland: During the first wave we looked at recommendations from bodies like the CDC in the United States or the NHS in the UK, and we put down a couple of points onto a flyer that we circulated around the department and uploaded to our website. Now, a couple of months later, we see that the recommendations on the flyer are still relevant. And, I noticed that the points I picked out as relevant for today reflect really well the answers ticked in the poll conducted right before this interview. The first tip I would give is: (1) Take care of your body: sleep enough, exercise, eat proper food, stick to the hand-washing and mask-wearing rules, stay healthy and safe. The second point is: (2) Keep in touch with your family and friends. Also, be open with your own feelings and share these with the people you can trust in; don’t become a hermit but share and be aware of your feelings. My third tip: (3) Use video chats, use them also in the private settings, use them as a tool to interact with people and keep a social life in these times where we have to be physically distant. Try to keep the cameras switched on whenever you can - maybe also during lab meetings - because seeing people’s faces and their expressions can make a big difference. After all we are social creatures. Finally: (4) Remember that you are not alone, we are all in this situation together! People who feel that their productivity is not as high as it should be or that they lost time over the last year and struggle to keep up, always remember: Everybody else in the whole world faces similar difficulties, don’t feel so bad about your own situation. Also, people who have a supervising role, remember: The people you are supervising may not be as productive in delivering results as they would be in a normal situation.

Many thanks to the four of you for the valuable support you offer to the members of the department!