I know of a research group in the UK where the Principal Investigator makes his PhD students and postdocs work on far more projects than they are supposedly funded for. If they refuse to do it, he terminates their studentship/contract. Isn't that dodgy/illegal? If a postdoc position, for example, is funded to do one particular project, can the PI legally squeeze in two or more projects in that slot?

My Sup treates her postdocs as RAs - in that they do some admin for her and work on bits and bobs from different projects, but are primarily responsible for 1. As a PhD student, she never gets me to do anything unless she pays me as an 'associate consultant' or if its related to my PhD - but for my PhD I am technically working on about 5 projects at the same time.

I wouldn't have thought its dodgy or illegal to ask a post doc to work on more than one - assuming they will get some form of publication and a range of skills from each of the projects its probably quite a good thing. Terminating their contracts a bit harsh though, unless they are underperforming

Hi Sneaks, yes that's the thing. If someone is asked to work on, say 3 projects, when they are realistically meant to be have adequate time for only 1 project, he/she is bound to under-perform, isn't it? And then the PI can take that as an excuse to get rid of them. That's why I said it sounds dodgy.

As a matter of fact, postdocs receive fixed-terms contracts to do specific projects. So isn't it illegal to ask them to do more than that?