You Are Here

Tag: challenge

Nathan

The Next Time

Daily Post

Frame your viva as the next challenge of your PhD.

It might even be the last challenge of your PhD. It’s certainly not the first. You’ve overcome many others to get this far.

Remind yourself of the challenges that you’ve passed. What made them difficult? What did you do to get past them? Exploring a difficult situation might initially remind you of stress but steer yourself to focus on the positives: look for evidence of your talent and effort to help drive a growing confidence.

While your viva could be last challenge of your PhD it won’t be your last challenge ever. As you finish your PhD journey consider what you’re taking with you. What can you apply from your PhD to all of your future challenges? How much better will you be for this process?

 

PS: if you’re looking for help as you get ready for this challenge then check out Viva Survivor, my upcoming live webinar on Wednesday 25th June. I have delivered this session to PhD candidates all around the UK at the request of doctoral colleges, but this is only the third time I’ve opened up registration. Viva Survivor is a 3-hour live webinar, you receive a catch-up recording and follow-up materials all about the viva, viva prep and getting ready. Do take a look and see if it could help you! 

Nathan

The Important Tasks

Daily Post

When someone asks me about the most important viva prep task that they need to do, I offer a lot of encouragement and I ask  a few questions.

The truest response for a lot of questions about the viva begins with “It depends…” because there are always lots of factors.

Viva prep helps someone get ready for the particular challenge of the viva. In general, it’s important to plan first to reduce stress as you prepare. It’s important to have a clear idea of your thesis and the contribution. It’s important to annotate your thesis but also important to create summaries to help you think. And it’s really important to feel confident about being in the viva – so it’s important to make time for rehearsal.

By asking someone questions I might be able to give some more specific suggestions to them. I can tailor all of the general points above to the person: everyone needs to rehearse, but a mock viva might not be the best choice for someone. Annotation is key but everyone has different needs for a well-annotated thesis.

While a lot depends on the unique situation and individual, every PhD candidate benefits from remembering that the most important tasks are the ones that have lead up to submission. Every candidate creates a unique body of work, a unique thesis and a unique set of circumstance that leads to their viva. But no candidate gets that far without overcoming challenges, learning a lot and doing a lot.

The important tasks of viva prep help someone be ready for the particular challenges of the viva. The important tasks of the PhD journey help someone be ready for facing difficult challenges in general.

Nathan

These Interesting Times

Daily Post

On March 16th 2020 I wrote Interesting Times, an extra post that marked when things started to change in the UK because of the pandemic. Things had been changing for weeks but lots of little changes became very big, very quickly.

And then things kept changing.

And changing.

And changing…

These five years have been a lot, right? That’s not to say that life is all doom and gloom. There’s good news everywhere. It can be hard to see sometimes, but there are people who want to help.

 

As I think back, I think about how my life was changing then and how it has changed since. At the time I thought, I’ll be doing webinars for a few months probably, and that became five years and forevermore by the looks of it!

Outside of my own situation I think about the people I meet at webinars now and the people I imagine who are reading these words.

I think of them and you, dear reader, because you have lived through interesting, difficult and upsetting times. You have been challenged not only by the work you do but by the conditions you do that work in. You have managed to keep going on your PhD journey in very difficult circumstances.

When your viva comes you’ll have to prepare but you can be sure that the challenge you’ll find there will be smaller than the challenge of what you’ve been through in the 2020s so far.

Dear reader, in short, keep going. Help others. Work to make things better if you’re able.

And thank you for reading.

Nathan

Important Past Dates

Daily Post

A companion post to these thoughts from November 2024!

The first day of your PhD: it was a long time ago and you’ve come a long way since then.

Your first supervisory meeting: whatever your relationship over the course of your PhD, you’ve grown as a result of your supervisor.

The first new thing that clicked: do you remember the moment when you made a significant connection?

Your biggest setback: what happened and what did you do as a result?

When you finished your first draft of your first chapter: how did it feel to get it done?

The final problem: why was it a problem? How did you solve it?

Looking back over all of these, whether you remember exact dates or not, the important thing is that you have grown. You were good at the start of your PhD and you have become more.

Viva prep involves relatively simple work like reading and making notes. The more difficult work is to reflect on your journey, what happened, what it means and why it makes you exactly right for the challenge you’ll face at your viva.

Nathan

And Then What?

Daily Post

It’s not unusual to feel that the viva is a bit of an anticlimax.

