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Tag: unique not unknown

Nathan

Defining The Unknown Viva

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Every viva is an unknown until someone experiences it – but that doesn’t mean that the viva itself is completely unknowable.

  • Your university has regulations that govern how vivas proceed. This leaves a lot of blanks for individual vivas but lays out formally what’s expected of examiners, candidates and others involved.
  • Stories of vivas past create a body of general experiences that show patterns and trends of vivas. Viva lengths, key questions, structure, flow, tone and more – there are no guarantees but a definite sense of what’s appropriate.
  • The stories of PhD graduates from your department can help shape your expectations of the common practices for vivas in your discipline. For example, in my department it was very common for candidates to be asked to give presentations to start the viva.

Taken together these can all give you something to expect about your unknown viva: you can’t know for certain exactly what will happen, but given the possibilities you can know that you will be ready for it.

Nathan

Fear Of The Unknown

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There are two steps to removing fear or worry about unknown aspects of the viva.

The first step is to try to accept that your viva will be an unknown in some ways until you experience it. You won’t know how long it is, you won’t know what questions will be asked and you don’t know how you’ll feel until you’re there.

The second step is to build up a reasonable sense of the general expectations before you get to the viva. Read your university’s regulations, learn about other viva experiences and ask your colleagues about their recent experiences. These different aspects can fill in many of the blanks you might have.

You can have a good sense of what happens at vivas. This is a massive help both practically and emotionally, even if you can’t know the exact details of your viva until it’s your time.

Nathan

Not Ideal

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There’s no such thing as a perfect viva. You can be very happy on the day of course, but at the time or afterwards you might feel like you want something else:

  • A different examiner;
  • An opening question that hits differently;
  • A shorter viva;
  • More time to talk about more stuff!
  • Another break;
  • A different date so you can prepare more.

However much time you think you need and whatever circumstances you want, at some point your viva happens. There will be some examiners, it will start and then it will go on until it’s done. You can steer some of these things but you can’t control them. Some of the details of the viva will be totally beyond your control or influence and they might even be not to your preference.

 

So what can you do? Work on and for the things you can control or influence.

  • You might want different examiners, but you can be ready for the ones you have;
  • You can prepare to respond to whatever question they start with;
  • You can find out what to reasonably expect from your viva;
  • You can rehearse to engage with the discussion however long it becomes!
  • You can always ask for whatever breaks you need;
  • And you can, if you really need to, make an honest request to change your viva date if there are extenuating circumstances.

But you probably don’t need more time to prepare – you just need to recognise what you can do to respond well to the situation, however it presents itself.

There is no perfect viva – but then you don’t need idealised circumstances in order to succeed.

Nathan

Other Vivas

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Every viva is unique. Every viva is similar and different to every other viva. Vivas follow patterns. Vivas are not mysterious but you don’t know what will happen until you get there. Expectations are not guarantees.

Hearing about someone else’s experience at the viva can help you to understand what yours might be like. Learning about what happens generally can help put some parameters on what you can reasonably expect for your own.

But finding out that a friend didn’t enjoy their viva doesn’t mean that you won’t enjoy yours. Discovering that a group of friends all had long vivas might set some expectations with you, but doesn’t provide guarantees.

Finding out about other vivas is useful but only part of the process of getting ready. Read the regulations, ask your friends and colleagues about what happened and then use that information to help you as you prepare.

Your viva will be the same as many others and also different from every other viva. You can still be ready to meet your examiners and succeed on the day.

Nathan

Preparing For The Unknown

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Your examiners will have a plan for what they want to talk about at your viva.

This isn’t a script. They’re not asking a set list of questions like a questionnaire. They’re using pre-prepared questions and points to prompt the discussion.

You might have some expectations. Based on past experiences of talking about your work or because of your research you might think, “I’ll probably be asked about…” or “I’ll bet they want to talk about…”

It’s reasonable to have hopes or expectations, but you still won’t know until you get to your viva and it’s happening. There’s lots you can do to be prepared for the unknown though:

  • Talk to friends about their experiences.
  • Talk to your supervisors about viva expectations.
  • Reflect on your contribution to think about what examiners might want to talk about.
  • Read your thesis to remind yourself of what you’ve done.
  • Practise for the viva by talking about your work or having a mock viva.

You won’t know what questions will be asked until you get to your viva, but doing any of the above will help you feel a little more ready for whatever questions your examiners do ask.

Nathan

Expect The Expected

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Every viva is unique but no viva should be a great unknown.

