Daily viva help for PhDs
The success you’ll find in your viva is cumulative. It’s built on top of everything you’ve done over the last few years.
It’s not an all or nothing, once-in-a-lifetime event. You’re there because of every little thing (and quite a few big things) that you’ve done well, got right and been amazing at over the course of your PhD.
Find your confidence for your viva in all of your other successes that have come before.
Early last year, I was sharing my Viva Survivor session to a dozen people in large room. It was a cold day outside but a warm room thanks to the heating. The session got off to a good start after introductions and sharing the outline, and I was moving on to the first topic.
I’d not been talking for long, when a tremendous noise started up from the windows at the far side of the room. Really loud, regular banging, like construction workers fixing scaffolding. After a minute we all realised it couldn’t be that, it was going on for too long. So we looked around outside for the cause of this terrible banging but couldn’t see anything. With nothing in sight and nothing to do we just tried to ignore it.
I presented for another hour before our break. The noise was still going. My voice was hoarse and all our ears were aching.
So I went to check and couldn’t see anything again. And it was only then that I realised that the noise sounded like it was coming from outside…
…but was actually coming from near the windows. From the radiator. A regular banging noise was vibrating outwards from the radiator, shaking the metal window frames.
And was silenced by turning a valve on the base of the radiator’s pipework. The room laughed and cheered! Then we all groaned as we saw how simple the solution had been; we could only have resolved it when we knew the real problem.
Keep this in mind for your viva: if your examiners have a criticism, or think there is a problem, make sure you know what it is before you start to respond. Ask questions to get more information or to find out their reasons. Sometimes you might know what to do. But other times you might need a little more to then simply turn the valve off at the base of their concerns.
The viva isn’t a one-way Q&A. Engage with your examiners to respond to all of their questions as well as you can.
It’s awards season. Great movies, shows, actors, directors, writers are all in competition. Five great people are up for this award, who will win?! Ten movies could all get that award – except, they can’t, only one can. Not just the best, but the best of the best.
Of course, PhD candidates don’t compete that way, not for their viva, not for their PhD, but language and mindset creep in.
You have to be better than good, better than great, you have to be perfect, you can’t make mistakes, you can’t go blank, you can’t slip up, you have to be better than anyone else!!!
To which I say, simply: no.
For the viva, for your PhD, you only have to be good. You have to be your best. Everything else is doubt and worry. We can’t sweep it away by saying “don’t worry.” You don’t have to focus on it either. Be your best. Be as good as you’ve become by the end of your PhD. Keep going.
And eventually, cross the stage and claim your prize.
You have no choice about having a viva or not. No real choice about who your examiners will be. No choice about how they feel or what questions they ask. No choice about how much time you’ll have after submission to prepare. You probably have no choice about how a question will feel when it’s asked.
But you can choose to submit your thesis. You can choose to think about potential examiners and give suggestions to your supervisor. You can choose to prepare, you can decide how you’ll spend your time. You can choose your mindset. However a question feels you can choose to answer as best as you possibly can.
You can choose to go to your viva as ready as you can be.
Make your choice.
If you feel good about your viva, ask yourself, “Why?”
If you feel nervous about your viva, ask yourself “Why?”
If you feel forgetful, ask yourself “Why?”
If you feel excited, ask yourself “Why?”
Different emotions seem good or bad when you think about your viva. In all cases, unpick them a little. However you feel, think about what you need to do next. You may not be in total control of how you feel, but you can do something. You might not need to change anything, but maybe you can add to how you feel.
Good and ready.
Nervous, but confident.
Forgetful, but prepared.
Excited and grounded.
So how do you feel? Why? How could you add to that in a positive way?
“What’s the best time of day to have your viva?” Some candidates want to know!
My answer always comes in two parts.
Part One: Anecdotal pros and cons. Vivas usually have to finish by 5pm at the latest, so a morning viva could be longer in principle than an afternoon viva. But you can start earlier and don’t have to be nervous all day. An afternoon viva could be shorter, but you have longer with butterflies in your stomach. There’s a trade-off maybe, but it’s purely anecdotal.
Part Two: The timing of your viva may not be within your control. A morning or afternoon viva has no special impact on the outcome of the viva. There are far more important things you can focus on. How will you prepare? What do you need to do? What is your contribution? How can you help yourself feel confident? Much more important questions for you to consider.
Look for answers to your questions about the viva – ask me, ask your supervisor, ask colleagues about their experiences – but don’t forget that some questions, answers and responses may be more useful than others.
Our washing machine broke a few months ago and blew a fuse. The power was off all around our house.
In the moment, I knew the sort of thing I needed to do in our fusebox, but couldn’t tell which fuse had gone. It took a little experimentation (and a call to my father-in-law) before I figured out what needed to be done. Ten minutes later the lights were back on.
