You Are Here

Tag: examiners

Nathan

Whys

Daily Post

My daughter will be four in the autumn. For some time now, “Why?” has been the most-uttered expression in and out of our house. Why is the sky blue, why did you say that, why are we having pasta for dinner, why can’t I go in the garden if it’s raining, why why why… It can make you a little crazy some time, but it’s how kids make sense of things.

For similar reasons, “why?” is also one of the most useful questions you can ask yourself before and during the viva. Come across something you don’t understand? Why? Is a sentence a bit vague in your thesis? Why? Question from your examiner not making sense? Why?

Even if your examiner disagrees with you, the best thing you can do to start discussing the topic with them is ask: why?

Nathan

Short

Daily Post

In a workshop a few weeks ago someone asked, “How can you keep the viva short?”

I took a long pause before answering. My answer: “Not much.”

You can answer questions well – providing the information or analysis requested, explaining things and so on – but that doesn’t mean that you will shorten the viva. I’ve heard stories from people who had short afternoon vivas and knew their external had a pre-booked train to catch. It’s all anecdotal though.

I missed a more important question in that session. I could have asked the person, “Why do you want to keep the viva short?” I wonder now what was at the root of their question. Vivas take as long as they take. They vary in length for a host of reasons.

There’s no need to rush: you can take the time you need to answer questions well. Many people tell me they feel their vivas took no time at all: my four hour viva went by in an eyeblink. It’s all anecdotal though!

My advice? Focus on being prepared, don’t worry about how long it will take. You can’t influence the length of the viva, but you can steer how well you will perform.

Nathan

The Fourth Option

Daily Post

I’ve heard there are three common responses to anxiety or fear: freeze, fight or flight. Now, my PhD is in pure maths, so I have no idea if that’s 100% right, but it got me thinking about stress over questions in the viva. If an examiner asks a tough question or makes an observation that isn’t in line with the way you think, you could:

  • Freeze: mind goes blank, no idea what to do, just hold still and hope that they move on.
  • Fight: go to war with them, take no prisoners, do everything to bring their arguments to their knees.
  • Flight: try to umm and ahh your way free, take evasive action and hope you get out.

Fortunately, there’s another option: Figure it out. Take a pause, think about what’s actually been said; ask some more questions if need be. Make sure you understand what your examiner has said. Ask them why. Get as much information as you can, and then try to resolve the situation.

No need to panic, battle or run. Just think.

Nathan

A Different Perspective

Daily Post

It would be great to know what your examiners think about your thesis. So awesome to know what questions they’re going to ask. Probably a relief to know what the viva is going to be exactly like.

But.

You can’t ask your examiners for help. You can’t know what questions they will ask. You can’t know how they will go about running the viva.

But.

You have a supervisor. You may have more than one. All of them have PhDs. They probably act as examiners too. So ask them questions.

Ask them what they do when they read a thesis. Ask them if there are any questions that they always have in mind. Ask them what they would want to know about your research.

You can’t know your examiners’ perspective in advance. But you can get your supervisors’ thoughts: not the same, but they’ll come from experience and will be valuable.

Nathan

Hierarchy of Worries

Daily Post

I record every question I get asked in workshops. The text document runs to over 15,000 words now. Over time I see trends and themes, and they help me to think about how I evolve the workshop.

In particular I see the worries of candidates collect in three groups:

  • First, people worry that there could be something wrong with their research;
  • Second, they worry that they may have made a mistake in the write-up;
  • Third, they worry that they may not be able to answer a question from their examiners.

I get lots of questions related to all these areas, and I think they’re arranged in a hierarchy. I think people are more worried about the second kind of worries than they are the first; I think they’re more worried about the third kind than the second. It makes a certain kind of sense. Research takes a long time to mature – you know everything you’ve done, everything you thought of doing, you learned from so many mistakes and successes. You know your research. Writing up took less time – however much you know about your research, there’s a chance that you’ve made a significant typo or forgotten something. You may have expressed something in a clumsy way. It’s not all that likely.

Whatever you did in your research and write-up though, you have no way of knowing exactly what your examiners will ask. There are lots of common questions, but your viva is a custom exam: you can’t predict every question or how you might respond.

Three common groups of worries, but some are more worrying than others. What do you do?

