Behind every intervention: making the developmental story visible

The Next Generation Research SuperVision Project (RSVP) will shortly begin releasing new professional development interventions for doctoral supervisors. Between now and spring 2027, we will release more than 20 interventions under a Creative Commons licence for colleagues who support supervisor development across the sector to use and adapt.

They range from standalone workshops to extended cohort-based programmes – in every case, accompanied by all the materials needed to successfully implement them. This includes detailed Facilitator Manuals with step-by-step guidance, as well as slides and other supporting materials.

Each intervention will also include what we have called an Intervention Profile – a summary of why an intervention was developed, how it was piloted, what feedback emerged, and how the resource has evolved in response.

More than simple companion documents, these Intervention Profiles are designed to make visible the essential work that might otherwise remain hidden – the reflections, conversations, adaptations, and revisions that shaped the final materials.

Through RSVP, we’ve been afforded a unique opportunity by Research England to develop and pilot new supervisor development interventions at scale. It is that developmental story that each Intervention Profile is designed to capture.

Starting with evidence

We began designing our interventions two years ago by reflecting on questions about supervisory practice.

What challenges are supervisors facing? What aspects of supervision are most difficult to navigate? Where are the gaps in existing professional development provision? What opportunities exist to strengthen supervisory practice and research culture?

Those questions were informed by scholarship and the empirical work undertaken across the project, including supervisor focus groups, the UK Research Supervision Survey (UKRSS), and a review of supervisor development provision across the sector. We sought to ground all of our interventions in evidence about supervisors' experiences, needs and contexts.

Each Intervention Profile begins with a rationale that draws on this evidence base.

Before discussing delivery, feedback or outcomes, we felt it was important to explain why a particular intervention exists at all.

Learning through piloting

We knew that this evidence alone would not guarantee that a resource would work effectively across different institutional settings, and this is where our Practitioner Partners have been central.

Over the past year, RSVP interventions have been piloted across a wide range of universities, research environments and supervisory development programmes. Practitioners adapted materials, integrated them into existing provision, tested them with different audiences, and provided detailed reflections on what happened.

Importantly, the purpose of piloting was never simply to ask whether an intervention "worked".

Instead, we were interested in understanding how an intervention was experienced in different research cultures and contexts, what adaptations facilitators made, where tensions emerged, what participants valued, and what that could teach us about implementation. We wanted to learn how they could be made as inclusive as possible, considering the experiences of diverse participants across a wide range of different institutions.

The second section of each Intervention Profile therefore describes where and how an intervention was piloted. Rather than presenting pilot activity as a validation exercise, it acknowledges the diverse contexts in which the resource was explored and developed.

Taking feedback seriously

One of the most rewarding aspects of the piloting process has been the quality of feedback received from Practitioner Partners and participants. We have reviewed detailed feedback from more than 50 pilot sessions, and across the interventions, some common themes emerged.

Peer discussion consistently proved the most valued aspect of supervisory development. Facilitators highlighted the importance of balancing content with opportunities for reflection and conversation. Many interventions prompted thoughtful suggestions about timing, accessibility, disciplinary relevance and local adaptation.

Not all feedback pointed in the same direction, and that was often the point.

Sometimes different facilitators responded differently because they were working in genuinely different contexts. In those situations, the most useful response was not necessarily to standardise the intervention, but to recognise that variation and to document it.

The Intervention Profiles therefore summarise the key themes that emerged from piloting while resisting the temptation to overstate what the data can tell us. They are intended to support reflection and interpretation, rather than present definitive verdicts.

Revision as a reflective process

The final sections of each profile focus on what changed – the ways in which each intervention’s author responded to the piloting feedback.

In some cases, piloting led to straightforward revisions: refining materials, improving guidance, clarifying instructions, or revising timings. In other cases, the most important insight was that facilitators had adapted the intervention in productive but different ways. Rather than treating those variations as problems to eliminate, we treated them as evidence that thoughtful local adaptation is an important part of successful implementation.

This reflects a broader principle that has informed our work throughout this part of the project. Our aim has not been to create resources that will be replicated identically in every institution. Instead, we have sought to collaboratively develop evidence-informed interventions that are flexible and adaptable. So that our colleagues can use their knowledge of their institutions and supervisors to implement our materials as effectively as possible.

Capturing the developmental journey

We have tried, through these Intervention Profiles, to make our developmental process transparent. By capturing the relationship between evidence, design, piloting, feedback and revision. And by acknowledging the vital contribution of our Practitioner Partners.

When the first revised interventions are released this week, we hope the profiles help to tell that broader story – the developmental journey of collaboration and reflection that the RSVP team and our Practitioner Partners have undertaken over the last few years.

Ultimately, we hope that we have provided future users with information that can help them decide how a resource might be further adapted within their own context – so that RSVP can have a lasting impact on how doctoral supervisors are supported in the vital work they do.