You might know the sorts of things you need to do to get ready for the viva, but not which specific things will help you feel ready. You might know you need to do something, but not know the thing that will help you feel confident.
So pull some levers. Flick some switches. Press some buttons.
Try things: reading, annotating, presenting, rehearsing, priming, deciding on what you will wear… The list of things you could do to get ready for the viva is long. You don’t need to do everything, but if you press enough buttons you’ll figure out what helps you feel and be ready. Press enough buttons and you’ll feel confident for the viva.
Press enough buttons and the lights will come on.
This is the 1000th daily Viva Survivors blog post!
A friend said to me, “That’s crazy! What are you doing to celebrate?”
And I said, “….Erm…..”
Hmm. Nothing really.
That got me thinking about celebrating milestones in general. I remember when I submitted my thesis (both for the viva and for my final submisson) I was feeling great, but lots of friends were too busy to go out. They had their own theses to think about! The staff at my university’s admin building basically shrugged when I handed my thesis over to them.
Milestones, like submitting your thesis, passing your viva, doing your literature review, completing a project – making it to the end of a tough week! – should be acknowledged. They should be marked. They should be celebrated!
I’ve seen some good practice on Twitter of departments and graduate schools sending out virtual cheers when someone passes their viva. I’ve heard of stickers being given out from time to time. My favourite little celebration I heard of recently came from an Edinburgh PGR who told me she was given a lollipop for submitting.
That’s a very fancy lollipop!
Maybe your friends are busy, maybe admin staff will shrug, maybe you won’t get a fancy lollipop or shiny sticker…
So what are you going to do? Good work needs recognition. It helps reinforce you did it. You persevered. You got your PhD done. How will you celebrate? If celebrating doesn’t feel quite right, at least how will you mark it? Think about it and do something.
I decided to mark the 1000th Viva Survivors post with… this post! (And maybe some ice cream later!)
When I was a mathematician, some of my colleagues said maths research was like sculpture. A big block of stone was chipped away at until you had the art you were trying to make. You have to start with everything and keep working until you have the proof you wanted.
I was always fond of that analogy, and of the two philosophies that followed. One mathematician might say they were really creating the maths and results. Maths is an act of creation. Another mathematician would say the maths was already there, hidden, waiting to be revealed. In this way, maths is an act of discovery. I loved hearing different takes on this, and personally, when it comes to maths I’m on the side of discovery – the ideas are out there waiting to be found!
I’ve heard similar thoughts and feelings from people in other lines of research too. Often though, I notice people enthusiastically discussing this topic but missing something fundamental. Creation or discovery don’t happen by accident, only through work. Whether you create an equation or discover it, you do the work.
Whatever you have in your thesis, whatever kind of research you discuss in your viva, it only happens because you did it.
Who are your supporters for your PhD?
Your supervisors, I hope! Your friends and colleagues from your department, probably. Academics you’ve met at conferences who keep in touch. Internet-people on Twitter and other networks who are part of your community. Friends and family who help you stay grounded. Maybe they don’t get what you do, but they help in other ways.
There are lots of ways people provide support. It all helps. Remember to say thank you!
I’m very grateful for how people have supported Viva Survivors since it began, but in particular since I started the daily blog in 2017. In April the daily blog will have been going for three years, and in a few days I’ll hit the 1000 post milestone!
I’m very grateful for the many ways that people have supported this blog:
And in some cases, generously, by telling staff at their institutions about me, and helping me get hired to do viva prep sessions with PhD candidates. I meet nearly a thousand candidates a year that way.
Now there’s one more way you can support Viva Survivors. I’ve started a Ko-Fi page to give people – who want to – the opportunity to financially support the daily blog. Ko-Fi is a little like Patreon and other services; it’s a platform to connect people with supporters. Unlike other services though, Ko-Fi allows for one-off or regular support.
It takes a lot of time to write and publish a daily blog, but it also requires some money too. This blog and any resources will always be freely available: supporting with a £2 donation (one-off or regular) will help cover the running costs of the blog. As more and more people support the blog it could allow me time and resources to provide even more for free here. It could help me to reach more PhD candidates who need support themselves as they finish their PhD and prepare for their viva.
I’m exploring ways to say an extra thank you to supporters; to begin with, anyone who donates can access a free copy of my second ebook, The Viva: Who? What? How? after they’ve donated (details at the Ko-Fi page).
Thank you for reading this post. Thank you for reading my other posts, if you have. Thank you for subscribing – and if you’ve not subscribed to get my daily free posts in your inbox, you can do so here! Thank you for sharing my posts on Twitter and with friends. Thank you to those of you who say nice things about my writing or Viva Survivor sessions!
And if you are in a position to support the blog with a small donation, one-off or recurring, thank you. Thank you. You’re helping me to write more and do more and reach more PhD candidates looking for help with their vivas.
Thank you!