Host A Mini-Viva

Message a friend with a viva coming up and offer to host a mini-viva for them over Zoom or Skype to give them some practice. There’s full instructions at this resource link for how you might use one of 7776 sets of questions, but simply – use the questions, have a little structure, listen, give your friend space to think and respond and extend discussions as you see fit.

To save a little time, here are two mini-viva question sets you could use, if you wanted to call someone up today and help them!

First Set:

• Where did your research ideas come from?
• What did you learn about doing research?
• How did your supervisor help shape your research?
• What questions would you like to ask your examiners?
• What are you taking away from your PhD?

Second Set:

• Why did you want to pursue your research?
• Where did you find support in the existing research for your methods?
• What are the core papers that have guided you?
• How would you summarise your main results?
• What do you hope others will take away from your thesis?

I often tell candidates there are plenty of people around them who can offer support; switch that up, be one of the people offering support. And if you need more mini-vivas to help more friends and don’t have dice to hand, here are four more from a previous post.