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Nathan

1 Page, 3 Questions, 30 Minutes

Daily Post

A thirty-minute thought-gathering task for viva prep!

Take a single sheet of paper, divide it into three parts and write the following questions, one in each part:

  • Why did you want to do your research?
  • How did you do it?
  • What was the result of all your work?

Then reflect and capture your thoughts for each of these questions. Why did you want to do this? How did you do it? What was the result?

Thirty minutes of thinking and writing won’t give you every single detail of years of research and the many pages in your thesis.

Thirty minutes of work will give you a good overview of what you work means, how you got it done and why it’s a valuable contribution to your discipline.

Nathan

Breathing Room

Daily Post

Give yourself space to breathe before, during and after your viva.

Take time off before and after to rest; take time to think while you’re in discussion with your examiners.

Rest is an essential part of being able to work well. A pause in the viva helps you respond to questions.

At all stages give yourself the space to work well.

Nathan

Remove Obstacles

Daily Post

Viva prep can be challenging. To remove friction from the process, find ways to remove obstacles that get in the way. For example:

  • Gather the resources you need before you start.
  • Plan how you will do the work.
  • Ask for help in advance.
  • Find somewhere to work that suits you.
  • Make a good, relaxed space for yourself.
  • Tell people to give you space if you live with others!

These thoughts are off the top of my head. Viva prep is personal: consider your situation and what you might need. Whatever it is, think about how you could achieve a good, quiet, relaxed environment to prepare in. Then take steps to make that a reality.

Viva prep can be challenging to do – so do what you can before you start to remove obstacles from the process.

Nathan

Imagine Your Success

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What will it be like to hear your examiners congratulate you?

What do you think your friends and family will say?

How do you want to celebrate passing your viva?

It helps to imagine what success might be like. You can use it to make future plans and motivate your viva preparation. Looking ahead can build your confidence up too. If you can dream it, maybe you can make it real.

 

What corrections do you think you might get?

How long are you given to complete minor corrections at your university?

How busy might you be during the likely correction period?

It helps to think about the likely practicalities of viva success! Most candidates are asked to complete minor corrections, so it’s probable that you will have to do that too. Looking ahead can help you to think about the weeks after your viva realistically.

 

Imagine your success, both the happy realities of passing your viva and the practical nature of finishing your PhD.

Nathan

Fortunate vs Lucky

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Being fortunate means working hard and that hard work paying off.

Being lucky means that you didn’t need to apply yourself for the success you’ve found.

Being fortunate is achieving something through your labour.

Being lucky is getting something through a lottery.

As you get to your viva, be careful of the words you use to describe your progress.

Were you lucky to get this far or are you fortunate to have found the results you have?

Nathan

The Wrong Thing

Daily Post

There’s a chance that you could do something wrong in relation to your viva.

  • You could say the wrong thing in response to a question.
  • You could believe the wrong thing about what to expect.
  • You could remember the wrong thing about an examiner.
  • You could do the wrong thing to prepare.
  • You could think the wrong thing about yourself and your ability.

Any of these are possible. So what can you do?

You could rehearse to get more practice at responding to questions and more generally prepare. You could learn about what to expect of the viva process and have a conversation with your supervisors about your examiners. You could take your time to prepare and be ready. You could reflect on your journey to be sure of who you are and what you can do.

All of these steps could help guard against doing the wrong thing.

Realistically though, if you did something wrong, how negative could that be for you?

For all the little things that could go wrong you’re much more likely to be doing the right thing at your viva.

Nathan

Serious And…

Daily Post

The viva is an exam. It’s a relatively short exam to explore years of work and the specific outputs of that work. The examiners are accomplished academics in relevant fields.

While every viva is different there are regulations and enough known experiences to inform a reasonable set of expectations for a candidate. Vivas are challenging discussions.

Three or more years of work plus many hours of deliberate preparation. Candidates might be expected to succeed but that doesn’t mean the viva is not difficult.

So the viva is serious.

And it can also be fun. It could be short. It could be rewarding. It could be exhausting! It could be an anticlimax. It could be fine. It could be disappointing. It could be fairly informal.

What do you expect from your viva? What do you hope for?

Nathan

How You Find Confidence

Daily Post

You have to look for it.

If you want to feel confident for your viva it’s not enough to hope that you will feel good on the day. You have to do something before then to feel confident.

Reflecting on your PhD journey is a good start. Remembering and reminding yourself of the successes you’ve made and the growth in your knowledge and capability.

Highlight your particular achievements. Make a list and write about why these things matter and help you to feel good.

Explore viva expectations to get a sense of what happens in vivas. Consider how suitable you are to thrive in that situation: talking about yourself and the work you have done.

Decide on specific actions to take in the days leading up to your viva to feel better. What can you do to prompt confident feelings? What can you do to remind yourself of the many successes you’ve had?

It’s not enough to hope you feel confident. You have to search for and find confidence.

Nathan

Multipliers for Viva Readiness

Daily Post

There are many tasks and activities that help someone get ready for their viva. Reading the thesis, rehearsing with a mock viva and so on – the practical stuff that helps.

Alongside what you might need to do, consider how you get it done. How you do something has an impact on your effectiveness, and consequently on your readiness for the viva. All of the following help, for example:

  • Rest helps you to relax and helps you to think.
  • Time to do the work well.
  • A plan to help you feel organised.
  • A quiet, calm space to do the work.
  • Understanding the process of the viva.
  • Time to reflect and think.

It’s unlikely that every aspect of the viva prep work you do and the way you do it will be within your control. Consider how you can start with good intentions and work towards being ready for your viva.

Nathan

The The

Daily Post

The most common typo I had to correct after my viva were the places I had not noticed “the the”.

This was also the most annoying correction I had to make! I didn’t spot the ten or twelve instances I had missed while I was proofreading my thesis. I also didn’t spot the places where I had typed “a the” as well, which was more than once but thankfully fewer than “the the”.

“the the” was enough.

Some typos are hard to spot. They’re annoying because they get in the way.

Thankfully they don’t get in the way too much. And thankfully they can be altered before a thesis goes into the archives forever.

Whatever your corrections, whether it’s many cases of the “the the”s or 101 typos and small edits, look on them as a helpful opportunity to make your thesis a little bit better, forever.

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