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Tag: emergency

Nathan

Sudden Problems

Daily Post

A week before submission you find that a section in your thesis is missing something important. What do you do?

Two weeks before your viva you learn that one of your examiners is cancelling. What do you do?

The day before your viva you find a big mistake in your thesis – you know what the correction is but you can’t change it now. What do you do?

Thirty minutes into your viva you are shaken by a question you’ve never considered before. What do you do?

 

These situations aren’t equivalent to each other. Impact and context matters. In some cases you can ask for help directly: for example, if your examiner cancelled that could be very stressful but it wouldn’t be your situation to resolve alone.

More than anything for any sudden problems the best advice I could offer is to stop: pause and breathe and get past any panic.

What can you do? Before you decide what you will do, think about what your options might be. Can you ask for help from someone? Have you faced a situation like this before? As stressful as it might immediately feel what is the real impact?

What can you do – then what will you do?

You have to do something but you don’t have to do the first thing that comes to mind when you’re experiencing the stress of a sudden problem. Pause and breathe then consider your options.

Nathan

Crisis

Daily Post

It feels like something big and earth-shattering has happened at least every few weeks for the last couple of years. The news starts to settle and something else comes up to disturb the peace.

This doesn’t have to be on a global or national scale either. In your daily life you can be upset and off-balance simply because the train is late, you catch a cold or you get sad news. Your short- and medium-term plans can be knocked to one side by somebody else’s change of plans or a sudden change of circumstances.

As you prepare for your viva, take a few small steps to help yourself just in case something was to go a little bit wrong:

  • Find and save emergency contact details for a member of staff who could help (if you had to postpone or an examiner cancelled, for example).
  • Plan your viva preparation with “wiggle room” – in case something disruptive happens.
  • Make as many decisions in advance as you can: what you’ll wear for the viva, what you need to have with you, what you will do on the morning of your viva day.

Build as much certainty as you can and take out small steps to guard against crisis and disruption.

Everything will be alright with your viva, but it might not all be exactly as you imagine or plan!

Nathan

Emergency!!!

Daily Post

An examiner cancels with short notice.

Someone involved gets sick.

Technology fails on the day.

You can’t account for every possible viva emergency in advance or have insurance policies against every worst case scenario, but simple things can really help.

  • Find out who the go-to person is at your Graduate School for helping PhD candidates, and get their name and contact details written on a Post-it Note.
  • Check the regulations for the viva, and requirements for video vivas. Check the technology, have test runs with friends and explore other options.
  • If your viva is over video, find out who you can contact if you do have problems (in case there is no in-person line of communication at the time you have your viva).

A viva Emergency!!! has to be figured out, but some of the work and stress can be reduced with a little early thought. You can do nothing now and choose to panic if something bad happens, or invest a little time now to thwart any unexpected situations later.

(and often the little time and thought now usually helps with non-emergency aspects too!)