It takes a lot to submit a thesis. It takes work to prepare for a viva. There’s a lot of anticipation and a lot of feelings-

-and then it’s over.

Two, three or four hours. They could be tough. They could be a nice chat. The viva could feel long or short. The questions could be a natural part of a conversation or feel like a challenging exercise.

But your viva will be over before you know it. You’ll most likely succeed.

Then what?

 

It’s one day. A few hours of one day. One challenge after years of challenges.

Get the viva in the right perspective. Find out what other people experience so you know what you can reasonably expect. Plan to do something to celebrate so that even if the viva makes you say, “…was that it?!” you still have something to look forward to.

Nathan

One Day, Not Day One

Daily Post

The viva is a single day when you have to rise to the occasion – but not the first day of the journey that you’re on.

Your viva could be difficult. You can expect to be challenged, but that challenge – discussing your research, your thesis and your ability as a researcher with your examiners – is not the first challenge of your PhD.

It’s not the tenth or even the hundredth.

The viva is one day you have to meet a challenge and succeed. By that day you have a lot of experience of doing just that.

Nathan

Things The Viva Isn’t

Daily Post

It’s not a quiz.

You need to know a lot, of course, but you’re not expected to have rapid recall or a photographic memory of your research and your thesis.

It’s not an interview.

You might choose to dress smart, but you’ve not applied for a position. The focus and purpose of the viva are radically different.

It’s not a game.

The people involved have roles but aren’t players. There are rules to be followed but there aren’t moves to make or best strategies to employ.

It’s not a question and answer session.

There are going to be lots of questions but the structure and flow is not simply question and answer, question and answer.

 

The viva is an exam.

The viva is a discussion.

The viva is a challenge, but one you can prepare for.

The viva is one more day to demonstrate your capability as a researcher.

Nathan

Easy or Hard?

Daily Post

Questions in the viva do not fall neatly into one of two piles.

Easy and hard are relative terms that don’t help to describe the questions that prompt the kind of discussion found in the viva.

An easy question for one candidate could be very hard for another.

An easy-to-ask question could have a very hard-to-formulate response.

A hard question could have been considered many times before by a candidate, while an easy question has no certain response.

Best to get away from labels of easy and hard completely.

Questions in the viva can be challenging or not. In either case, they are there to drive the discussion. They’re asked with an expectation of a response from the candidate. You can’t predict what questions you will be asked before your viva, but you can prepare yourself to respond to whatever question your examiners bring to you.

Nathan

Easy Mode

Daily Post

I enjoy playing video games where I can alter the setting to “easy” and feel powerful. I can advance through the story, feel present and connected to the world of the game (as enemies don’t knock me down every two minutes) and I can really have fun.

Unlike a video game, you can’t simply alter the difficulty setting of your viva.

The nature of what you’re there to do, not knowing exactly what questions you might be asked, feeling nervous – all of these can layer to create a challenging environment.

I also enjoy playing video games where you can’t alter the difficulty. There is no easy mode, you have to persevere. You explore the systems and scenario, get a feel for the challenge. Try different tactics and find ways to play to your strengths. The game remains challenging, but also seems easier, due to the practice I’ve had.

This is more analogous to the PhD journey and the challenge of the viva. You can’t alter the difficulty, you have to raise yourself up to meet each challenge. Learn more to do more, do more to know more. Find your strengths, use them well and you make it through.

The final challenge is still a challenge, but it’s not all or nothing: you continue to show what you know and what you can do, and you succeed.

There’s no easy mode for the viva – and you don’t need one anyway.

Nathan

Level Up

Daily Post

In some video games you defeat monsters or complete tasks and gain quantifiable experience that helps you to level up: over time you gain points to invest in making your character better. Stronger abilities, new equipment and perhaps completely new skillsets.

A webinar participant suggested to me that this was like the viva:

After much toil and many obstacles you have reached the hallowed halls of your destiny. You are the mighty wielder of the legendary Sword of Thesis! Only you can overcome the Terrifying Twin Dragons of Examination!!

For obvious reasons, I like the idea, but also I think the reality of the PhD presents something different to this fantasy viva micro-world. By the time you reach the viva, you – the brave hero – have levelled up so many times, and overcome so many great challenges, that the difficulties you face in the viva are not so terrible.

The Twin Dragons really aren’t so scary at all actually.

Questions can be managed. Fears can be resolved. You’re no longer a mere mortal.

There’s challenge for you in the viva, but your experience helps you overcome it.

1 2