Exploring postgraduate supervision practices with supervisors is a complex and contested endeavour. The growing body of literature on approaches to working with supervisors attests to this. Unlike some areas of higher education research, studies of supervision span theoretical spectrums from liberal approaches (e.g. Ballard and Clanchy 1991; Bruce and Brameld 1999; Ryan and Zuber-Skerritt 1999; Wisker et al. 2003) to post-modernist, post-colonial and psychoanalytic interpretations (e.g. Frow 1988; Giblett 1992; Grant 2003, 2008; Manathunga 2005, 2007a,b; McCormack and Pamphilon 2004). However, as Rowland (2003) has argued, there is very little engagement and contestation across theoretical boundaries within the higher education field. In this article, the author responds to Firth and Martens' (2008) critique of post-liberal approaches to supervision. She explains the design and intent of the post-liberal approaches and clarifies some apparent misunderstandings of her work in Firth and Martens' (2008) article.