  • Worried that something is wrong with your research? Map out your methods. Check the core literature. Test your assumptions again. Try to explain it to someone who doesn’t know that much.
  • Worried that you’ve slipped up somewhere in your thesis? Get more feedback. Read it closely, line by line, no skimming. Ask a friend to proofread. Read it aloud to check that it makes sense.
  • Worried about your examiners’ questions? Practise answering questions. Have a mock viva. Use a list of common viva questions and record your answers. Get friends to ask you any and every question about your research.

Feeling worried? That’s OK. Work your way past the worries.

Nathan

Experts

Daily Post

When I first got interested about the viva someone told me, “People hopefully pick an internal who they like, and hopefully pick an external that is an expert in their field.” I’m not sure that’s the best advice for picking examiners, but it’s a starting point for today.

It could certainly help to have an expert for an examiner: then you would feel confident that they would understand the implications of what you have done without needing to spell it out again.

But suppose they know it all too well? Suppose they understand it better than you? Suppose they can appreciate problems that you haven’t? Suppose, suppose, suppose…

Don’t forget: by the time you submit your thesis you are an expert. No-one else has done what you’ve done. No-one else has your lived-in experience of doing your PhD. Maybe it takes an expert to examine an expert?

Nathan

Spoilers

Daily Post

For years I’ve avoided spoilers. I remember racing home with the final three Harry Potter books on the days they were released, turning my phone off and reading until they were done – partly because I was desperate to know what happened, but also because I didn’t want anyone else to spoil them for me.

Spoiler Alert! A small number of vivas start with examiners telling the candidate that they’ve passed. Some examiners do it to reassure the candidate. Examiners who declare a pass at the start have good intentions, but universities would prefer examiners didn’t do it. It begs the question, “Is this an exam or not?”

After I’ve shared this possibility in workshops – usually because someone has said, “A friend of a friend was told they’d passed…” – I have to add that it’s not that likely and if it were your viva you would never know until it happens. You could spend all the time on the run up to the viva thinking, “Will they tell me at the start? Will they tell me at the start?” Is that helpful? I don’t think so.

You can’t control what your examiners will do in the viva or at the start.

Spoiler Alert! You can control what you do and how well you can be prepared.

Nathan

Wrong

Daily Post

There’s always a chance you’ve missed something. Not a typo, not a passage that needs editing, but something wrong. Maybe something that is a problem.

It’s a very small chance though. Long odds.

There’s a greater chance that your examiners THINK there is something wrong, or that you’ve not acknowledged something they feel is really important. They might be right, but it’s not a good idea to just accept what they say, or for you to put your head down and insist that you are right.

Instead: ask them why. Why do they think you’ve made a mistake? What are their reasons? What’s their thinking? Because you know your thinking. Once you have both pictures, you can start to see what the reality might be. What sounds like a mountain-high hurdle could be a tiny speed bump. After thinking and talking it through, it may not even be a problem.

There’s a chance that you’re wrong, but given how far you’ve come, it’s much more likely that you’re right or know the way to right. Show your examiners.

Nathan

A Good Choice

Daily Post

In most institutions PhD candidates can talk to their supervisors and discuss possible examiners. There may be hundreds of names that could fill the roles. What makes for a good choice? Who do you pick? How do you pick?

I like creative thinking tools. There’s a lot of them, and many approaches aimed at finding a creative solution to a problem propose divergent thinking – trying to find as many ideas as possible – followed by convergent thinking – using tools to narrow down possibilities to the most suitable choices.

Some questions to open up the space of possible examiners:
Who have you cited?
Who have you met at conferences?
Who has particular interest in the kind of research you’ve done?
Who has a reputation for being excellent?

Some questions to narrow the field:
Who is just an absolute no? (for whatever reason)
Whose name would be a useful reference?
Whose work have you criticised?
Whose work do you find particularly influential?

These questions can be useful, but I think you first need to have some idea of good examiner qualities. The overall question is far more personalised than people usually take it: instead of “what qualities should you want in a good examiner?” the question needs to be “what qualities do I want in my examiner?”

Nathan

Examiners Aren’t

Daily Post

They’re not monsters. They’re not cyborgs from the future programmed to irrevocably alter your timeline. They’ve not got a list of 101 unfair questions. They’ve not been looking through your thesis with an eye for problems and mistakes.

They’re not ninjas.

Your examiners are experienced. They’re professional. They’re interested. They’ve done the work to be prepared for your viva. You can too.

1 … 10 11 12