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Month: March 2020

Nathan

Catastrophising

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One day in January, around 5pm, I noticed our house was getting cold.

I checked, and realised the boiler wasn’t on. I tried a few things and realised it wouldn’t come on. I called our boiler service people, they talked me through a few checks and realised there was nothing I could do: someone would have to come and see it.

“OK, we aim to get someone out within 24 hours; we’ll be in touch as soon as possible,” said the helpful person on the phone. This was around 5:30pm.

I started imagining…

Well. 24 hours. So the house is going to be cold all night. No showers. OK, kettles to fill a shallow bath. Hot drinks. Where’s our electric heaters? Hot water bottles for bedtime. Blankets, get all the blankets out. OK. OK… Don’t panic. It might not be fixed tomorrow. So what do we do? Stay with mum? Stay with sister? Maybe. OK. What about work? Nevermind work, what about money? The central heating is broke, BROKE, the boiler won’t fire… How much is a new boiler? How long will it take?? How long will I be paying for it on the credit card???

Ring-ring. It’s now 6pm. “Hi, this is the boiler guy! I should be with you by 7!”

So he’ll be here soon. But it’s going to be expensive. Well. OK, seriously, don’t panic. Don’t panic. Disrupted evening, late night, but I’m not out tomorrow. We’ll be fine, we can do this. We always find a way to make it work… But I suppose I’d best pack things up in the office, as the boiler is in there, and when they have to replace the boiler I’ll need to work somewhere else for at least a few days I think-

Knock-knock. It’s now 6:45pm. “Let’s take a look… Oh, did this happen? … Right, and let’s try this… OK, there’s the problem! All done! No problem, bye!”

It’s 7:10pm. All sorted. No fuss, no headache, no drama and no more cold as the radiators start pumping out heat again.

Sometimes, something goes wrong and before you know it, you’re imagining the outcome is going to be awful. It can feel impossible to put the brakes on the runaway train of catastrophes that lurch ahead in your brain. If you don’t know what the problem is, all you have are questions. If you don’t know the exact answer, all you can do sometimes is imagine it’s the worst possible option.

In your viva, it’s entirely possible that your examiners won’t like something, or won’t agree with you, or aren’t sure about a choice you’ve made. It’s natural for there to be typos, or paragraphs that don’t communicate what you want, or ideas that can be challenged. And none of them are necessarily catastrophic: in some cases, you won’t know what’s motivating the questions or resistance or different opinion. And in the absence of that information, your brain instantly jumps to catastrophe.

So: ask questions to get answers.

If your examiners say they found mistakes, don’t worry straight away: ask them where and ask them why. If they don’t agree with something, ask them why, so you know what you need to respond to. If they aren’t sure about something, ask what they would need to be convinced. You may need to do nothing to resolve the situation.

As with my boiler “catastrophe” you might realise there is nothing you can do but wait, listen and try not to obsess.

Nathan

Totals

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How many days did you show up and do the work during your PhD?

How many papers did you read?

How many questions did you ask yourself or others?

How many times were you called on to respond to a question?

How many times did you present something?

How many times did you sit down at a keyboard to write your thesis?

How many people have told you something you did was good?

A few of these questions will have exact answers; others, might have ballpark responses you could guess. But all together, the totals tell you – and others – that you are ready for your viva when it comes. You have done the work, you have what it takes, you are ready.

And if you need to, you have time to increase those totals: keep showing up, keep sharing your work, keep asking questions, keep responding.

Keep going.

Nathan

What Have You Forgotten?

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I believe it’s worth reflecting on this a little before the viva.

What have you forgotten?

Perhaps you can’t know for sure. You’ve had to edit out papers, ideas and references that didn’t fit. You forgot them, to concentrate on what mattered.

Perhaps there are details that elude you sometimes; if so, what can you do make them more memorable or to summarise them?

Perhaps you view the question as an almost-irrelevance, a nonsense. How could you remember what you’ve forgotten?

I think it’s useful to remember that however much you have forgotten, accidentally or so you could focus, there must be so much more that you remember by the end of your PhD. You have a lot of knowledge, which doesn’t mean simply knowing more: you know more of what you need.

What have you forgotten? What do you remember? What do you know?

Nathan

Values & Valuable

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Different people value different things.

Whether or not a job, a house, a partner, a research idea or anything else is suitable or good to you will depend on what you see as valuable. For your thesis then, there are two useful sets of questions to consider.

First, what do you value in your field? What is it that you think is “good” or “useful”? What topics or ideas do you think are better? Consequently, how do you see your thesis as being valuable? What contribution does it make? Why does that align with your idea of what you value?

Second, what might others value in your field? What might they then see as being valuable in your thesis? What ideas are people looking for? What contributions have you seen others value recently, at conferences or in papers?

Different sets of values might still find common valuable features in your research. Perhaps by considering what others find interesting, useful or significant, you could find a new perspective on your research.

Nathan

Every Single Question

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Every single question in the viva comes as a result of your research and your thesis. While you can’t predict every question, nor know a perfect response for every one, you do have everything you need to be able to respond.

Every single question in the viva is being asked for a reason. It might not be immediately clear to you what that reason is.