Regulations and stories of viva experiences give a shape to the general process; departmental and disciplinary practices give some fine detail to specific viva norms. Taken together these give a general pattern of expectations: you can’t know exactly what will happen, but you can imagine something that the viva will tend towards.

Every viva is different, so you can expect the unexpected – a unique experience – but you can also expect your viva to be like others you’ve heard about in your preparations. You won’t know which details will follow the pattern exactly, or how closely, but unless your situation is very different from every other PhD candidate you can expect your viva to be similar to many past stories.

Every viva is unique but you can expect yours to follow expectations.

Nathan

Most Vivas

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Most vivas are not too long. They regularly result in minor corrections. They most often have two examiners, with a possibility for an independent chair as well. The great majority of vivas result in success.

Remember all this, but also remember that your viva will be unique. Your research, your contribution and you are all unique elements to your viva experience.

As you prepare, take time to reflect on what your viva will likely have in common with every other viva. Be sure to focus on what makes your contribution and journey unique too.

Nathan

Gingerbread Houses

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My wife and daughter love decorating gingerbread houses at this time of year.

Sometimes they’ll work on two houses at the same time, one each. Their houses will be the same structurally with walls and roof baked from the same moulds. They’ll each take their own icing, sweets and chocolates to make their house look special.

A long time ago I made a present for someone at Christmas-time, by taking a gingerbread mould and making the walls out of chocolate. It looked good, but the walls were so thick I felt sorry for their teeth afterwards…

 

All of which makes me think of vivas of course! Vivas follow patterns, the same way that gingerbread houses follow the moulds they’re baked in.

The dough in a gingerbread mix might be more or less well-combined than is typical. An ingredient might be over-represented in sometime or lacking entirely. Gingerbread houses follow patterns in the same way that vivas do. They can also vary wildly based on how people engage with them – or decorate them!

And sometimes they can follow the same pattern but be very different because the ingredients are different, like the chocolate house I made.

Patterns and common expectations still create different experiences. Your viva will be unique, but not unknown.

It’s not hard to get a good sense of what to expect – and expect that your viva will be one of a kind.

My chocolate house from long ago, plus my wife's far better house from that year! A light gingerbread house decorated with white icing and smarties roof, next to a dark chocolate house made from the same mould, decorated barely with white icing, smarties and a stacked cookie chimney
My chocolate house from long ago, plus my wife’s far better house from that year!
Nathan

Terrifying Tales Of Vivas Past!

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How many scary movies have come to cinemas in the last few weeks? How many horror shows have just been released on various streaming services?

Around viva time you’ll notice something about the stories people tell too.

They remember a friend of a friend had a rough time. Maybe it was the wrong examiner for them.

Or that person – what’s-their-name? – whose viva was all day!

And who can forget the story of So-and-so… The year before you started your PhD they failed theirs!

 

Some vivas are tough or especially difficult: there are real tales of bad viva experiences out there, but the vast majority are positive.

Most vivas result in success and most of those successes are vivas that are two or three hours in length, involving deep discussion and resulting in minor corrections.

Around viva time rumours and half-truths swirl about, like ghosts on a Halloween fog conjured from a spooky cauldron – but inspect them just a little, ask some specific questions from people you can trust and you’ll see that that’s not what all vivas are like.

In fact, terrifying tales are the rare exception rather than the typical situation.

Nathan

Anti-Expectations

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There are lots of key viva expectations, based around the typical length, the structure, tone and overall (high!) pass rate.

There are also anti-expectations that are much more particular to individuals: beliefs and expectations that, despite the general picture, something will go wrong this time, for them. Hardworking, capable candidates can come to believe that…

  • …they won’t pass, despite what everyone says.
  • …examiners are not going to be fair, they’ll just look for problems and mistakes.
  • …they just can’t be ready in time for the viva.

With viva anti-expectations, worries are jumped on and magnified. Details from one viva story are generalised. Anxieties blossom through misunderstanding and become something difficult to be shifted.

 

Of course, every viva is unique. It would be ridiculous to claim that every viva is free from problems. But the overwhelming evidence from the stories presented and the available understanding of the general situation is that vivas are fair, examiners are reasonable and prepared, vivas are structured and they can be prepared for.

If you hold any anti-expectations, then look for the evidence that supports them. Is it convincing? Is there even evidence for what you’re expecting?

Or is it better to explore the general expectations of the viva that you can use to get ready?

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