Supervisory feedback: Supervisors’ reasons for not giving timely feedback

ABSTRACT

Timely insightful feedback during the supervision process is crucial to completing a dissertation and acquiring sustainable research skills. Insightful feedback from research supervisors can significantly improve the quality of the dissertation. This study was focused on finding out factors that hinder timely feedback during the supervision process. This study adopted the exploratory case study research design. A qualitative methodology was used. The study participants were 66 research supervisors in the Social Sciences from two universities in Cameroon. A semi-structured interview guide was used to collect data. The qualitative data collected was analysed thematically. The study found that late feedback during the supervision process is due to heavy workload, poor quality of the dissertation, lack of engagement with the supervisory feedback, late submissions by students, the disparity in research interest, lack of reward and recognition. Implications are given to ensure timely feedback during the supervision process.

KEYWORDS:

• Supervisory feedback
• research supervision
• doctoral supervision
• supervisors’ perspectives

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Informed consent statement

Informed consent was obtained from all subjects involved in the study.

Data availability statement

Not available due to ethical considerations.

Additional information

Funding

This research was not funded

Notes on contributors

Marinette Bahtilla

Marinette Bahtilla is a Doctoral Researcher in the Faculty of Education, Department of Educational Leadership and Management, Southwest University, Chongqing, China. She holds an M.Ed. degree in Curriculum Studies and Teaching from the University of Buea, Cameroon. Her research interest includes; the internationalisation of higher education, research development, leadership and management, teacher education, supervisors’ development, educational policy, curriculum development, and implementation.