Every single question in the viva is going to be asked by one of your examiners, or by you. You can’t know what questions your examiners will have, but you might have ideas. Prepare for your examiners’ questions by rehearsing with a mock viva or in conversation with friends. Don’t create model answers, instead build experience of responding to questions. You can know what questions you would like to ask your examiners; think about this topic in advance, write a list of questions you’d like to ask.

Every single question in the viva is NOT every single question you could possibly be asked about your thesis and your research. Rather than focus on trying to anticipate every single question, focus on being knowledgeable, confident and prepared for the questions as they come.

Nathan

False Hopes

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Don’t hope for a short viva. Don’t hope for no corrections. Don’t hope that your examiners “go easy on you”.

Don’t hope they tell you the outcome at the start. Don’t hope they have no comments. Don’t hope you won’t be worried or nervous.

Hope is a powerful thing, but you can do so much more than hope when it comes to your viva.

For some of the points above, you have no control at all: so why focus on them when there are things you can do something about? Better to put your efforts where they might do something. You can do a lot more than hope you won’t be nervous: you can act to work on what makes you nervous, and act to boost your confidence and offset anxieties.

Don’t hope for things you can’t control. Do more than hope for things that you can. Put your focus on more than hope.

Nathan

17% Uncomfortable

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That’s my prediction for your viva.

You know your research, you wrote your thesis, you’ve prepared for the day. You’re reasonably confident, not arrogant, slight flutter of nerves because it’s important. There’s a few moments of worry – you don’t know what your examiners think, what they’re going to ask, if you’ll go blank on something or not – but you can probably feel pretty comfortable with the situation.

I would hope that you feel only a little uncomfortable, just a little, because when you think rationally you know why and how you’ve got this far. 17% uncomfortable means that you’re doing well.

And if you’re feeling more uncomfortable than that, what are you going to do about it? Who are you going to ask for help? What actions are you going to take?

Nathan

The Least I Can Do

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There are lots of things that could get in the way of preparing.

You’re busy or you’re bothered, you feel stressed or worried…

What’s the smallest meaningful thing you could do? Even if you’re busy or something’s getting in the way, what could you do that would take five minutes and make a difference? Two minutes? One minute?

Why not…

  • Read a page of your thesis.
  • Add a bookmark.
  • Stick a Post-it in your journal saying what you need to do next when you get a moment.
  • Write down a question that occurs to you.
  • Summarise your contribution, even if you’ve done it many times before.
  • Google your examiners and save their staff pages for later.
  • Pencil in half an hour in your diary for when you will do some prep.
  • Download “The tiny book of viva prep” to print and fold later!
  • Print and fold “The tiny book of viva prep”! 😉

Viva preparation takes time; usually thirty minutes to an hour at a time is good for considered thinking or work. But little things add up too. If you find yourself short on time, short on patience, short on confidence, just ask yourself, “What’s the least I could do?”

What small thing could you do, even if it takes only a moment, that would make a difference overall?

Nathan

Celebrate Your Thesis

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I love World Book Day! Not the costumes and dressing-up, but the sheer love of books.

It’s… a celebration of authors, illustrators, books and (most importantly) it’s a celebration of reading.

I don’t remember a time when I couldn’t read, when I didn’t read for fun, for learning, for joy, for the thrill of it. Books are fantastic.

A PhD thesis is fantastic too, but, like the viva, I wonder if they tend to get dragged down a bit. Lots of questions about writing up and so on tend to be negatively tuned in tone, or get a less than positive response from the person being asked.

That would be nice to turn that around, don’t you think? We can’t dismiss the hard work, the long hours, the difficult effort that goes into a thesis, but we can do more to recognise that a thesis is amazing.

So this World Book Day, if you have a thesis and want to celebrate:

  • Tell others what’s so great about it!
  • Write summaries in preparation for your viva!
  • Explore what makes it great – which is what your examiners will be looking for too!

If your friend has their viva or submission coming up, help them to celebrate their thesis:

  • Ask them about it! Not “How’s it going?” but “What makes it special?!”
  • Ask to know more: go for coffee and ask for more details.
  • Celebrate when it is finished!

Books are fantastic. A thesis is fantastic. To write one, you’ve got to be fantastic too.

Nathan

Not Ideal

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There’s so much about your viva that might not be exactly how you want it to be.

You find typos or a clunky paragraph after submission.

You’re busy and struggle to find preparation time.

Your first choice examiner can’t do it.

You feel more nervous than you want to be.

You worry there’s something missing in your thesis.

You worry you should have done more.

Worry and mistakes and missed opportunities are all not ideal. But the best thing to do is ask, “What can I do?”

Then act. Do something. Don’t diminish how you feel, or just stress about would be better: work to get closer. Work to do something that helps.

So underline your typos or pencil in a correction.

Make a plan for your prep and do what you can.

Learn about your examiner’s research.

Ask yourself why you feel nervous and work on the root cause.

Examine whether there’s really something missing, not just a worry.

Ask why you didn’t do more – probably, because you were doing something else in your thesis!

If something’s not ideal, you can feel disappointed or cross or upset.

But then act. What can you do?

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